X-Git-Url: http://pere.pagekite.me/gitweb/homepage.git/blobdiff_plain/24da44ee1a578509baf0dc45dfa6c243af983075..dbc8873e70bf8b522959bcb7a7a42b9f1d83d528:/blog/index.html diff --git a/blog/index.html b/blog/index.html index c7aecc7cb5..4bba4c119a 100644 --- a/blog/index.html +++ b/blog/index.html @@ -20,192 +20,38 @@
-
First Jessie based Debian Edu released (alpha0)
-
27th October 2014
-

I am happy to report that I on behalf of the Debian Edu team just -sent out -this -announcement:

- -
-The Debian Edu Team is pleased to announce the release of Debian Edu
-Jessie 8.0+edu0~alpha0
-
-Debian Edu is a complete operating system for schools. Through its
-various installation profiles you can install servers, workstations
-and laptops which will work together on the school network. With
-Debian Edu, the teachers themselves or their technical support can
-roll out a complete multi-user multi-machine study environment within
-hours or a few days. Debian Edu comes with hundreds of applications
-pre-installed, but you can always add more packages from Debian.
-
-For those who want to give Debian Edu Jessie a try, download and
-installation instructions are available, including detailed
-instructions in the manual[1] explaining the first steps, such as
-setting up a network or adding users. Please note that the password
-for the user your prompted for during installation must have a length
-of at least 5 characters!
-
- [1] <URL: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie >
-
-Would you like to give your school's computer a longer life? Are you
-tired of sneaker administration, running from computer to computer
-reinstalling the operating system? Would you like to administrate all
-the computers in your school using only a couple of hours every week?
-Check out Debian Edu Jessie!
-
-Skolelinux is used by at least two hundred schools all over the world,
-mostly in Germany and Norway.
-
-About Debian Edu and Skolelinux
-===============================
-
-Debian Edu, also known as Skolelinux[2], 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 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 more than 60 educational software
-packages[3] and more are available from the Debian archive, and
-schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE, Xfce and MATE desktop
-environment.
-
- [2] <URL: http://www.skolelinux.org/ >
- [3] <URL: http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html >
-
-Full release notes and manual
-=============================
-
-Below the download URLs there is a list of some of the new features
-and bugfixes of Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie. The full
-list is part of the manual. (See the feature list in the manual[4] for
-the English version.) For some languages manual translations are
-available, see the manual translation overview[5].
-
- [4] <URL: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/Features >
- [5] <URL: http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/ >
-
-Where to get it
----------------
-
-To download the multiarch netinstall CD release (624 MiB) you can use
-
- * ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso
- * http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso
- * rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso .
-
-The SHA1SUM of this image is: 361188818e036ce67280a572f757de82ebfeb095
-
-New features for Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie released 2014-10-27
-===============================================================================
-
-
-Installation changes
---------------------
-
- * PXE installation now installs firmware automatically for the hardware present.
-
-Software updates
-----------------
-
-Everything which is new in Debian Jessie 8.0, eg:
-
- * Linux kernel 3.16.x
- * Desktop environments KDE "Plasma" 4.11.12, GNOME 3.14, Xfce 4.10,
-   LXDE 0.5.6 and MATE 1.8 (KDE "Plasma" is installed by default; to
-   choose one of the others see manual.)
- * the browsers Iceweasel 31 ESR and Chromium 38 
- * !LibreOffice 4.3.3
- * GOsa 2.7.4
- * LTSP 5.5.4
- * CUPS print system 1.7.5
- * new boot framework: systemd
- * Educational toolbox GCompris 14.07 
- * Music creator Rosegarden 14.02
- * Image editor Gimp 2.8.14
- * Virtual stargazer Stellarium 0.13.0
- * golearn 0.9
- * tuxpaint 0.9.22
- * New version of debian-installer from Debian Jessie.
- * Debian Jessie includes about 42000 packages available for
-   installation.
- * More information about Debian Jessie 8.0 is provided in the release
-   notes[6] and the installation manual[7].
-
- [6] <URL: http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes >
- [7] <URL: http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual >
-
-Fixed bugs
-----------
-
- * Inserting incorrect DNS information in Gosa will no longer break
-   DNS completely, but instead stop DNS updates until the incorrect
-   information is corrected (Debian bug #710362)
- * and many others.
-
-Documentation and translation updates
-------------------------------------- 
-
- * The Debian Edu Jessie Manual is fully translated to German, French,
-   Italian, Danish and Dutch. Partly translated versions exist for
-   Norwegian Bokmal and Spanish.
-
-Other changes
--------------
-
- * Due to new Squid settings, powering off or rebooting the main
-   server takes more time.
- * To manage printers localhost:631 has to be used, currently www:631
-   doesn't work.
-
-Regressions / known problems
-----------------------------
-
- * Installing LTSP chroot fails with a bug related to eatmydata about
-   exim4-config failing to run its postinst (see Debian bug #765694
-   and Debian bug #762103).
- * Munin collection is not properly configured on clients (Debian bug
-   #764594).  The fix is available in a newer version of munin-node.
- * PXE setup for Main Server and Thin Client Server setup does not
-   work when installing on a machine without direct Internet access.
-   Will be fixed when Debian bug #766960 is fixed in Jessie.
-
-See the status page[8] for the complete list.
-
- [8] <URL: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie >
-
-How to report bugs
-------------------
-
-<URL: http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs >
-
-About Debian
-============
-
-The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly
-free community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of
-the largest and most influential open source projects. Thousands of
-volunteers from all over the world work together to create and
-maintain Debian software. Available in 70 languages, and supporting a
-huge range of computer types, Debian calls itself the universal
-operating system.
-
-Contact Information
-For further information, please visit the Debian web pages[9] or send
-mail to press@debian.org.
-
- [9] <URL: http://www.debian.org/ >
-
+
Mimes brønn, norsk utgave av Alaveteli / WhatDoTheyKnow, endelig lansert
+
9th July 2015
+

I går fikk vi endelig lansert en norsk version av mySocietys +WhatDoTheyKnow. +Tjenesten heter Mimes brønn, og ble +annonsert +av NUUG via blog, epost og twitter til NUUG-assosierte personer. +Det har tatt noen år, men de siste dagene fikk vi endelig tid til å få +på plass de siste bitene. Vi er to, Gorm og meg selv, som har vært +primus motor for det hele, men vi har fått hjelp med oversettelser og +oppsett fra mange flere. Jeg vil si tusen takk til hver og en av dem, +og er veldig fornøyd med at vi klarte å få tjenesten opp å kjøre før +ferietiden slo inn for fullt.

+ +

Vi er usikker på hvor mye belastning den virtuelle maskinen der +tjenesten kjører klarer, så vi har lansert litt i det stille og ikke +til for mange folk for å se hvordan maskinen klarer seg over sommeren, +før vi går mer aktivt ut og annonserer til høsten. Ta en titt, og se +om du kanskje har et spørsmål til det offentlige som er egnet å sende +inn via Mimes brønn.

+ +

Hvis du lurer på hva i alle dager en slik tjenestes kan brukes til, +anbefaler jeg deg å se +TED-foredraget til +Heather Brook om hvordan hun brukte WhatDoTheyKnow til å lære +hvordan offentlige midler ble misbrukt. Det er en inspirerende +historie.

- Tags: debian edu, english. + Tags: norsk, nuug, offentlig innsyn.
@@ -213,32 +59,268 @@ mail to press@debian.org.
-
I spent last weekend recording MakerCon Nordic
-
23rd October 2014
-

I spent last weekend at Makercon -Nordic, a great conference and workshop for makers in Norway and -the surrounding countries. I had volunteered on behalf of the -Norwegian Unix Users Group (NUUG) to video record the talks, and we -had a great and exhausting time recording the entire day, two days in -a row. There were only two of us, Hans-Petter and me, and we used the -regular video equipment for NUUG, with a -dvswitch, a -camera and a VGA to DV convert box, and mixed video and slides -live.

- -

Hans-Petter did the post-processing, consisting of uploading the -around 180 GiB of raw video to Youtube, and the result is -now becoming -public on the MakerConNordic account. The videos have the license -NUUG always use on our recordings, which is -Creative -Commons Navngivelse-Del på samme vilkår 3.0 Norge. Many great -talks available. Check it out! :)

+
MPEG LA on "Internet Broadcast AVC Video" licensing and non-private use
+
7th July 2015
+

After asking the Norwegian Broadcasting Company (NRK) +why +they can broadcast and stream H.264 video without an agreement with +the MPEG LA, I was wiser, but still confused. So I asked MPEG LA +if their understanding matched that of NRK. As far as I can tell, it +does not.

+ +

I started by asking for more information about the various +licensing classes and what exactly is covered by the "Internet +Broadcast AVC Video" class that NRK pointed me at to explain why NRK +did not need a license for streaming H.264 video: + +

+ +

According to +a +MPEG LA press release dated 2010-02-02, there is no charge when +using MPEG AVC/H.264 according to the terms of "Internet Broadcast AVC +Video". I am trying to understand exactly what the terms of "Internet +Broadcast AVC Video" is, and wondered if you could help me. What +exactly is covered by these terms, and what is not?

