X-Git-Url: http://pere.pagekite.me/gitweb/homepage.git/blobdiff_plain/b7b8beef9513edbd0880013b9c18ac3b8f8dc90c..6827c20a65667b2d54f665b5c49539dd75f228c0:/blog/index.html?ds=inline diff --git a/blog/index.html b/blog/index.html index ece642da22..4408d5a52e 100644 --- a/blog/index.html +++ b/blog/index.html @@ -20,57 +20,46 @@
-
Making battery measurements a little easier in Debian
-
15th March 2016
-

Back in September, I blogged about -the -system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery, and -how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced). I -created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing, -but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already -a battery-stats -package in Debian that should do the same thing, and I did not see -a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be -fixed instead. I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and -hoped someone would step in and fix it. But no-one did.

- -

I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own -hands. The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of -battery stats (available from github) and part of the team maintaining -battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally -able to collect battery status using the /sys/class/power_supply/ -information provided by the Linux kernel. If you install the -battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a -graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the -status of the battery. The source package build and work just fine in -Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not -tested). The default graph you get for that system look like this:

- -

- -

My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the -battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details -about the battery. The scripts are merged into the upstream -battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work -yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way. Will have to test a -bit more before I make a new release.

- -

I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I -suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it -impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing -and graphing.

- -

If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop -battery, check out the battery-stats package in -Debian and -on -github. -I would love some help to improve the system further.

+
The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?
+
6th June 2016
+

When I set out a few weeks ago to figure out +which +multimedia player in Debian claimed to support most file formats / +MIME types, I was a bit surprised how varied the sets of MIME types +the various players claimed support for. The range was from 55 to 130 +MIME types. I suspect most media formats are supported by all +players, but this is not really reflected in the MimeTypes values in +their desktop files. There are probably also some bogus MIME types +listed, but it is hard to identify which one this is.

+ +

Anyway, in the mean time I got in touch with upstream for some of +the players suggesting to add more MIME types to their desktop files, +and decided to spend some time myself improving the situation for my +favorite media player VLC. The fixes for VLC entered Debian unstable +yesterday. The complete list of MIME types can be seen on the +Multimedia +player MIME type support status Debian wiki page.

+ +

The new "best" multimedia player in Debian? It is VLC, followed by +totem, parole, kplayer, gnome-mpv, mpv, smplayer, mplayer-gui and +kmplayer. I am sure some of the other players desktop files support +several of the formats currently listed as working only with vlc, +toten and parole.

+ +

A sad observation is that only 14 MIME types are listed as +supported by all the tested multimedia players in Debian in their +desktop files: audio/mpeg, audio/vnd.rn-realaudio, audio/x-mpegurl, +audio/x-ms-wma, audio/x-scpls, audio/x-wav, video/mp4, video/mpeg, +video/quicktime, video/vnd.rn-realvideo, video/x-matroska, +video/x-ms-asf, video/x-ms-wmv and video/x-msvideo. Personally I find +it sad that video/ogg and video/webm is not supported by all the media +players in Debian. As far as I can tell, all of them can handle both +formats.

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, video.
@@ -78,100 +67,113 @@ I would love some help to improve the system further.

-
Creating, updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically
-
19th February 2016
-

Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to -details. And one of the details is the content of the -debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by -the code in the package in question, preferably in -machine -readable DEP5 format.

- -

For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write -and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the -package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters. So getting it right -the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save -both you and the ftpmasters some work.. Today, while trying to figure -out what was wrong with -the -zfsonlinux copyright file, I decided to spend some time on -figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least -semi-automatically.

- -

Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the -file based on the code in the source package, -debmake -and cme. I'm -not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to -create a sensible draft file. As far as I can tell, none of them can -be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be -polished a bit before the file is OK to upload. I found the debmake -option in -a -blog posts from 2014. - -

To generate using debmake, use the -cc option: - -

-debmake -cc > debian/copyright
-

- -

Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so -this might not be the best option.

