<channel>
<title>Petter Reinholdtsen - Entries from May 2020</title>
<description>Entries from May 2020</description>
- <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/</link>
+ <link>https://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/</link>
+ <item>
+ <title>More reliable vlc bittorrent plugin in Debian (version 2.9)</title>
+ <link>https://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_reliable_vlc_bittorrent_plugin_in_Debian__version_2_9_.html</link>
+ <guid isPermaLink="true">https://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_reliable_vlc_bittorrent_plugin_in_Debian__version_2_9_.html</guid>
+ <pubDate>Sun, 24 May 2020 17:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
+ <description><p>I am very happy to report that a more reliable
+<a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/vlc-plugin-bittorrent">VLC
+bittorrent plugin</a> was just uploaded into debian. This fixes a
+couple of crash bugs in the plugin, hopefully making the VLC
+experience even better when streaming directly from a bittorrent
+source. The package is currently in Debian unstable, but should be
+available in Debian testing in two days. To test it, simply install
+it like this:</p>
+
+<p><pre>
+apt install vlc-plugin-bittorrent
+</pre></p>
+
+<p>After it is installed, you can try to use it to play a file
+downloaded live via bittorrent like this:
+
+<p><pre>
+vlc https://archive.org/download/Glass_201703/Glass_201703_archive.torrent
+</pre></p>
+
+<p>It also support magnet links and local .torrent files.</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">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
+</description>
+ </item>
+
+ <item>
+ <title>Debian Edu interview: Yvan Masson</title>
+ <link>https://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Yvan_Masson.html</link>
+ <guid isPermaLink="true">https://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Yvan_Masson.html</guid>
+ <pubDate>Tue, 12 May 2020 06:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
+ <description><p>It has been way too long since my last interview, but as the
+<a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>
+community is still active, and new people keep showing up on the IRC
+channel <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-edu">#debian-edu</a> and
+<a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/">the debian-edu mailing
+list</a>, I decided to give it another go. I was hoping someone else
+might pick up the idea and run with it, but this has not happened as
+far as I can tell, so here we are… This time the announcement of a new
+free software tool to
+<a href="https://framagit.org/Yvan-Masson/WhosWho">create a school year
+book</a> triggered my interest, and I decided to learn more about its
+author.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
+
+<p>My name is Yvan MASSON, I live in France. I have my own one person
+business in computer services. The work consist of visiting my
+customers (person's home, local authority, small business) to give
+advise, install computers and software, fix issues, and provide
+computing usage training. I spend the rest of my time enjoying my
+family and promoting free software.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What is your approach for promoting free
+software?</strong></p>
+
+<p>When I think that free software could be suitable for someone, I
+explain what it is, with simple words, give a few known examples, and
+explain that while there is no fee it is a viable alternative in many
+situations. Most people are receptive when you explain how it is
+better (I simplify arguments here, I know that it is not so simple):
+Linux works on older hardware, there are no viruses, and the software
+can be audited to ensure user is not spied upon. I think the most
+important is to keep a clear but moderated speech: when you try to
+convince too much, people feel attacked and stop listening.</p>
+
+<p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
+project?</strong></p>
+
+<p>I can not remember how I first heard of Skolelinux / Debian Edu,
+but probably on planet.debian.org. As I have been working for a
+school, I have interest in this type of project.
+
+<p>The school I am involved in is a school for "children" between 14
+and 18 years old. The French government has recommended free software
+since 2012, but they do not always use free software themselves. The
+school computers are still using the Windows operating system, but all
+of them have the classic set of free software: Firefox ESR,
+LibreOffice (with the excellent extension Grammalecte that indicates
+French grammatical errors), SumatraPDF, Audacity, 7zip, KeePass2, VLC,
+GIMP, Inkscape…
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>It is free software! Built on Debian, I am sure that users are not
+spied upon, and that it can run on low end hardware. This last point
+is very important, because we really need to improve "green IT". I do
+not know enough about Skolelinux / Debian Edu to tell how it is better
+than another free software solution, but what I like is the "all in
+one" solution: everything has been thought of and prepared to ease
+installation and usage.</p>
+
+<p>I like Free Software because I hate using something that I can not
+understand. I do not say that I can understand everything nor that I
+want to understand everything, but knowing that someone / some company
+intentionally prevents me from understanding how things work is really
+unacceptable to me.</p>
+
+<p>Secondly, and more importantly, free software is a requirement to
+prevent abuses regarding human rights and environmental care.
+Humanity can not rely on tools that are in the hands of small group of
+people.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Again, I don't know this project enough. Maybe a dedicated website?
+Debian wiki works well for documentation, but is not very appealing to
+someone discovering the project. Also, as Skolelinux / Debian Edu uses
+OpenLDAP, it probably means that Windows workstations cannot use
+centralized authentication. Maybe the project could use Samba as an
+Active Directory domain controller instead, allowing Windows desktop
+usage when necessary.</p>
+
+<p>(Editors note: In fact Windows workstations can
+<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Buster/HowTo/Samba">use
+the centralized authentication in a Debian Edu setup</a>, at least for
+some versions of Windows, but the fact that this is not well known can
+be seen as an indication of the need for better documentation and
+marketing. :)</p>
+
+<p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Nothing original: Debian testing/sid with Gnome desktop, Firefox,
+Thunderbird, LibreOffice…</p>
+
+<p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
+get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Every effort to spread free software into schools is important,
+whatever it is. But I think, at least where I live, that IT
+professionals maintaining schools networks are still very "Microsoft
+centric". Schools will use any working solution, but they need people
+to install and maintain it. How to make these professionals sensitive
+about free software and train them with solutions like Debian Edu /
+Skolelinux is a really good question :-)</p>
+</description>
+ </item>
+
<item>
<title>Jami as a Zoom client, a trick for password protected rooms...</title>
- <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Jami_as_a_Zoom_client__a_trick_for_password_protected_rooms___.html</link>
- <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Jami_as_a_Zoom_client__a_trick_for_password_protected_rooms___.html</guid>
+ <link>https://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Jami_as_a_Zoom_client__a_trick_for_password_protected_rooms___.html</link>
+ <guid isPermaLink="true">https://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Jami_as_a_Zoom_client__a_trick_for_password_protected_rooms___.html</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 8 May 2020 13:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
<description><p>Half a year ago,
<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Jami_Ring__finally_functioning_peer_to_peer_communication_client.html">I
password set on the room. The Jami daemon leak memory like crazy
(approximately 1 GiB a minute) when I am connected to the video
conference, so I had to restart the client every 7-10 minutes, which
-is not a great. I tried to get other SIP Linux clients to work
+is not great. I tried to get other SIP Linux clients to work
without success, so I decided I would have to live with this wart
until someone managed to fix the leak in the dring code base. But
another problem showed up once the rooms were password protected. I
consist of the room ID (a number), an @ character and the IP address
of the Zoom SIP gateway. But Zoom understand a lot more than just the
room ID in front of the at sign. The format is "<tt>[Meeting
-ID].[Password].[Layout].[Host Key]</tt>", and you can hear see how you
+ID].[Password].[Layout].[Host Key]</tt>", and you can here see how you
can both enter password, control the layout (full screen, active
presence and gallery) and specify the host key to start the meeting.
The full SIP address entered into Jami to provide the password will
projects / homepage.git / blobdiff