+ +

The only source of more information I have been able to find is a +PDF named +AVC +Patent Portfolio License Briefing, which states this about the +fees:

+ +
    +
  • Where End User pays for AVC Video +
      +
    • Subscription (not limited by title) – 100,000 or fewer + subscribers/yr = no royalty; > 100,000 to 250,000 subscribers/yr = + $25,000; >250,000 to 500,000 subscribers/yr = $50,000; >500,000 to + 1M subscribers/yr = $75,000; >1M subscribers/yr = $100,000
      • + +
    • Title-by-Title - 12 minutes or less = no royalty; >12 minutes in + length = lower of (a) 2% or (b) $0.02 per title
      • +
    • + +
  • Where remuneration is from other sources +
      +
    • Free Television - (a) one-time $2,500 per transmission encoder or + (b) annual fee starting at $2,500 for > 100,000 HH rising to + maximum $10,000 for >1,000,000 HH
      • + +
    • Internet Broadcast AVC Video (not title-by-title, not subscription) + – no royalty for life of the AVC Patent Portfolio License
      • +
    • +
+ +

Am I correct in assuming that the four categories listed is the +categories used when selecting licensing terms, and that "Internet +Broadcast AVC Video" is the category for things that do not fall into +one of the other three categories? Can you point me to a good source +explaining what is ment by "title-by-title" and "Free Television" in +the license terms for AVC/H.264?

+ +

Will a web service providing H.264 encoded video content in a +"video on demand" fashing similar to Youtube and Vimeo, where no +subscription is required and no payment is required from end users to +get access to the videos, fall under the terms of the "Internet +Broadcast AVC Video", ie no royalty for life of the AVC Patent +Portfolio license? Does it matter if some users are subscribed to get +access to personalized services?

+ +

Note, this request and all answers will be published on the +Internet.

+

+ +

The answer came quickly from Benjamin J. Myers, Licensing Associate +with the MPEG LA:

+ +

+

Thank you for your message and for your interest in MPEG LA. We +appreciate hearing from you and I will be happy to assist you.

+ +

As you are aware, MPEG LA offers our AVC Patent Portfolio License +which provides coverage under patents that are essential for use of +the AVC/H.264 Standard (MPEG-4 Part 10). Specifically, coverage is +provided for end products and video content that make use of AVC/H.264 +technology. Accordingly, the party offering such end products and +video to End Users concludes the AVC License and is responsible for +paying the applicable royalties.

+ +

Regarding Internet Broadcast AVC Video, the AVC License generally +defines such content to be video that is distributed to End Users over +the Internet free-of-charge. Therefore, if a party offers a service +which allows users to upload AVC/H.264 video to its website, and such +AVC Video is delivered to End Users for free, then such video would +receive coverage under the sublicense for Internet Broadcast AVC +Video, which is not subject to any royalties for the life of the AVC +License. This would also apply in the scenario where a user creates a +free online account in order to receive a customized offering of free +AVC Video content. In other words, as long as the End User is given +access to or views AVC Video content at no cost to the End User, then +no royalties would be payable under our AVC License.

+ +

On the other hand, if End Users pay for access to AVC Video for a +specific period of time (e.g., one month, one year, etc.), then such +video would constitute Subscription AVC Video. In cases where AVC +Video is delivered to End Users on a pay-per-view basis, then such +content would constitute Title-by-Title AVC Video. If a party offers +Subscription or Title-by-Title AVC Video to End Users, then they would +be responsible for paying the applicable royalties you noted below.

+ +

Finally, in the case where AVC Video is distributed for free +through an "over-the-air, satellite and/or cable transmission", then +such content would constitute Free Television AVC Video and would be +subject to the applicable royalties.

+ +

For your reference, I have attached +a +.pdf copy of the AVC License. You will find the relevant +sublicense information regarding AVC Video in Sections 2.2 through +2.5, and the corresponding royalties in Section 3.1.2 through 3.1.4. +You will also find the definitions of Title-by-Title AVC Video, +Subscription AVC Video, Free Television AVC Video, and Internet +Broadcast AVC Video in Section 1 of the License. Please note that the +electronic copy is provided for informational purposes only and cannot +be used for execution.

+ +

I hope the above information is helpful. If you have additional +questions or need further assistance with the AVC License, please feel +free to contact me directly.

+

+ +

Having a fresh copy of the license text was useful, and knowing +that the definition of Title-by-Title required payment per title made +me aware that my earlier understanding of that phrase had been wrong. +But I still had a few questions:

+ +

+

I have a small followup question. Would it be possible for me to get +a license with MPEG LA even if there are no royalties to be paid? The +reason I ask, is that some video related products have a copyright +clause limiting their use without a license with MPEG LA. The clauses +typically look similar to this: + +

+ This product is licensed under the AVC patent portfolio license for + the personal and non-commercial use of a consumer to (a) encode + video in compliance with the AVC standard ("AVC video") and/or (b) + decode AVC video that was encoded by a consumer engaged in a + personal and non-commercial activity and/or AVC video that was + obtained from a video provider licensed to provide AVC video. No + license is granted or shall be implied for any other use. additional + information may be obtained from MPEG LA L.L.C. +

+ +

It is unclear to me if this clause mean that I need to enter into +an agreement with MPEG LA to use the product in question, even if +there are no royalties to be paid to MPEG LA. I suspect it will +differ depending on the jurisdiction, and mine is Norway. What is +MPEG LAs view on this?

+

+ +

According to the answer, MPEG LA believe those using such tools for +non-personal or commercial use need a license with them:

+ +

+ +

With regard to the Notice to Customers, I would like to begin by +clarifying that the Notice from Section 7.1 of the AVC License +reads:

+ +

THIS PRODUCT IS LICENSED UNDER THE AVC PATENT PORTFOLIO LICENSE FOR +THE PERSONAL USE OF A CONSUMER OR OTHER USES IN WHICH IT DOES NOT +RECEIVE REMUNERATION TO (i) ENCODE VIDEO IN COMPLIANCE WITH THE AVC +STANDARD ("AVC VIDEO") AND/OR (ii) DECODE AVC VIDEO THAT WAS ENCODED +BY A CONSUMER ENGAGED IN A PERSONAL ACTIVITY AND/OR WAS OBTAINED FROM +A VIDEO PROVIDER LICENSED TO PROVIDE AVC VIDEO. NO LICENSE IS GRANTED +OR SHALL BE IMPLIED FOR ANY OTHER USE. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION MAY BE +OBTAINED FROM MPEG LA, L.L.C. SEE HTTP://WWW.MPEGLA.COM

+ +

The Notice to Customers is intended to inform End Users of the +personal usage rights (for example, to watch video content) included +with the product they purchased, and to encourage any party using the +product for commercial purposes to contact MPEG LA in order to become +licensed for such use (for example, when they use an AVC Product to +deliver Title-by-Title, Subscription, Free Television or Internet +Broadcast AVC Video to End Users, or to re-Sell a third party's AVC +Product as their own branded AVC Product).

+ +

Therefore, if a party is to be licensed for its use of an AVC +Product to Sell AVC Video on a Title-by-Title, Subscription, Free +Television or Internet Broadcast basis, that party would need to +conclude the AVC License, even in the case where no royalties were +payable under the License. On the other hand, if that party (either a +Consumer or business customer) simply uses an AVC Product for their +own internal purposes and not for the commercial purposes referenced +above, then such use would be included in the royalty paid for the AVC +Products by the licensed supplier.

+ +

Finally, I note that our AVC License provides worldwide coverage in +countries that have AVC Patent Portfolio Patents, including +Norway.

+ +

I hope this clarification is helpful. If I may be of any further +assistance, just let me know.

+

+ +

The mentioning of Norwegian patents made me a bit confused, so I +asked for more information:

+ +

+ +

But one minor question at the end. If I understand you correctly, +you state in the quote above that there are patents in the AVC Patent +Portfolio that are valid in Norway. This make me believe I read the +list available from <URL: +http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/PatentList.aspx +> incorrectly, as I believed the "NO" prefix in front of patents +were Norwegian patents, and the only one I could find under Mitsubishi +Electric Corporation expired in 2012. Which patents are you referring +to that are relevant for Norway?

+ +

+ +

Again, the quick answer explained how to read the list of patents +in that list:

+ +

+ +

Your understanding is correct that the last AVC Patent Portfolio +Patent in Norway expired on 21 October 2012. Therefore, where AVC +Video is both made and Sold in Norway after that date, then no +royalties would be payable for such AVC Video under the AVC License. +With that said, our AVC License provides historic coverage for AVC +Products and AVC Video that may have been manufactured or Sold before +the last Norwegian AVC patent expired. I would also like to clarify +that coverage is provided for the country of manufacture and the +country of Sale that has active AVC Patent Portfolio Patents.

+ +

Therefore, if a party offers AVC Products or AVC Video for Sale in +a country with active AVC Patent Portfolio Patents (for example, +Sweden, Denmark, Finland, etc.), then that party would still need +coverage under the AVC License even if such products or video are +initially made in a country without active AVC Patent Portfolio +Patents (for example, Norway). Similarly, a party would need to +conclude the AVC License if they make AVC Products or AVC Video in a +country with active AVC Patent Portfolio Patents, but eventually Sell +such AVC Products or AVC Video in a country without active AVC Patent +Portfolio Patents.