- -

The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found -this approach in -a -blog post from 2015. To generate using cme, use the 'update -dpkg-copyright' option: - -

-cme update dpkg-copyright
-

- -

This will create or update debian/copyright. The cme tool seem to -handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.

- -

When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to -check if the file is correct. For this I found two good options, -debmake -k and license-reconcile. The former seem -to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect -ineffective blocks in the copyright file. The latter reports missing -copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license -names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0). I suspect it is good to use both and -fix all issues reported by them before uploading. But I do not know -if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a -copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.

- -

The devscripts tool licensecheck deserve mentioning. It -will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements. -It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but -can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.

- -

Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update -debian/copyright file. Please let me know, or blog about it on -planet.debian.org.

- -

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

- -

Update 2016-02-20: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel -on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file - -

-licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
-  /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
-

- -

He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the -version control system to make it easier to discover license and -copyright changes in the upstream source. I will try to do the same -with my packages in the future.

- -

Update 2016-02-21: The cme author recommended -against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed -command line.

+
A program should be able to open its own files on Linux
+
5th June 2016
+

Many years ago, when koffice was fresh and with few users, I +decided to test its presentation tool when making the slides for a +talk I was giving for NUUG on Japhar, a free Java virtual machine. I +wrote the first draft of the slides, saved the result and went to bed +the day before I would give the talk. The next day I took a plane to +the location where the meeting should take place, and on the plane I +started up koffice again to polish the talk a bit, only to discover +that kpresenter refused to load its own data file. I cursed a bit and +started making the slides again from memory, to have something to +present when I arrived. I tested that the saved files could be +loaded, and the day seemed to be rescued. I continued to polish the +slides until I suddenly discovered that the saved file could no longer +be loaded into kpresenter. In the end I had to rewrite the slides +three times, condensing the content until the talk became shorter and +shorter. After the talk I was able to pinpoint the problem – +kpresenter wrote inline images in a way itself could not understand. +Eventually that bug was fixed and kpresenter ended up being a great +program to make slides. The point I'm trying to make is that we +expect a program to be able to load its own data files, and it is +embarrassing to its developers if it can't.

+ +

Did you ever experience a program failing to load its own data +files from the desktop file browser? It is not a uncommon problem. A +while back I discovered that the screencast recorder +gtk-recordmydesktop would save an Ogg Theora video file the KDE file +browser would refuse to open. No video player claimed to understand +such file. I tracked down the cause being file --mime-type +returning the application/ogg MIME type, which no video player I had +installed listed as a MIME type they would understand. I asked for +file to change its +behavour and use the MIME type video/ogg instead. I also asked +several video players to add video/ogg to their desktop files, to give +the file browser an idea what to do about Ogg Theora files. After a +while, the desktop file browsers in Debian started to handle the +output from gtk-recordmydesktop properly.

+ +

But history repeats itself. A few days ago I tested the music +system Rosegarden again, and I discovered that the KDE and xfce file +browsers did not know what to do with the Rosegarden project files +(*.rg). I've reported the +rosegarden problem to BTS and a fix is commited to git and will be +included in the next upload. To increase the chance of me remembering +how to fix the problem next time some program fail to load its files +from the file browser, here are some notes on how to fix it.

+ +

The file browsers in Debian in general operates on MIME types. +There are two sources for the MIME type of a given file. The output from +file --mime-type mentioned above, and the content of the +shared MIME type registry (under /usr/share/mime/). The file MIME +type is mapped to programs supporting the MIME type, and this +information is collected from +the +desktop files available in /usr/share/applications/. If there is +one desktop file claiming support for the MIME type of the file, it is +activated when asking to open a given file. If there are more, one +can normally select which one to use by right-clicking on the file and +selecting the wanted one using 'Open with' or similar. In general +this work well. But it depend on each program picking a good MIME +type (preferably +a +MIME type registered with IANA), file and/or the shared MIME +registry recognizing the file and the desktop file to list the MIME +type in its list of supported MIME types.

+ +

The /usr/share/mime/packages/rosegarden.xml entry for +the +Shared MIME database look like this:

+ +

+<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
+<mime-info xmlns="http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info">
+  <mime-type type="audio/x-rosegarden">
+    <sub-class-of type="application/x-gzip"/>
+    <comment>Rosegarden project file</comment>
+    <glob pattern="*.rg"/>
+  </mime-type>
+</mime-info>
+

+ +

This states that audio/x-rosegarden is a kind of application/x-gzip +(it is a gzipped XML file). Note, it is much better to use an +official MIME type registered with IANA than it is to make up ones own +unofficial ones like the x-rosegarden type used by rosegarden.

+ +

The desktop file of the rosegarden program failed to list +audio/x-rosegarden in its list of supported MIME types, causing the +file browsers to have no idea what to do with *.rg files:

+ +

+% grep Mime /usr/share/applications/rosegarden.desktop
+MimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition;audio/x-rosegarden-device;audio/x-rosegarden-project;audio/x-rosegarden-template;audio/midi;
+X-KDE-NativeMimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition
+%
+

+ +

The fix was to add "audio/x-rosegarden;" at the end of the +MimeType= line.

+ +

If you run into a file which fail to open the correct program when +selected from the file browser, please check out the output from +file --mime-type for the file, ensure the file ending and +MIME type is registered somewhere under /usr/share/mime/ and check +that some desktop file under /usr/share/applications/ is claiming +support for this MIME type. If not, please report a bug to have it +fixed. :)

@@ -184,81 +186,36 @@ command line.

-
Using appstream in Debian to locate packages with firmware and mime type support
-
4th February 2016
-

The appstream system -is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very -convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given -firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it. This can -be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog -about. :)

- -

Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware -file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly -picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian -unstable. In general you would be looking for the firmware requested -by the kernel during kernel module loading. To find the package -providing the example file, do like this:

- -
-% apt install appstream
-[...]
-% apt update
-[...]
-% appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
-  awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
-firmware-qlogic
-%
-
- -

See the -appstream wiki page to learn how to embed the package metadata in -a way appstream can use.

- -

This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a -given MIME type. This is very useful when you get a file you do not -know how to handle. First find the mime type using file ---mime-type, and next look up the package providing support for -it. Lets say you got an SVG file. Its MIME type is image/svg+xml, -and you can find all packages handling this type like this:

- -
-% apt install appstream
-[...]
-% apt update
-[...]
-% appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
-  awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
-bkchem
-phototonic
-inkscape
-shutter
-tetzle
-geeqie
-xia
-pinta
-gthumb
-karbon
-comix
-mirage
-viewnior
-postr
-ristretto
-kolourpaint4
-eog
-eom
-gimagereader
-midori
-%
-
- -

I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for -packages providing appstream metadata.

+
Tor - from its creators mouth 11 years ago
+
28th May 2016
+

A little more than 11 years ago, one of the creators of Tor, and +the current President of the Tor +project, Roger Dingledine, gave a talk for the members of the +Norwegian Unix User group (NUUG). A +video of the talk was recorded, and today, thanks to the great help +from David Noble, I finally was able to publish the video of the talk +on Frikanalen, the Norwegian open channel TV station where NUUG +currently publishes its talks. You can +watch the live stream using a web +browser with WebM support, or check out the recording on the video +on demand page for the talk +"Tor: Anonymous +communication for the US Department of Defence...and you.".

+ +

Here is the video included for those of you using browsers with +HTML video and Ogg Theora support:

+ +

+ +

I guess the gist of the talk can be summarised quite simply: If you +want to help the military in USA (and everyone else), use Tor. :)

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: english, frikanalen, nuug, video.
@@ -266,91 +223,67 @@ packages providing appstream metadata.

-
Creepy, visualise geotagged social media information - nice free software
-
24th January 2016
-

Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around -with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their -position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long -time (like every time a SMS is received or sent). And if their -computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called -mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often -also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access -during installation). And when these programs send out information to -central collection points, the location is often included, unless -extra care is taken to not send the location. The provided -information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is -good and bad, depend on your point of view). What is certain, is that -the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and -perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way, -when they share their whereabouts with private and public -entities.