+

+ +

As far as I understand it, MPEG LA believe anyone using Adobe +Premiere and other video related software with a H.264 distribution +license need a license agreement with MPEG LA to use such tools for +anything non-private or commercial, while it is OK to set up a +Youtube-like service as long as no-one pays to get access to the +content. I still have no clear idea how this applies to Norway, where +none of the patents MPEG LA is licensing are valid. Will the +copyright terms take precedence or can those terms be ignored because +the patents are not valid in Norway?

- Tags: english, nuug, video. + Tags: english, h264, multimedia, opphavsrett, standard, video, web.
@@ -246,91 +328,57 @@ talks available. Check it out! :)

-
listadmin, the quick way to moderate mailman lists - nice free software
-
22nd October 2014
-

If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on -alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to -operate. First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password -and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate -and various options for each email address. This take a while for -every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good -job as a list moderator. But there is a quick alternative, -the -listadmin program. It allow you to check lists for new messages -to moderate in a fraction of a second. Here is a test run on two -lists I recently took over:

- -

-% time listadmin xiph
-fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
-fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
-
-real    0m1.709s
-user    0m0.232s
-sys     0m0.012s
-%
-

- -

In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that -there are no message in the moderation queue. Every morning I -currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two -minutes. When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days -ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue. It took me -less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin -program.

- -

If you install -the listadmin -package from Debian and create a file ~/.listadmin.ini -with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:

- -

-username username@example.org
-spamlevel 23
-default discard
-discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
-
-password secret
-adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
-mailman-list@lists.example.com
-
-password hidden
-other-list@otherserver.example.org
-

- -

There are other options to set as well. Check the manual page to -learn the details.

- -

If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where -the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a -generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment -variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:

- -

-PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
-

- -

If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you -can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the -initial screen dump (the xiph argument). Using an argument, only -lists matching the argument string will be processed. This make it -quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your -email.

- -

Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68 -mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the -process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of -time I could spend elsewhere over the years. It truly is nice free -software.

- -

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my -activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address -15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

- -

Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in -configuration example. Also, I've been told that the -PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone. Not -sure why.

+
New laptop - some more clues and ideas based on feedback
+
5th July 2015
+

Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my +need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback. I wish to +thank every one of these. Several pointed me to the possibility of +fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to +do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the +machine. But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it +with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live +for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement. If I did +not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts +using FrancEcrans, but it +might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.

+ +

One tip I got was to use the +Skinflint web service to +compare laptop models. It seem to have more models available than +prisjakt.no. Another tip I got from someone I know have similar +keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not +very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook +keyboards I tested. Because of this, I will not consider it any further. + +

When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the +newest Thinkpad X model. The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons +(which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with +Debian Sid/Unstable according to +Corsac.net. The reports I +got on the keyboard quality are not consistent. Some say the keyboard +is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good. +Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250 +keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I +keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to +replace it. I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk +activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230. I'm +also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit +noisy. In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian +Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.

+ +

I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was +Pro-Star, another was +Libreboot. +The latter look very attractive to me.

+ +

Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback. It help a lot +as I keep looking for a replacement.

+ +

Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the +lapstore.de web shop for used laptops. They got several +different +old +thinkpad X models, and provide one year warranty.

@@ -343,114 +391,38 @@ sure why.

-
Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation
-
17th October 2014
-

When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the -problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly. -And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian. -Normally something more is needed. But thanks to -my isenkram -package and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy -to do this using simple preseeding.

- -

The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install -firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by -the kernel modules for the hardware). (It can also install user space -programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus -of this story.)

- -

To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding -values are needed. First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed -into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed -in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system. This is done by -preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the -isenkram-cli package. The package name is next passed to debootstrap -for installation. With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel -will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific -packages for the machine being installed and install them, because -isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.

- -

Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because -most firmware unfortunately is non-free. This is done by preseeding -the apt-mirror-setup step. This is unfortunate, but for a lot of -hardware it is the only option in Debian.

- -

The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get -firmware installed automatically by the installer:

- -

-base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
-apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
-

- -

The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install -both firmware and user space packages when using this method. It also -do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later. Installing both -firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you -want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware -and one for user space programs. The firmware task is enabled by -default, while the one for user space programs is not. This split is -implemented in the package currently in unstable.

- -

If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how -this recipe work for you. :)

- -

So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work. First and -foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever -files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/. So the -isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find. First there -is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):

- -

-Task: isenkram-packages
-Section: hardware
-Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
- Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
- proposed.
-Test-new-install: show show
-Relevance: 8
-Packages: for-current-hardware
-
-Task: isenkram-firmware
-Section: hardware
-Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
- Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
- packages are proposed.
-Test-new-install: mark show
-Relevance: 8
-Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
-

- -

The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task -should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in -/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/. The scripts use other scripts to get a -list of packages to install. The for-current-hardware-firmware script -look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine: - -

-#!/bin/sh
-#
-PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
-export PATH
-isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
-

- -

With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by -tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)

- -

If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is -installed, run DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test ---new-install to get the list of packages that tasksel would -install.

- -

Debian Edu will be -pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to -install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.

+
Time to find a new laptop, as the old one is broken after only two years
+
3rd July 2015
+

My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a +replacement soon. The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230 +started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken +cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the +flickering.

+ +

My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is +still as +I +described them in 2013. The last time I bought a laptop, I had +good help from +prisjakt.no +where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin, +wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually. Three button mouse +and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three +laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and +G2) lack three mouse buttons). It is also unclear to me how good the +keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are. I hope Lenovo have not messed up +the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have +deteriorated since X41.

+ +

I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options +seem sensible to me? Are there better services around to search the +set of available laptops for features? Please send me an email if you +have suggestions.

- Tags: debian, english, isenkram, sysadmin. + Tags: debian, english.
@@ -458,23 +430,82 @@ install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.

-
Ubuntu used to show the bread prizes at ICA Storo
-
4th October 2014
-

Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen. Above the -bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu -with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck -on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:

- -

- -

If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known -about this hidden Linux installation. It is interesting what -errors can reveal.

+
MakerCon Nordic videos now available on Frikanalen
+
2nd July 2015
+

Last oktober I was involved on behalf of +NUUG with recording the talks at +MakerCon Nordic, a conference for +the Maker movement. Since then it has been the plan to publish the +recordings on Frikanalen, which +finally happened the last few days. A few talks are missing because +the speakers asked the organizers to not publish them, but most of the +talks are available. The talks are being broadcasted on RiksTV +channel 50 and using multicast on Uninett, as well as being available +from the Frikanalen web site. The unedited recordings are +available on +Youtube too.

+ +

This is the list of talks available at the moment. Visit the +Frikanalen video +pages to view them.

+ +
    + +
  • Evolutionary algorithms as a design tool - from art + to robotics (Kyrre Glette)
    • + +
  • Make and break (Hans Gerhard Meier)
    • + +
  • Making a one year school course for young makers + (Olav Helland)
    • + +
  • Innovation Inspiration - IPR Databases as a Source of + Inspiration (Hege Langlo)
    • + +
  • Making a toy for makers (Erik Torstensson)
    • + +
  • How to make 3D printer electronics (Elias Bakken)
    • + +
  • Hovering Clouds: Looking at online tool offerings for Product + Design and 3D Printing (William Kempton)
    • + +
  • Travelling maker stories (Øyvind Nydal Dahl)
    • + +
  • Making the first Maker Faire in Sweden (Nils Olander)
    • + +
  • Breaking the mold: Printing 1000’s of parts (Espen Sivertsen)
    • + +
  • Ultimaker — and open source 3D printing (Erik de Bruijn)
    • + +
  • Autodesk’s 3D Printing Platform: Sparking innovation (Hilde + Sevens)
    • + +
  • How Making is Changing the World – and How You Can Too! + (Jennifer Turliuk)
    • + +
  • Open-Source Adventuring: OpenROV, OpenExplorer and the Future of + Connected Exploration (David Lang)
    • + +
  • Making in Norway (Haakon Karlsen Jr., Graham Hayward and Jens + Dyvik)
    • + +
  • The Impact of the Maker Movement (Mike Senese)
    • + +
+ +

Part of the reason this took so long was that the scripts NUUG had +to prepare a recording for publication were five years old and no +longer worked with the current video processing tools (command line +argument changes). In addition, we needed better audio normalization, +which sent me on a detour to +package +bs1770gain for Debian. Now this is in place and it became a lot +easier to publish NUUG videos on Frikanalen.

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: english, frikanalen, multimedia, video.
@@ -482,49 +513,125 @@ about this hidden Linux installation. It is interesting what
-
New lsdvd release version 0.17 is ready
-
4th October 2014
-

The lsdvd project -got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original -developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood. -This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve -Dibb.

- -

I just wrapped up -a -new lsdvd release, available in git or from -the -download page. This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version -0.17.