- -

- -

The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out -when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing. It is -unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government -officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from -unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information. But the -public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software -tool to do so is called -Creepy or Cree.py. I -discovered it when I read -an -article about Creepy in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i -November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian. -The python program was in Debian, but -the version in -Debian was completely broken and practically unmaintained. I -uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not -have time to fix it then. This Christmas I decided to finally try to -get Creepy operational in Debian. Now a fixed version is available in -Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches -are now included -upstream.

- -

The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from -Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a -complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a -given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all -these services. Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at -least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these -days it is impossible. This mean that to use Creepy, you need to -configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide -information to them about your search interests. This should be taken -into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information -about yourself with the services.

- -

The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least -geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital -of Norway. One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at -information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the -information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area. -I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in -twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a -Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time, -making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other -things. A similar technique have been -used -to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine, and it is both a powerful -tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people -understand the value of the private information they provide to the -public.

- -

The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as -it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at -least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and -python-requests-toolbelt).

- -

(I have uploaded -the image to -screenshots.debian.net and licensed it under the same terms as the -Creepy program in Debian.)

+
Isenkram with PackageKit support - new version 0.23 available in Debian unstable
+
25th May 2016
+

The isenkram +system is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware +related packages. The idea is to have a database of mappings between +hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to +install the packages to use a given hardware dongle. Some use cases +are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software +needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it +proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader; +and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to +install the driver for it. The system work well, and even have a few +command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the +hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).

+ +

The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found +good documentation and example code on how to use it. But aptdaemon +is going away and is generally being replaced by +PackageKit, +so Isenkram needed a rewrite. And today, thanks to the great patch +from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the +rewrite finally took place. I've just uploaded a new version of +Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default +for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit. To check it out, +install the isenkram package and insert some hardware dongle +and see if it is recognised.

+ +

If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for +the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup +program. This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:

+ +

+% isenkram-lookup 
+bluez
+cheese
+fprintd
+fprintd-demo
+gkrellm-thinkbat
+hdapsd
+libpam-fprintd
+pidgin-blinklight
+thinkfan
+tleds
+tp-smapi-dkms
+tp-smapi-source
+tpb
+%p
+

+ +

The hardware mappings come from several places. The preferred way +is for packages to announce their hardware support using +the +cross distribution appstream system. +See +previous +blog posts about isenkram to learn how to do that.

- Tags: debian, english, nice free software. + Tags: debian, english, isenkram.
@@ -358,72 +291,62 @@ Creepy program in Debian.)

-
Always download Debian packages using Tor - the simple recipe
-
15th January 2016
-

During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum -observed -that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to -believe a computer have a given security hole if it download a -security fix from a Debian mirror. This is a good reason to always -use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those -listening do not know which IP address to attack. In August, Richard -Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible -to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that -download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and -proposed -to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror. He -was not the first to propose this, as the -apt-transport-tor -package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt -to use Tor, but I was not -aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.

- -

Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian -sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central -Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making -it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes, -making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.

- -

Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by -installing apt-transport-tor and replacing http and https -urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead -of the official Debian mirror site. I recommend installing -etckeeper before you start to have a history of the changes -done in /etc/.

- -
-apt install apt-transport-tor
-sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
-sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
-
- -

If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run -the sed commands for these too. The sed command is assuming your are -using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror. Adjust the command (or just -edit the file manually) to match your mirror.

- -

This work in Debian Jessie and later. Note that tools like -apt-file only recently started using the apt transport -system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs. For -apt-file you need the version currently in experimental, -which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable. So if you -need a working apt-file, this is not for you.

- -

Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start -using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you -update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus -masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine. Using Tor will -become normal for the machine in question.

- -

On Freedombox, APT -is set up by default to use apt-transport-tor when Tor is -enabled. It would be great if it was the default on any Debian -system.

+
Discharge rate estimate in new battery statistics collector for Debian
+
23rd May 2016
+

Yesterday I updated the +battery-stats +package in Debian with a few patches sent to me by skilled and +enterprising users. There were some nice user and visible changes. +First of all, both desktop menu entries now work. A design flaw in +one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was +dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available. +The script worked when called from the command line, but not when +called from the desktop menu. I changed this to look for a DISPLAY +variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the +graph window pop up as expected.

+ +

The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the +graphs (the one showing the last few hours). New is also the user of +colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red. The percentages +of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design +capacity.

+ +

+ +

The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery +statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to +visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time. The red +line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent: + +

+ +

In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80 +percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is +shrinking. :(

+ +

The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle +more hardware models. On some hardware, Linux power supply +information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the +collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/. Now +both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the +machine.

+ +

If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please +check out the +battery-stats +in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on +Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from github. +Patches are very welcome.

+ +

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

- Tags: debian, english, sikkerhet. + Tags: debian, english.
@@ -431,37 +354,34 @@ system.

-
Nedlasting fra NRK, som Matroska med undertekster
-
2nd January 2016
-

Det kommer stadig nye løsninger for å ta lagre unna innslag fra NRK -for å se på det senere. For en stund tilbake kom jeg over et script -nrkopptak laget av Ingvar Hagelund. Han fjernet riktignok sitt script -etter forespørsel fra Erik Bolstad i NRK, men noen tok heldigvis og -gjorde det tilgjengelig -via github.

- -

Scriptet kan lagre som MPEG4 eller Matroska, og bake inn -undertekster i fila på et vis som blant annet VLC forstår. For å -bruke scriptet, kopier ned git-arkivet og kjør

- -

-nrkopptak/bin/nrk-opptak k https://tv.nrk.no/serie/bmi-turne/MUHH45000115/sesong-1/episode-1
-

- -

URL-eksemplet er dagens toppsak på tv.nrk.no. Argument 'k' ber -scriptet laste ned og lagre som Matroska. Det finnes en rekke andre -muligheter for valg av kvalitet og format.

- -

Jeg foretrekker dette scriptet fremfor youtube-dl, som - -nevnt i 2014 støtter NRK og en rekke andre videokilder, på grunn -av at nrkopptak samler undertekster og video i en enkelt fil, hvilket -gjør håndtering enklere på disk.

+
French edition of Lawrence Lessigs book Cultura Libre on Amazon and Barnes & Noble
+
21st May 2016
+

A few weeks ago the French paperback edition of Lawrence Lessigs +2004 book Cultura Libre was published. Today I noticed that the book +is now available from book stores. You can now buy it from +Amazon +($19.99), +Barnes +& Noble ($?) and as always from +Lulu.com +($19.99). The revenue is donated to the Creative Commons project. If +you buy from Lulu.com, they currently get $10.59, while if you buy +from one of the book stores most of the revenue go to the book store +and the Creative Commons project get much (not sure how much +less).

+ +

I was a bit surprised to discover that there is a kindle edition +sold by Amazon Digital Services LLC on Amazon. Not quite sure how +that edition was created, but if you want to download a electronic +edition (PDF, EPUB, Mobi) generated from the same files used to create +the paperback edition, they are +available +from github.

- Tags: multimedia, norsk, video, web. + Tags: docbook, english, freeculture.
@@ -469,58 +389,67 @@ gjør håndtering enklere på disk.

-
OpenALPR, find car license plates in video streams - nice free software
-
23rd December 2015
-

When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to -call the car license plate numbers in those days. I would write the -numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids -to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some -exotic or special region codes and numbers. It was a fun game to pass -time, as we kids have plenty of it.

- -

A few days I came across -the OpenALPR -project, a free software project to automatically discover and -report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the -"car numbers" in a machine readable format. I've been looking for -such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the -automatic -number plate recognition tool only is available in the hands of -the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to -even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance. I -discovered the developer -wanted to get the tool into -Debian, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to -help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian -archive.