+
Hvem fører Medietilsynet tilsyn med?
+
28th June 2015
+

I en global verden med eierskap på tvers, trengs det informasjon om +hvem som har kontrollen i selskaper og bedrifter. Og for å få tilgang +til slik informasjon for alle som ønsker å analysere eierskap, holder +med ikke med nasjonale databaser over eierskap, det må globale +samledatabaser med åpne data til. Heldigvis finnes det en +internasjonal bevegelse for å gjøre selskapsinformasjon for alle land +offentlig tilgjengelig. En slik database heter +OpenCorporates, der +informasjonen er gratis tilgjengelig med en "del på samme +vilkår"-lisens. De samler inn selskapsinformasjon, eierskap, +konsesjonstildelinger og lignende. De manglet ganske mye for Norge, +da bruksvilkårene til Norsk offentlig informasjon i stor grad +blokkerer OpenCorporates fra å samle den inn.

+ +

Men jeg er jo involvert i +Frikanalen, som har +TV-konsesjon, og tenkte det kunne være fint om informasjon om alle +mediakonsesjoner var tilgjengelig i OpenCorporates, så jeg sendte +avgårde følgende spørsmål til Medietilsynet 2015-06-22:

+ +
+

Hei. Finnes det en oversikt over enhetene som Mediatilsynet fører +tilsyn med som åpne data? Jeg lette etter den på +<URL:http://data.norge.no/> og +<URL:http://hotell.difi.no/> uten å +finne noe der, og fant heller ikke noe under +<URL:http://www.medietilsynet.no/>.

+ +

Jeg tenker på alle som har fått kringkastingskonsesjon og alle som +er omtalt under +<URL:http://www.medietilsynet.no/mediebildet/>.

+ +

Jeg skulle gjerne hatt dette maskinlesbart, og inkludert +organisasjonsnummer og hva slags forhold mediatilsynet har til +organisasjonene. Tanken er å importere det i +<URL:https://opencorporates.com/> for analyse, så det bør ikke ha +bruksbegresninger som gjør dette umulig.

+
+ +

To dager senere fikk jeg svar, med de datasettene de hadde +tilgjengelig. Svaret fra Hanne Sekkelsten hos Medietilsynet var +informativt og imøtekommende.

+ +
+

Vi viser til din e-post av 22. juni, der du ber om å få tilsendt oversikter +over aktører Medietilsynet fører tilsyn med.

+ +

Medietilsynet fører tilsyn med kringkastere og audiovisuelle +bestillingstjenester som omfattes av kringkastingsloven, og med +eierskap i aviser, fjernsyn radio og elektroniske medier etter +medieeierskapsloven. I tillegg vil Medietilsynet etter at +beskyttelsesloven trer i kraft fra 1. juli ha tilsyn med en rekke nye +aktører. Nærmere informasjon om den nye loven finnes på Medietilsynets +nettsted, her: +http://www.medietilsynet.no/mediebransjen/bildeprogramloven/ +. Vi har ikke utarbeidet oversikter over alle aktørene, men vi sender +deg her de listene vi har utarbeidet, hentet fra våre databaser. Vi +har dessverre ikke ferdige rapporter som inneholder +organisasjonsnummer. Dersom du ønsker flere opplysninger ber vi om at +du tar kontakt med oss slik at vi kan finne ut av hvilke opplysninger +du trenger, og hvilke vi kan fremskaffe.

+ +

Vedlagt følger:

    -
  • Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks
    • -
  • Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is - non-existant, to work around additional copy protection
    • -
  • Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles
    • -
  • Fix pallete display of first entry
    • -
  • Fix include orders
    • -
  • Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway
    • -
  • Fix the chapter count
    • -
  • Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising - the palette size is the same.
    • -
  • Fix array printing.
    • -
  • Correct subsecond calculations.
    • -
  • Add sector information to the output format.
    • -
  • Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings - with more GCC compiler warnings.
    • +
  • Konsesjoner - lokalradio FM pr. 31.12.2014 [PDF (original)]
    • + +
  • Konsesjoner - lokalfjernsyn i det digitale bakkenettet for fjernsyn, pr. mars 2015 [DOCX (original), +PDF]
    • + +
  • Konsesjoner - DAB-radio, status mars 2015 [XPS (original), +PDF]
    • +
  • Registreringspliktige kringkastere - status mars 2015: [XPS (original), PDF] + +
      +
    • Kabelsendt fjernsyn +
    • Satellittsendt fjernsyn +
    • Nett-tv +
    • Kabelsendt radio +
    • Satellittsendt radio +
    • Nett-radio +
-

This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various -Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the -project the last nine years. Please check it out. :)

+

Vi må ta forbehold om at det kan være enkelte feil i oversiktene +siden disse ikke er oppdaterte pr. dags dato. Vi vil foreta nye +oppdateringer i august.

+ +

Med hilsen

+ +

Hanne Nistad Sekkelsten +
Seniorrådgiver | Senior Legal Adviser +
Medietilsynet | Norwegian Media Authority +
A: Nygata 4, NO-1607 Fredrikstad +
T: [telefonnummer fjernet] +
E: [adresse fjernet] | W: www.medietilsynet.no +

+
+ +

Desverre er formatene for ustrukturerte til maskinell behandling og +mangler endel informasjon, men det er gode oversikter over hvem +Medietilsynet fører tilsyn med. Filene er på formatene PDF, XPS +(XML-basert PDF-lignende format fra Microsoft) og DOCX, så det vil +være en stor jobb å strukturere informasjonen på en måte som kan +importeres i OpenCorporates. Svaret er ikke i tråd med +Forskrift +om IT-standarder i offentlig forvaltning som sier epostvedlegg +skal sendes som PDF, så jeg har gjorde PDF-utgaver av XPS og +DOCX-utgavene tilgjengelig for å gjøre det enklere for alle å se +innholdet.

- Tags: debian, english, lsdvd, multimedia. + Tags: norsk, offentlig innsyn.
@@ -532,77 +639,79 @@ project the last nine years. Please check it out. :)

-
How to test Debian Edu Jessie despite some fatal problems with the installer
-
26th September 2014
-

The Debian Edu / Skolelinux -project provide a Linux solution for schools, including a -powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing -web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE -boot of both clients without disk and the installation to install Debian -Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small -to mention here). We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on -the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the -freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the -future. The -current -status can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of -work left. Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer, -but it is possible to work around these to get anyway. Here is a -recipe on how to get the installation limping along.

- -

First, download the test ISO via -ftp, -http -or rsync (use -ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso). -The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every -12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to -install with some tweaking.

- -

When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2 -(use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run

- -

-nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
-

- -

and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata -optimization. Return to the installation, select the profile you want -and continue. Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install -due to a known bug in eatmydata.

- -

When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if -this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be. All my -test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit -your need.

- -

If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as -root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the -education-desktop-XXX metapackage. XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce -or mate. If you want several desktop options, install more than one -metapackage. Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working -graphical login screen. This workaround should no longer be needed -once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two -days.

- -

I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new -tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to -update the debian-cd git repository. The eatmydata, grub and desktop -issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up -on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again. Well the -eatmydata optimization is really just disabled. The proper fix -require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch -provided in bug #702711. -The rest have proper fixes in unstable.

- -

I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are -quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based -installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.

+
Graphing the Norwegian company ownership structure
+
15th June 2015
+

It is a bit work to figure out the ownership structure of companies +in Norway. The information is publicly available, but one need to +recursively look up ownership for all owners to figure out the complete +ownership graph of a given set of companies. To save me the work in +the future, I wrote a script to do this automatically, outputting the +ownership structure using the Graphviz/dotty format. The data source +is web scraping from Proff, because +I failed to find a useful source directly from the official keepers of +the ownership data, Brønnøysundsregistrene.

+ +

To get an ownership graph for a set of companies, fetch +the code from git and run it using the organisation number. I'm +using the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet as an example here, as its +ownership structure is very simple:

+ +
+% time ./bin/eierskap-dotty 958033540 > dagbladet.dot
+
+real    0m2.841s
+user    0m0.184s
+sys     0m0.036s
+%
+
+ +

The script accept several organisation numbers on the command line, +allowing a cluster of companies to be graphed in the same image. The +resulting dot file for the example above look like this. The edges +are labeled with the ownership percentage, and the nodes uses the +organisation number as their name and the name as the label:

+ +
+digraph ownership {
+rankdir = LR;
+"Aller Holding A/s" -> "910119877" [label="100%"]
+"910119877" -> "998689015" [label="100%"]
+"998689015" -> "958033540" [label="99%"]
+"974530600" -> "958033540" [label="1%"]
+"958033540" [label="AS DAGBLADET"]
+"998689015" [label="Berner Media Holding AS"]
+"974530600" [label="Dagbladets Stiftelse"]
+"910119877" [label="Aller Media AS"]
+}
+
+ +

To view the ownership graph, run "dotty dagbladet.dot" or +convert it to a PNG using "dot -T png dagbladet.dot > +dagbladet.png". The result can be seen below:

+ + + +

Note that I suspect the "Aller Holding A/S" entry to be incorrect +data in the official ownership register, as that name is not +registered in the official company register for Norway. The ownership +register is sensitive to typos and there seem to be no strict checking +of the ownership links.

+ +

Let me know if you improve the script or find better data sources. +The code is licensed according to GPL 2 or newer.

+ +

Update 2015-06-15: Since the initial post I've been told that +"Aller +Holding A/S" is a Danish company, which explain why it did not +have a Norwegian organisation number. I've also been told that there +is a web +services API available from Brønnøysundsregistrene, for those +willing to accept the terms or pay the price.

- Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + Tags: english, offentlig innsyn.
@@ -610,37 +719,59 @@ installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.

-
Suddenly I am the new upstream of the lsdvd command line tool
-
25th September 2014
-

I use the lsdvd tool -to handle my fairly large DVD collection. It is a nice command line -tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length, -etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format. But lsdvd have not seen -any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting -its use with some DVDs. Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I -sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the -project, without any reply. But I use it regularly and would like to -get an updated version -into Debian. So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with -the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that -he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take -over. And yesterday, I became project admin.

- -

I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian -maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream -project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly, -collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place. -I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git -repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too. If you got -a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out -the git source and join -the project mailing -list. :)

+
Measuring and adjusting the loudness of a TV channel using bs1770gain
+
11th June 2015
+

Television loudness is the source of frustration for viewers +everywhere. Some channels are very load, others are less loud, and +ads tend to shout very high to get the attention of the viewers, and +the viewers do not like this. This fact is well known to the TV +channels. See for example the BBC white paper +"Terminology +for loudness and level dBTP, LU, and all that" from 2011 for a +summary of the problem domain. To better address the need for even +loadness, the TV channels got together several years ago to agree on a +new way to measure loudness in digital files as one step in +standardizing loudness. From this came the ITU-R standard BS.1770, +"Algorithms to +measure audio programme loudness and true-peak audio level".

+ +

The ITU-R BS.1770 specification describe an algorithm to measure +loadness in LUFS (Loudness Units, referenced to Full Scale). But +having a way to measure is not enough. To get the same loudness +across TV channels, one also need to decide which value to standardize +on. For European TV channels, this was done in the EBU Recommondaton +R128, "Loudness +normalisation and permitted maximum level of audio signals", which +specifies a recommended level of -23 LUFS. In Norway, I have been +told that NRK, TV2, MTG and SBS have decided among themselves to +follow the R128 recommondation for playout from 2016-03-01.

+ +

There are free software available to measure and adjust the loudness +level using the LUFS. In Debian, I am aware of a library named +libebur128 +able to measure the loudness and since yesterday morning a new binary +named bs1770gain +capable of both measuring and adjusting was uploaded and is waiting +for NEW processing. I plan to maintain the latter in Debian under the +Debian +multimedia umbrella.

+ +

The free software based TV channel I am involved in, +Frikanalen, plan to follow the +R128 recommondation ourself as soon as we can adjust the software to +do so, and the bs1770gain tool seem like a good fit for that part of +the puzzle to measure loudness on new video uploaded to Frikanalen. +Personally, I plan to use bs1770gain to adjust the loudness of videos +I upload to Frikanalen on behalf of the +NUUG member organisation. The program seem to be able to measure +the LUFS value of any media file handled by ffmpeg, but I've only +successfully adjusted the LUFS value of WAV files. I suspect it +should be able to adjust it for all the formats handled by ffmpeg.

- Tags: debian, english, lsdvd, multimedia. + Tags: english, frikanalen, multimedia, video.
@@ -648,263 +779,332 @@ list. :)

-
Hva henger under skibrua over E16 på Sollihøgda?
-
21st September 2014
-

Rundt omkring i Oslo og Østlandsområdet henger det bokser over -veiene som jeg har lurt på hva gjør. De har ut fra plassering og -vinkling sett ut som bokser som sniffer ut et eller annet fra -forbipasserende trafikk, men det har vært uklart for meg hva det er de -leser av. Her om dagen tok jeg bilde av en slik boks som henger under -ei -skibru på Sollihøgda:

- -

- -

Boksen er tydelig merket «Kapsch >>>», logoen til -det sveitsiske selskapet Kapsch som -blant annet lager sensorsystemer for veitrafikk. Men de lager mye -forskjellig, og jeg kjente ikke igjen boksen på utseendet etter en -kjapp titt på produktlista til selskapet.

- -

I og med at boksen henger over veien E16, en riksvei vedlikeholdt -av Statens Vegvesen, så antok jeg at det burde være mulig å bruke -REST-API-et som gir tilgang til vegvesenets database over veier, -skilter og annet veirelatert til å finne ut hva i alle dager dette -kunne være. De har både -en -datakatalog og -et -søk, der en kan søke etter ulike typer oppføringer innen for et -gitt geografisk område. Jeg laget et enkelt shell-script for å hente -ut antall av en gitt type innenfor området skibrua dekker, og listet -opp navnet på typene som ble funnet. Orket ikke slå opp hvordan -URL-koding av aktuelle strenger kunne gjøres mer generisk, og brukte -en stygg sed-linje i stedet.

- -
-#!/bin/sh
-urlmap() {
-    sed \
-    -e 's/  / /g'   -e 's/{/%7B/g'  \
-    -e 's/}/%7D/g'  -e 's/\[/%5B/g' \
-    -e 's/\]/%5D/g' -e 's/ /%20/g'  \
-    -e 's/,/%2C/g'  -e 's/\"/%22/g' \
-    -e 's/:/%3A/g'
-}
+      
Hva gjør at NRK kan distribuere H.264-video uten patentavtale med MPEG LA?

+      
10th June 2015

+      
Helt siden jeg i 2012 fikk beskjed fra MPEG LA om at
+NRK
+trengte patentavtale med dem hvis de distribuerte H.264-video til
+sluttbrukere, har jeg lurt på hva som gjør at NRK ikke har slik
+avtale.  For noen dager siden fikk jeg endelig gjort noe med min
+undring, og sendte 2015-05-28 følgende epost til info (at) nrk.no med
+tittel "Hva gjør at NRK kan distribuere H.264-video uten patentavtale
+med MPEG LA?":

+
+

+
Jeg lurer på en ting rundt NRKs bruk av H.264-video på sine
+websider samt distribusjon via RiksTV og kabel-TV.  Har NRK vurdert om
+det er behov for en patentavtale med
+MPEG LA slik det står i
+programvarelisensene til blant annet Apple Final Cut Studio, Adobe
+Premiere Pro, Avid og Apples Final Cut Pro X?

+
+
Hvis dere har vurdert dette, hva var utfallet av en slik vurdering?

+
+
Hvis dere ikke har vurdert dette, har NRK planer om å vurdere behovet
+for patentavtale?

+
+
I følge en artikkel på
+NRK
+Beta i 2012 har NRK brukt eller testet både Apple Final Cut
+Studio, Adobe Premiere Pro, Avid og Apples Final Cut Pro X til bruk
+for å redigere video før sending. Alle disse har bruksvilkår
+understøttet av opphavsretten som sier at de kun kan brukes til å lage
+filmer til personlig og ikke-kommersiell bruk - med mindre en har en
+lisensavtale med MPEG LA om bruk av patenter utstedt i USA for H.264.
+Se f.eks. bruksvilkårene for Avid, Adobe Premiere og Apple Final
+Cut Studio og søk etter "MPEG LA".

+
+
Dette får meg til å lure på om det er brudd på opphavsretten å bruke
+disse verktøyene i strid med bruksvilkårene uten patentavtale med MPEG
+LA.  Men NRK bruker jo tilsynelatende disse verktøyene uten patentavtale
+med MPEG LA.

+
+
I følge forfatteren av Open Broadcast Encoder finnes det to typer
+H.264-relaterte avtaler en kan få med MPEG LA. Det er én for å lage
+programvare og utstyr som produserer H.264-video, og en annen for å
+kringkaste video som bruker H.264. Dette forteller meg at selv om
+produsentene av utstyr og programvare som NRK bruker har en slik avtale
+med MPEG LA, så trenges det en egen avtale for å kringkaste video på det
+formatet.

+
+
I følge Ryan Rodriguez hos MPEG LA, da jeg spurte ham på epost i
+juni 2012, har NRK ikke en slik avtale med MPEG LA. Han sa videre at
+NRK trenger en slik avtale hvis NRK tilbyr H.264-kodet video til
+sluttbrukere.  Jeg sjekket listen med
+organisasjoner
+med avtale med MPEG LA og NRK står fortsatt ikke der.

+
+
Jeg lurer dermed på hva som gjør at NRK kan bruke de overnevnte
+videoredigeringsverktøyene, som tilsynelatende har krav om avtale med
+MPEG LA for å kunne brukes slik NRK bruker dem, til å lage videofiler
+for distribusjon uten å ha en avtale med MPEG LA om distribusjon av
+H.264-video?  Dette er spesielt interessant å vite for oss andre som
+også vurderer å spre H.264-video etter å ha redigert dem med disse mye
+brukte videoredigeringsverktøyene.

+

+
+
Samme dag fikk jeg automatisk svar om at min henvendelse hadde fått
+saksid 1294699.  Jeg fikk deretter følgende respons fra NRK
+2015-06-09:

+
+

+
Hei, beklager lang svartid, men det tok litt tid å finne ut hvem som kunne
+svare på dette.

+
+
For selskaper som leverer h.264 til sluttbrukere på nett (f.eks
+NRKs nett- tv utgaver som bruker h.264) - og som leverer slike
+tjenester uten betaling fra forbrukere – er det heller ikke påkrevd
+noen patentavtale.