- -

Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded -it into Debian, where it currently -waits -in the NEW queue for review by the Debian ftpmasters.

- -

I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful -for the common folks, ie those not running a large government -surveillance system? Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike -and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified -when number plates on my watch list are discovered. Another use case -was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home -to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his -car. When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone -capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to -open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway. I -guess for such use case it make sense. I am sure there are other use -cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.

- -

If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check -out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/ -before running "debuild" to build the source. Or wait a bit until the -package show up in unstable.

+
I want the courts to be involved before the police can hijack a news site DNS domain (#domstolkontroll)
+
19th May 2016
+

I just donated to the +NUUG defence +"fond" to fund the effort in Norway to get the seizure of the news +site popcorn-time.no tested in court. I hope everyone that agree with +me will do the same.

+ +

Would you be worried if you knew the police in your country could +hijack DNS domains of news sites covering free software system without +talking to a judge first? I am. What if the free software system +combined search engine lookups, bittorrent downloads and video playout +and was called Popcorn Time? Would that affect your view? It still +make me worried.

+ +

In March 2016, the Norwegian police seized (as in forced NORID to +change the IP address pointed to by it to one controlled by the +police) the DNS domain popcorn-time.no, without any supervision from +the courts. I did not know about the web site back then, and assumed +the courts had been involved, and was very surprised when I discovered +that the police had hijacked the DNS domain without asking a judge for +permission first. I was even more surprised when I had a look at +the web +site content on the Internet Archive, and only found news coverage +about Popcorn Time, not any material published without the right +holders permissions.

+ +

The seizure was widely covered in the Norwegian press (see for +example Hegnar Online and +ITavisen +and +NRK), +at first due to the press release sent out by Økokrim, but then based +on +protests +from the law professor Olav Torvund and +lawyer +Jon Wessel-Aas. It even got some +coverage +on TorrentFreak.

+ +

I + +wrote about the case a month ago, when the +Norwegian Unix User Group (NUUG), +where I am an active member, decided to ask the courts to test this seizure. +The request was denied, but NUUG and its co-requestor EFN have not +given up, and now they are rallying for support to get the seizure +legally challenged. They accept both bank and Bitcoin transfer for +those that want to support the request.

+ +

If you as me believe news sites about free software should not be +censored, even if the free software have both legal and illegal +applications, and that DNS hijacking should be tested by the courts, I +suggest you show +your support by donating to NUUG.

- Tags: debian, english, nice free software. + Tags: english, nuug, offentlig innsyn, opphavsrett.
@@ -528,114 +457,25 @@ package show up in unstable.

-
Using appstream with isenkram to install hardware related packages in Debian
-
20th December 2015
-

Around three years ago, I created -the isenkram -system to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing -hardware related packages. A GUI system in the isenkram package will -present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by -relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine. The same -lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line -tools in the isenkram-cli package. In addition to mapping hardware, -it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to -install needed firmware packages automatically. The key for this -system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other -words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work -with.

- -

I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and -adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run -time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available. -I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in -the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I -was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings, -the -appstream system was announced. I got in touch and suggested to -add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use -appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the -Debian version of appstream.

- -

A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible, -and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for -appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages. The only -package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my -pymissile package. I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out -how do add the required -metadata -in pymissile. I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with -this content:

- -
-<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
-<component>
-  <id>pymissile</id>
-  <metadata_license>MIT</metadata_license>
-  <name>pymissile</name>
-  <summary>Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher</summary>
-  <description>
-    <p>
-      Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
-      Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
-      motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
-      launcher.
-    </p>
-  </description>
-  <provides>
-    <modalias>usb:v1130p0202d*</modalias>
-  </provides>
-</component>
-
- -

The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value, -which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings -(modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel. In this case, it -will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code -0202.

- -

Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files -are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide -appstream files. Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for -these files. A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as -it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions -(in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use). But -it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as -upstream for this project is dormant.

- -

To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the -mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the -appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary -package under /usr/share/appdata/. I did this by adding the following -line to debian/pymissile.install:

- -
-debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
-
- -

With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list -all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI -pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already -installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in -question.

- -

Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the -DEP-11 proposal.

- -

To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine, -try running this command on the command line:

- -
-cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
-
- -

To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out -my -blog posts tagged isenkram.

+
Debian now with ZFS on Linux included
+
12th May 2016
+

Today, after many years of hard work from many people, +ZFS for Linux finally entered +Debian. The package status can be seen on +the package tracker +for zfs-linux. and +the +team status page. If you want to help out, please join us. +The +source code is available via git on Alioth. It would also be +great if you could help out with +the dkms package, as +it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.

- Tags: debian, english, isenkram. + Tags: debian, english.
@@ -643,89 +483,49 @@ blog posts tagged isenkram.

-
Bokhandeldistribusjon av boken Fri kultur av Lawrence Lessig
-
14th December 2015
-

Besøk -lulu.com -eller -Amazon -for å kjøpe boken på papir, eller last ned ebook som -PDF, -ePub -eller -MOBI -fra -github.

- -

Jeg ble gledelig overrasket i dag da jeg oppdaget at boken jeg har -gitt ut -hadde -dukket opp i Amazon. Jeg hadde trodd det skulle ta lenger tid, da -jeg fikk beskjed om at det skulle ta seks til åtte uker. -Amazonoppføringen er et resultat av at jeg for noen uker siden -diskuterte prissetting og håndtering av profitt med forfatteren. Det -måtte avklares da bruksvilkårene til boken har krav om -ikke-kommersiell bruk. Vi ble enige om at overskuddet fra salg av -boken skal sendes til -Creative Commons-stiftelsen. -Med det på plass kunne jeg be -lulu.com -om å gi boken «utvidet» distribusjon. Årsaken til at -bokhandeldistribusjon var litt utfordrende er at bokhandlere krever -mulighet for profitt på bøkene de selger (selvfølgelig), og dermed -måtte de få lov til å selge til høyere pris enn lulu.com. I tillegg -er det krav om samme pris på lulu.com og i bokhandlene, dermed blir -prisen økt også hos lulu.com. Hva skulle jeg gjøre med den profitten -uten å bryte med klausulen om ikkekommersiell? Løsningen var å gi -bort profitten til CC-stiftelsen. Prisen på boken ble nesten -tredoblet, til $19.99 (ca. 160,-) pluss frakt, men synligheten øker -betraktelig når den kan finnes i katalogene til store nettbokhandlere. -Det betyr at hvis du allerede har kjøpt boken har du fått den veldig -billig, og kjøper du den nå, får du den fortsatt billig samt donerer i -tillegg noen tiere til fremme av Creative Commons.

- -

Mens jeg var i gang med å titte etter informasjon om boken -oppdaget jeg at den også var dukket opp på -Google -Books, der en kan lese den på web. PDF-utgaven har ennå ikke -dukket opp hos Nasjonalbiblioteket, -men det regner jeg med kommer på plass i løpet av noen uker. Boken er -heller ikke dukket opp hos -Barnes & Noble ennå, men -jeg antar det bare er et tidsspørsmål før dette er på plass.

- -

Boken er dessverre ikke tilgjengelig fra norske bokhandlere, og -kommer neppe til å bli det med det første. Årsaken er at for å få det -til måtte jeg personlig håndtere bestilling av bøker, hvilket jeg ikke -er interessert i å bruke tid på. Jeg kunne betalt ca 2000,- til -den norske bokbasen, en felles -database over bøker tilgjengelig for norske bokhandlere, for å få en -oppføring der, men da måtte jeg tatt imot bestillinger på epost og -sendt ut bøker selv. Det ville krevd at jeg var klar til å -sende ut bøker på kort varsel, dvs. holdt meg med ekstra bøker, -konvolutter og frimerker. Bokbasen har visst ikke opplegg for å be -bokhandlene bestille direkte via web, så jeg droppet oppføring der. -Jeg har spurt Haugen bok og Tronsmo direkte på epost om de er -interessert i å ta inn boken i sin bestillingskatalog, men ikke fått -svar, så jeg antar de ikke er interessert. Derimot har jeg fått en -hyggelig henvendelse fra Biblioteksentralen som fortalte at de har -lagt den inn i sin database slik at deres bibliotekskunder enkelt kan -bestille den via dem.