+
+
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20100825006629/en/MPEG-LA%E2%80%99s-AVC-License-Charge-Royalties-Internet#.VWb2ws_774Y

+
+
Med vennlig hilsen
+
Gunn Helen Berg
+
Informasjonskonsulent, Publikumsservice

+
+
NRK
+
Strategidivisjonen
+
Sentralbord: +47 23 04 70 00
+
Post: NRK Publikumsservice, 8608 Mo i Rana
+
nrk.no / info (at) nrk.no

+

+
+Da dette ikke helt var svar på det jeg lurte på, sendte jeg samme dag
+oppfølgerepost tilbake:
+
+

+
[Gunn Helen Berg]
+
> Hei, beklager lang svartid, men det tok litt tid å finne ut hvem som
+
> kunne svare på dette.

+
+
Takk for svar.  Men det besvarte ikke helt det jeg spurte om.

+
+
> For selskaper som leverer h.264 til sluttbrukere på nett (f.eks NRKs
+
> nett- tv utgaver som bruker h.264) - og som leverer slike tjenester
+
> uten betaling fra forbrukere – er det heller ikke påkrevd noen
+
> patentavtale.
+
>
+
> http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20100825006629/en/MPEG-LA%E2%80%99s-AVC-License-Charge-Royalties-Internet#.VWb2ws_774Y

+
+
Spørsmålet er ikke kun om MPEG LA krever patentavtale eller ikke
+(hvilket ikke helt besvares av pressemeldingen omtalt over, gitt at
+pressemeldingen kom i 2010, to år før MPEG LA ansvarlige for
+internasjonal lisensiering egen Ryan Rodriguez fortalte meg på epost
+at NRK trenger en lisens.

+
+
Det er uklart fra pressemeldingen hva "Internet Broadcast AVC
+Video" konkret betyr, men i følge en
+presentasjon
+fra MPEG LA med tema "AVC PAtent Portfoli License Briefing" datert
+2015-05-15 gjelder "Internet Broadcast AVC Video" kun kringkasting
+på Internet som ikke tilbyr valg av enkeltinnslag ("not
+title-by-title"), hvilket jo NRK gjør på sine nettsider.  I tillegg
+kringkaster jo NRK H.264-video også utenom Internet (RiksTV, kabel,
+satelitt), hvilket helt klart ikke er dekket av vilkårene omtalt i
+pressemeldingen.

+
+
Spørsmålet mitt er hvordan NRK kan bruke verktøy med bruksvilkår
+som krever avtale med MPEG LA for det NRK bruker dem til, når NRK ikke
+har avtale med MPEG LA.  Hvis jeg forsto spørsmålet riktig, så mener
+NRK at dere ikke trenger avtale med MPEG LA, men uten slik avtale kan
+dere vel ikke bruke hverken Apple Final Cut Studio, Adobe Premiere
+Pro, Avid eller Apples Final Cut Pro X for å redigere video før
+sending?

+
+
Mine konkrete spørsmål var altså:

 
-lookup() {
-    url="$1"
-    curl -s -H 'Accept: application/vnd.vegvesen.nvdb-v1+xml' \
-       "https://www.vegvesen.no/nvdb/api$url" | xmllint --format -
-}
+
    
+
+
  • Hvis NRK har vurdert om det er behov for en patentavtale med MPEG LA
+   slik det er krav om i programvarelisensene til blant annet Apple
+   Final Cut Studio, Adobe Premiere Pro, Avid og Apples Final Cut Pro X,
+   hva var utfallet av en slik vurdering? Kan jeg få kopi av vurderingen
+   hvis den er gjort skriftlig?
    • 
 
-for id in $(seq 1 874) ; do
-    search="{
-  lokasjon: {
-    bbox: \"10.34425,59.96386,10.34458,59.96409\",
-    srid: \"WGS84\"
-  },
-   objektTyper: [{
-     id: $id, antall: 10
-   }]
-}"
-
-    query=/sok?kriterie=$(echo $search | urlmap)
-    if lookup "$query" |
-    grep -q '<totaltAntallReturnert>0<'
-    then
-    :
-    else
-    echo $id
-    lookup "/datakatalog/objekttyper/$id" |grep '^  <navn>'
-    fi
-done
-
-exit 0
-
- -Aktuelt ID-område 1-874 var riktig i datakatalogen da jeg laget -scriptet. Det vil endre seg over tid. Skriptet listet så opp -aktuelle typer i og rundt skibrua: - -
-5
-  <navn>Rekkverk</navn>
-14
-  <navn>Rekkverksende</navn>
-47
-  <navn>Trafikklomme</navn>
-49
-  <navn>Trafikkøy</navn>
-60
-  <navn>Bru</navn>
-79
-  <navn>Stikkrenne/Kulvert</navn>
-80
-  <navn>Grøft, åpen</navn>
-86
-  <navn>Belysningsstrekning</navn>
-95
-  <navn>Skiltpunkt</navn>
-96
-  <navn>Skiltplate</navn>
-98
-  <navn>Referansestolpe</navn>
-99
-  <navn>Vegoppmerking, langsgående</navn>
-105
-  <navn>Fartsgrense</navn>
-106
-  <navn>Vinterdriftsstrategi</navn>
-172
-  <navn>Trafikkdeler</navn>
-241
-  <navn>Vegdekke</navn>
-293
-  <navn>Breddemåling</navn>
-301
-  <navn>Kantklippareal</navn>
-318
-  <navn>Snø-/isrydding</navn>
-445
-  <navn>Skred</navn>
-446
-  <navn>Dokumentasjon</navn>
-452
-  <navn>Undergang</navn>
-528
-  <navn>Tverrprofil</navn>
-532
-  <navn>Vegreferanse</navn>
-534
-  <navn>Region</navn>
-535
-  <navn>Fylke</navn>
-536
-  <navn>Kommune</navn>
-538
-  <navn>Gate</navn>
-539
-  <navn>Transportlenke</navn>
-540
-  <navn>Trafikkmengde</navn>
-570
-  <navn>Trafikkulykke</navn>
-571
-  <navn>Ulykkesinvolvert enhet</navn>
-572
-  <navn>Ulykkesinvolvert person</navn>
-579
-  <navn>Politidistrikt</navn>
-583
-  <navn>Vegbredde</navn>
-591
-  <navn>Høydebegrensning</navn>
-592
-  <navn>Nedbøyningsmåling</navn>
-597
-  <navn>Støy-luft, Strekningsdata</navn>
-601
-  <navn>Oppgravingsdata</navn>
-602
-  <navn>Oppgravingslag</navn>
-603
-  <navn>PMS-parsell</navn>
-604
-  <navn>Vegnormalstrekning</navn>
-605
-  <navn>Værrelatert strekning</navn>
-616
-  <navn>Feltstrekning</navn>
-617
-  <navn>Adressepunkt</navn>
-626
-  <navn>Friksjonsmåleserie</navn>
-629
-  <navn>Vegdekke, flatelapping</navn>
-639
-  <navn>Kurvatur, horisontalelement</navn>
-640
-  <navn>Kurvatur, vertikalelement</navn>
-642
-  <navn>Kurvatur, vertikalpunkt</navn>
-643
-  <navn>Statistikk, trafikkmengde</navn>
-647
-  <navn>Statistikk, vegbredde</navn>
-774
-  <navn>Nedbøyningsmåleserie</navn>
-775
-  <navn>ATK, influensstrekning</navn>
-794
-  <navn>Systemobjekt</navn>
-810
-  <navn>Vinterdriftsklasse</navn>
-821
-  <navn>Funksjonell vegklasse</navn>
-825
-  <navn>Kurvatur, stigning</navn>
-838
-  <navn>Vegbredde, beregnet</navn>
-862
-  <navn>Reisetidsregistreringspunkt</navn>
-871
-  <navn>Bruksklasse</navn>
-
- -

Av disse ser ID 775 og 862 mest relevant ut. ID 775 antar jeg -refererer til fotoboksen som står like ved brua, mens -«Reisetidsregistreringspunkt» kanskje kan være boksen som henger der. -Hvordan finner jeg så ut hva dette kan være for noe. En titt på -datakatalogsiden -for ID 862/Reisetidsregistreringspunkt viser at det er finnes 53 -slike målere i Norge, og hvor de er plassert, men gir ellers få -detaljer. Det er plassert 40 på østlandet og 13 i Trondheimsregionen. -Men siden nevner «AutoPASS», og hvis en slår opp oppføringen på -Sollihøgda nevner den «Ciber AS» som ID for eksternt system. (Kan det -være snakk om -Ciber -Norge AS, et selskap eid av Ciber Europe Bv?) Et nettsøk på - «Ciber AS autopass» fører meg til en artikkel fra NRK Trøndelag i - 2013 med tittel -«Sjekk -dette hvis du vil unngå kø». Artikkelen henviser til vegvesenets -nettside -reisetider.no -som har en -kartside -for Østlandet som viser at det måles mellom Sandvika og Sollihøgda. -Det kan dermed se ut til at jeg har funnet ut hva boksene gjør.

- -

Hvis det stemmer, så er dette bokser som leser av AutoPASS-ID-en -til alle passerende biler med AutoPASS-brikke, og dermed gjør det mulig -for de som kontrollerer boksene å holde rede på hvor en gitt bil er -når den passerte et slikt målepunkt. NRK-artikkelen forteller at -denne informasjonen i dag kun brukes til å koble to -AutoPASS-brikkepasseringer passeringer sammen for å beregne -reisetiden, og at bruken er godkjent av Datatilsynet. Det er desverre -ikke mulig for en sjåfør som passerer under en slik boks å kontrollere -at AutoPASS-ID-en kun brukes til dette i dag og i fremtiden.