- -

Boken er i følge -Bibsys/Oria -og bokdatabasen til -Deichmanske -tilgjengelig fra flere biblioteker allerede, og alle eksemplarer er -visst allerede utlånt med ventetid. Det synes jeg er veldig gledelig -å se. Jeg håper mange kommer til å lese boken. Jeg tror den er -spesielt egnet for foreldre og bekjente av oss nerder for å forklare -hva slags problemer vi ser med dagens opphavsrettsregime.

+
What is the best multimedia player in Debian?
+
8th May 2016
+

Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in +Debian claim support for most file formats.

+ +

A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser +plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian +Edu. I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types +for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser +plugin supported most file formats / media types. +The +result can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have +not been updated for a while. But browser plugins are less relevant +these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone +players.

+ +

A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable +player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National +Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why. The cause is a +missing MIME type in the VLC +desktop file. In the process I wrote a script to compare the set +of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin, +only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the +two for VLC. This discovery made me dig up the script I used to +compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files +instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian +support most file formats.

+ +

The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as +a +table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included +in the table, with the package supporting most MIME types being +listed first in the table.

+ +

The best multimedia player in Debian? It is totem, followed by +parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and +kmplayer. Time for the other players to update their announced MIME +support?

- Tags: freeculture, norsk. + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, video.
@@ -733,114 +533,29 @@ hva slags problemer vi ser med dagens opphavsrettsregime.

-
The GNU General Public License is not magic pixie dust
-
30th November 2015
-

A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled -"The -GPL is not magic pixie dust" explain the importance of making sure -the GPL is enforced. -I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:

- -

- -

Become a Software Freedom Conservancy Supporter!

- -
-The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.
- -The first step is to choose a -copyleft license for your -code.
- -The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license, -it must be enforced
- -and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of -work
- -is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do. -
- -

-- Bradley Kuhn, in -FaiF -episode -0x57

- -

As the Debian Website -used -to -imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to -the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful -software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or -software products. Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created -to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but -such licenses are not enough. With the ongoing adoption of Free -Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's -expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of -ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always. As Karen -and Bradley explained in FaiF -episode 0x57, -copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court -to protect it. The reality of today's world is that legal -representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming. With -gpl-violations.org in hiatus -until -some time in 2016, the Software -Freedom Conservancy (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender -of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations. -In March the SFC supported a -lawsuit -by Christoph Hellwig against VMware for refusing to -comply -with the GPL in relation to their use of parts of the Linux -kernel. Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and -conferences -blocked -or cancelled their talks. As a result they have decided to rely -less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of -individuals who support Free Software and copyleft. So the SFC has -launched -a campaign to create -a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by -supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free -Software.

- -

If you support Free Software, -like -what the SFC do, agree with their -compliance -principles, are happy about their -successes in 2015, -work on a project that is an SFC -member and or -just want to stand up for copyleft, please join -Christopher -Allan Webber, -Carol -Smith, -Jono -Bacon, myself and -others in -becoming a -supporter. For the -next week your donation will be -matched -by an anonymous donor. Please also consider asking your employer to -match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC. Don't forget to -spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or -social media accounts.

- -
- -

I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter -of Software Freedom Conservancy myself. Perhaps you should be a -supporter too?

+
The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled
+
4th May 2016
+
A friend of mine made me aware of +The Pyra, a +handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled. I +would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)

+ +

The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB +plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5" +LCD touch screen. The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole +day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests +confirming this. The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the +last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before +production started.

+ +

As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with +Debian. Please let me know if you know of any others. Is it the +first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?

- Tags: debian, debian edu, english, opphavsrett. + Tags: debian, english.
@@ -862,7 +577,13 @@ supporter too?

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