- -

I tillegg til denne type AutoPASS-sniffere vet jeg at det også -finnes mange automatiske stasjoner som tar betalt pr. passering (aka -bomstasjoner), og der lagres informasjon om tid, sted og bilnummer i -10 år. Finnes det andre slike sniffere plassert ut på veiene?

- -

Personlig har jeg valgt å ikke bruke AutoPASS-brikke, for å gjøre -det vanskeligere og mer kostbart for de som vil invadere privatsfæren -og holde rede på hvor bilen min beveger seg til enhver tid. Jeg håper -flere vil gjøre det samme, selv om det gir litt høyere private -utgifter (dyrere bompassering). Vern om privatsfæren koster i disse -dager.

- -

Takk til Jan Kristian Jensen i Statens Vegvesen for tips om -dokumentasjon på vegvesenets REST-API.

+
  • Hvis NRK ikke har vurdert dette, har NRK planer om Ã¥ vurdere behovet + for patentavtale?
    • + +
  • Hva slags saksnummer fikk min henvendelse i NRKs offentlige + postjournal? Jeg ser at postjournalen ikke er publisert for den + aktuelle perioden ennÃ¥, sÃ¥ jeg fikk ikke sjekket selv.
    • + + +

    + +

    Det hjelper å ha funnet rette vedkommende i NRK, for denne gangen +fikk jeg svar tilbake dagen etter (2015-06-10), fra Geir Børdalen i +NRK:

    + +

    +

    Hei Petter Reinholdtsen

    + +

    Jeg har sjekket saken med distribusjonssjef for tv, Arild Hellgren +(som var teknologidirektør da bakkenettet ble satt opp). NRK v/ +Hellgren hadde møte med MPEG LA sammen med den europeiske +kringkastingsunionen EBU før bakkenettet for TV ble satt opp +(igangsatt høsten 2007). I dette møtet ble det avklart at NRK/EBU ikke +trengte noen patentavtale for h.264 i forbindelse med oppsett av +bakkenettet eller bruk av MPEG4 h.264 som kompresjonsalgoritme fordi +tjenesten «in full»(nor: helt) var betalt av utsendelseselskapene og +ikke av forbrukerne.

    + +

    http://www.nrk.no/oppdrag/digitalt-bakkenett-1.3214555

    + +

    Det er også klart slått fast at selskaper som leverer video basert +på MPEG4 h.264 til sluttbrukere på nett, heller ikke påkrevd noen +patentavtale – så lenge de leverer slike tjenester uten betaling fra +sluttbrukere.

    + +http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20100825006629/en/MPEG-LA%E2%80%99s-AVC-License-Charge-Royalties-Internet#.VWb2ws_774Y + +

    “MPEG LA announced today that its AVC Patent Portfolio License will +continue not to charge royalties for Internet Video that is free to +end users (known as “Internet Broadcast AVC Video”) during the entire +life of this License. MPEG LA previously announced it would not charge +royalties for such video through December 31, 2015 (see +http://www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%20LA%20News%20List/Attachments/226/n-10-02-02.pdf), +and today’s announcement makes clear that royalties will continue not +to be charged for such video beyond that time. Products and services +other than Internet Broadcast AVC Video continue to be +royalty-bearing.”

    + +

    Vi har derfor ikke noe behov for å vurdere noen patentavtale med +MPEG LA.

    + +

    Understreker for øvrig at NRK ikke er låst til MPEG4 – h.264 som +utsendelsesformat – og at vi har brukt og bruker flere andre +alternativer i våre tjenester. Ulike «devicer» har ofte behov for +forskjellige løsninger – og NRK har forsøkt å levere med best mulig +kvalitet /økonomi /stabilitet avhengig av +plattform. Produksjonsformater i NRK spenner for øvrig over en rekke +forskjellige formater – hvor MPEG4 bare er en av disse. Når NRK kjøper +teknisk utstyr er betaling for kodekstøtte ofte en del av +anskaffelsesprisen for denne maskinvaren (enten dette er spesialiserte +enkodere eller forskjellige typer produksjonsutstyr).

    + +

    Vennlig hilsen +
    Geir Børdalen

    + +

    ________________________________________ +
    Geir Børdalen +
    Investeringsansvarlig NRK / Hovedprosjektleder - Origo +
    Avdeling for utvikling, innovasjon, investering og eiendom +
    NRK medietjenester +
    Sentralbord: +47 23 04 70 00 +
    Post: NRK, AUTV (RBM5), Pb. 8500 Majorstuen, 0340 Oslo +
    nrk.no +

    + +

    Et godt og grundig svar, som var informativt om hvordan NRK tenker +rundt patentavtale med MPEG LA, men heller ikke helt besvarte det jeg +lurte på, så jeg sendte epostoppfølging samme dag.

    + +

    +

    [Geir Børdalen] +
    > Hei Petter Reinholdtsen

    + +

    Hei, og takk for raskt svar. Er min henvendelse journalført slik +at den dukker opp i NRKs postjournal?

    + +

    Svaret ditt var meget nyttig, og jeg forstår ut fra det du skriver +at avklaringen med MPEG LA rundt H.264-distribusjon via bakkenettet +gjelder alle TV-kanaler i Norge. Hvilke saksnummer fikk dokumenter +som ble opprettet i forbindelse med det omtalte møtet NRK v/Hellgren +og EBU hadde med MPEG LA (dvs. referater, avtaler, etc), +f.eks. dokumentet der formuleringen "in full" som du omtaler +finnes?

    + +

    Men det er et par ting jeg fortsatt ikke forstår. Det ene er +hvorfor NRKs forståelse av hva "Internet Broadcast AVC Video" dekker +ser ut til å avvike fra det som presenteres i +lysark +fra MPEG LA i mai, der MPEG LA på lysark med overskriften +"AVC/H.264 License Terms Participation Fees" og undertittel "Where +remuneration is from other sources" skriver "Internet Broadcast AVC +Video (not title-by-title, not subscription) – no royalty for life of +the AVC Patent Portfolio License".

    + +

    Her leser jeg MPEG LA dithen at det kun er kringkasting uten +abonnement via Internet som er dekket at vilkårne omtalt i +pressemeldingen, mens jeg forstår deg dithen at NRK mener NRKs +nettsider som også har enkeltfilmer og innslag (som jeg forstår dekket +av formuleringen "title-by-title") dekkes av "Internet Broadcast AVC +Video" fra MPEG LA. Hva baserer dere denne tolkningen på? Jeg har +ikke sett noe skriftlig fra MPEG LA som støtter NRKs tolkning, og +lurer på om dere har andre kilder enn den pressemeldingen fra 5 år +tilbake, der NRKS forståelse av hva "Internet Broadcast AVC Video" +dekker er beskrevet?

    + +

    Det andre er at eposten din ikke nevnte spørsmålet mitt om +bruksvilkårene til videoredigeringsverktøyene som NRK bruker. Disse +har som tidligere nevnt krav om at de kun skal brukes til private og +ikke-kommersielle formål med mindre en har avtale med MPEG LA, og uten +avtale med MPEG LA kan det jo virke som om NRK bruker verktøyene i +strid med bruksvilkårene. Hva gjør at disse bruksvilkårene ikke +gjelder for NRK?

    +

    + +

    Noen minutter senere får jeg foreløpig siste svar i +føljetongen:

    + +

    +

    Hei igjen

    + +

    Vårt dokumentarkiv har fått en kopi (journalføringsnr kan jeg +dessverre ikke gi deg).

    + +

    > Svaret ditt var meget nyttig, og jeg forstår ut fra det du +
    > skriver at avklaringen med MPEG LA rundt H.264-distribusjon via +
    > bakkenettet gjelder alle TV-kanaler i Norge.

    + +

    Svar: Kan ikke svare for andre enn for NRK/EBU - og for bakkenettet +i Norge er det kun NRK som er et lisensbasert selskap. Kan ikke gi noe +svar på saksnr på dokumenter eller ytterligere informasjon da jeg selv +ikke var del i dette.

    + +

    > Men det er et par ting jeg fortsatt ikke forstår. ...

    + +

    Svar: Kan ikke gå ytterligere inn i dette fra min side og mitt +fagfelt som er produksjon/publisering og systemstrukturene bak +disse. For øvrig ligger det etter vår formening ingen begrensninger +for NRK i mulighetene til publisering mht til kodek i +produksjonssystemer. Som tidligere skrevet mener vi at NRK ikke +trenger noen avtale med MPEG LA og støtter oss til det vi allerede har +kommunisert i forrige epost.

    + +

    Mvh +
    Geir Børdalen

    +

    + +

    Det syntes vanskelig å komme videre når NRK ikke ønsker å gå inn i +problemstillingen rundt bruksvilkårene til videoredigeringsverktøyene +NRK bruker, så jeg sendte takk for svarene og avsluttet utvekslingen +så langt:

    + +

    +

    Tusen takk for rask respons, og oppklarende forklaring om hvordan +NRK tenker rundt MPEG LA.

    + +

    Jeg vil høre med NRK-arkivet for å se om de kan spore opp de +omtalte dokumentene. Jeg setter pris på om du kan dele titler, dato +eller annen informasjon som kan gjøre det enklere for arkivet å finne +dem.

    + +

    Når det gjelder hvordan bruksvilkårene til +videoredigeringsverktøyene skal tolkes, så skal jeg høre med MPEG LA +og produsentene av verktøyene for å forsøke å få klarhet i hva de +mener er rikgig rettstilstand.

    +

    + +

    Jeg ble litt klokere, men fortsatt er det uklart for meg hva som er +grunnlaget til NRK for å se bort fra bruksvilkår i +videoredigeringsprogramvare som krever MPEG LA-avtale til alt annet +enn privat og ikke-kommersiell bruk.

    - Tags: kart, norsk, personvern, rfid, surveillance. + Tags: h264, multimedia, norsk, opphavsrett, standard, video, web.
    @@ -912,221 +1112,92 @@ dokumentasjon på vegvesenets REST-API.

    -
    Speeding up the Debian installer using eatmydata and dpkg-divert
    -
    16th September 2014
    -

    The Debian installer could be -a lot quicker. When we install more than 2000 packages in -Skolelinux / Debian Edu using -tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever. -A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in -bug #613428 about too -much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package -responsible for unpacking the binary packages. Other parts (like code -executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during -installation. All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to -me. If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try -to salvage the half installed system. So the failure sync-ing is -supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really -relevant while the installer is running.

    - -

    A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file -system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to -change the code in several packages. The idea is not new, but I have -not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before. It -depend on the small and clever package -eatmydata, which -uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to -disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live -dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly. Instead of -modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the -packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages), -it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace -them with a simple shell wrapper calling -"eatmydata $program $@", to get the same effect. -Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple -implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.

    - -

    The effect was stunning. In my first test it reduced the running -time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44 -minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell -Latitude D505 machine. I am not quite sure what the optimised time -would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf -priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during -installation. As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation -along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the -installation. I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie, -and got these results. The time measured is the time stamp in -/var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the -"pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement -yourself. In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the -timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel -dialog.

    - -

    - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
    Machine/setupOriginal taskselOptimised taskselReduction
    Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE64 min (07:46-08:50)<44 min (11:27-12:11)>20 min 18%
    Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE57 min (08:48-09:45)34 min (07:43-08:17)23 min 40%
    Latitude D505 Minimal22 min (10:37-10:59)11 min (11:16-11:27)11 min 50%
    Thinkpad X200 Minimal6 min (08:19-08:25)4 min (08:04-08:08)2 min 33%
    Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE19 min (09:21-09:40)15 min (10:25-10:40)4 min 21%

    - -

    The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the -time is spent downloading packages. The connection to the Internet -was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a -significant factor in the measurement. Download typically took a few -seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being -installed.

    - -

    The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in -Debian -Installer, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the -finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the -installation. I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the -post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the -eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in -Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO. The -negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this -optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i. If the code is -moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger -for the entire installation.

    - -

    I've implemented this in the -debian-edu-install -git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the -Debian Edu installation. If you want to test this yourself, you can -create two files in the installer (or in an udeb). One shell script -need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:

    - -

    -#!/bin/sh
-set -e
-. /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
-info() {
-    logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
-}
-error() {
-    logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
-}
-override_install() {
-    apt-install eatmydata || true
-    if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
-        for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
-            file=/usr/bin/$bin
-            # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
-            if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
-                info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
-                printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
-                    > /target$file.edu
-                chmod 755 /target$file.edu
-                in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
-                    --rename --quiet --add $file
-                ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
-            else
-                error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
-            fi
-        done
-    else
-        error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
-    fi
-}
-
-override_install
-

    - -

    To clean up, another shell script should go into -/usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this: - -

    -#! /bin/sh -e
-. /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
-error() {
-    logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
-}
-remove_install_override() {
-    for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
-        file=/usr/bin/$bin
-        if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
-            rm /target$file
-            in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
-                --rename --quiet --remove $file
-            rm /target$file.edu
-        else
-            error "Missing divert for $file."
-        fi
-    done
-    sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
-}
-
-remove_install_override
-

    - -

    In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script -edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and -finish-install.d scripts.

    - -

    By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal -Debian installer too? I suspect it should, but am not sure the -current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough. It also -depend on the side effects of the change. I'm not aware of any, but I -guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing. -Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and -fsync() having effect? Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to -allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting -everyone.

    - -

    Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization -will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of -bug #702711. An updated -eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.

    - -

    Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and -the optimization work again. And I have discovered that the -dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly -simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package. See -tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.

    +
    Blir det virkelig krav om fingeravtrykk i nasjonale ID-kort?
    +
    12th May 2015
    +

    Noen finner det vanskelig å tro at Stortinget faktisk har vedtatt å +kreve at alle norske borgerne må avgi fingeravtrykk til politiet for å +fungere i samfunnet. Jeg er blitt spurt hva som er grunnlaget for +min +påstand i forrige bloggpost om at det nå blir krav om å avgi +fingeravtrykk til politiet for å fungere som borger i Norge. De som +spør klarer ikke lese det ut fra det som er vedtatt. Her er en liten +oppsummering om hva jeg baserer det på. Det sies ikke direkte i +hverken proposisjon, innstilling eller vedtak, men fremgår når en ser +på indirekte formuleringer.

    + +

    I +stortingsproposisjon +66, avsnitt 6.3.5 (Avgivelse av biometriske personopplysninger) +står det

    + +

    + +

    Departementet foreslår at både ansiktsfoto og fingeravtrykk skal + kunne opptas og lagres som identifikasjonsdata i de nasjonale + ID-kortene, på samme måte som i passene. Lovforslaget er derfor + utformet i tråd med passloven § 6 annet ledd, som fastslår at det + til bruk for senere verifisering eller kontroll av passinnehaverens + identitet kan innhentes og lagres i passet biometrisk + personinformasjon i form av ansiktsfoto og fingeravtrykk (to + fingre). Dagens ordning med lagring av ansiktsfoto og fingeravtrykk + i et kontaktløst smartkort i passet er basert på internasjonale + standarder. Fingeravtrykkene i nasjonalt ID-kort vil bli beskyttet + på samme måte som fingeravtrykkene i passene.

    + +

    [...]

    + +

    For norske forhold understreker departementet at innføring av + nasjonale ID-kort sammen med innføring av nye systemer for sikrere + utstedelse og kontroll av pass og relaterte dokumenter gir mulighet + til å utforme ordningen slik at den best mulig møter utfordringene + forbundet med identitetskriminalitet. Det tilsier at fingeravtrykk + opptas og lagres i alle nasjonale ID-kort.

    +

    + +

    Departementet sier altså at sin anbefaling er at fingeravtrykk skal +opptas og lagres i alle nasjonale ID-kort. Det skrives som om det +blir valgfritt, på samme måten som det skrives passloven, der det i +loven sier at det kan +«innhentes +og lagres i passet biometrisk personinformasjon i form av ansiktsfoto +og fingeravtrykk (to fingre)». Men på tross av bruken av «kan» i +passloven er det innført krav om å avgi fingeravtrykk for å få et pass +i Norge. Proposisjonen sier i tillegg i del 1 (Proposisjonens +hovedinnhold) at ID-kortene skal være like pålitelig som pass og ha +samme sikkerhetsnivå som pass. Departementet foreslår altså at +ID-kortene skal gis etter samme regler som for pass.

    + +

    Formuleringene fra hovedinnholdet i proposisjonen er videreført i +innstillingen +fra stortingskomiteen, der det konkret står «De foreslåtte reglene +vil gi befolkningen tilbud om et offentlig utstedt identitetsbevis som +vil være like pålitelig som passet, og mer praktisk å bruke som +legitimasjon» og «Det nasjonale ID-kortet skal også holde samme +sikkerhetsnivå som passet». Komiteen har altså ingen kommentarer +eller innsigelser til dette forslaget, og gjorde i debatten da saken +ble vedtatt det klart at dette var en god sak og at en enstemmig +komité var glad for resultatet. Stortinget har dermed stilt seg helt +og fullt bak departementets forslag.

    + +

    For meg er det åpenbart når en leser proposisjonen at «like +pålitelig» og «samme sikkerhetsnivå» vil bli tolket av departementet +som «med samme biometrisk informasjon som i passene», og departementet +forklarer i tillegg i proposisjonen at de har tenkt at +fingeravtrykkene «vil bli beskyttet på samme måte som fingeravtrykkene +i passene». Jeg ser det dermed som åpenbart at den samme +tvangsinnhentingen av fingeravtrykk som gjelder for pass vil bli +viderført til de nasjonale ID-kortene.

    + +

    Det eneste som kan endre dette er massive protester fra +befolkningen på at folk som ikke er mistenkt for noe kriminelt skal +tvinges til å gi fingeravtrykket til politiet for å f.eks. kunne få +bankkonto eller stemme ved valg. Det kunne få departementet til å +snu. Det tror jeg ikke vil skje.

    - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + Tags: norsk, personvern, surveillance.
    @@ -1141,6 +1212,25 @@ tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.

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