Streaming the Linux desktop to Kodi using VLC and RTSP

12th July 2018

A while back, I was asked by a friend how to stream the desktop to -my projector connected to Kodi. I sadly had to admit that I had no -idea, as it was a task I never had tried. Since then, I have been -looking for a way to do so, preferable without much extra software to -install on either side. Today I found a way that seem to kind of -work. Not great, but it is a start.

- -

I had a look at several approaches, for example -using uPnP -DLNA as described in 2011, but it required a uPnP server, fuse and -local storage enough to store the stream locally. This is not going -to work well for me, lacking enough free space, and it would -impossible for my friend to get working.

- -

Next, it occurred to me that perhaps I could use VLC to create a -video stream that Kodi could play. Preferably using -broadcast/multicast, to avoid having to change any setup on the Kodi -side when starting such stream. Unfortunately, the only recipe I -could find using multicast used the rtp protocol, and this protocol -seem to not be supported by Kodi.

- -

On the other hand, the rtsp protocol is working! Unfortunately I -have to specify the IP address of the streaming machine in both the -sending command and the file on the Kodi server. But it is showing my -desktop, and thus allow us to have a shared look on the big screen at -the programs I work on.

- -

I did not spend much time investigating codeces. I combined the -rtp and rtsp recipes from -the -VLC Streaming HowTo/Command Line Examples, and was able to get -this working on the desktop/streaming end.

- -

-vlc screen:// --sout \
-  '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{dst=projector.local,port=1234,sdp=rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp}'
-

- -

I ssh-ed into my Kodi box and created a file like this with the -same IP address:

- -

-echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp \
-  > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
-

- -

Note the 192.168.11.4 IP address is my desktops IP address. As far -as I can tell the IP must be hardcoded for this to work. In other -words, if someone elses machine is going to do the steaming, you have -to update screenstream.m3u on the Kodi machine and adjust the vlc -recipe. To get started, locate the file in Kodi and select the m3u -file while the VLC stream is running. The desktop then show up in my -big screen. :)

- -

When using the same technique to stream a video file with audio, -the audio quality is really bad. No idea if the problem is package -loss or bad parameters for the transcode. I do not know VLC nor Kodi -enough to tell.

- -

Update 2018-07-12: Johannes Schauer send me a few -succestions and reminded me about an important step. The "screen:" -input source is only available once the vlc-plugin-access-extra -package is installed on Debian. Without it, you will see this error -message: "VLC is unable to open the MRL 'screen://'. Check the log -for details." He further found that it is possible to drop some parts -of the VLC command line to reduce the amount of hardcoded information. -It is also useful to consider using cvlc to avoid having the VLC -window in the desktop view. In sum, this give us this command line on -the source end - -

-cvlc screen:// --sout \
-  '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{sdp=rtsp://:8080/}'
-

- -

and this on the Kodi end

- -

-echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/ \
-  > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
-

- -

Still bad image quality, though. But I did discover that streaming -a DVD using dvdsimple:///dev/dvd as the source had excellent video and -audio quality, so I guess the issue is in the input or transcoding -parts, not the rtsp part. I've tried to change the vb and ab -parameters to use more bandwidth, but it did not make a -difference.

- -

I further received a suggestion from Einar Haraldseid to try using -gstreamer instead of VLC, and this proved to work great! He also -provided me with the trick to get Kodi to use a multicast stream as -its source. By using this monstrous oneliner, I can stream my desktop -with good video quality in reasonable framerate to the 239.255.0.1 -multicast address on port 1234: - -

-gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
-  videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
-  x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
-  key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
-  mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
-  udpsink host=239.255.0.1 port=1234 ttl-mc=1 auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
-  pulsesrc device=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | \
-    grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' |  cut -d" " -f2|head -1) ! \
-  audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux.
-

- -

and this on the Kodi end

- -

-echo udp://@239.255.0.1:1234 \
-  > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
-

- -

Note the trick to pick a valid pulseaudio source. It might not -pick the one you need. This approach will of course lead to trouble -if more than one source uses the same multicast port and address. -Note the ttl-mc=1 setting, which limit the multicast packages to the -local network. If the value is increased, your screen will be -broadcasted further, one network "hop" for each increase (read up on -multicast to learn more. :)!

- -

Having cracked how to get Kodi to receive multicast streams, I -could use this VLC command to stream to the same multicast address. -The image quality is way better than the rtsp approach, but gstreamer -seem to be doing a better job.

- -

-cvlc screen:// --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{mux=ts,dst=239.255.0.1,port=1234,sdp=sap}'
-

- -

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

TotalovervÃ¥kning av innbyggernes bevegelser - nei takk!

16th April 2020

Jeg er blitt spurt hva jeg synes om lansering av smittestopp-appen, +overvÃ¥kningslÃ¸sningen lansert av Folkehelseinstituttet, +Simula-senteret og Regjeringen i dag, fulgt av klare trusler fra +regjeringen om konsekvenser hvis befolkningen ikke tar den i bruk. +Rekker ikke skrive noe fyldig om temaet, men det er klart for meg at +den utraderer retten til privatliv samt utgjÃ¸r en personlig +sikkerhetsrisiko for alle som tar den i bruk. Bare det er nok til at +det fremstÃ¥r som en svert dÃ¥rlig ide Ã¥ bli med pÃ¥ denne "dugnaden". +Det finnes andre og bedre tilnÃ¦rminger enn den valgt av FHI. Har de +valgt den for Ã¥ sikre seg nok et datasett i den fremtidige +ehelse-portalen? Potensialet for misbruk av informasjon samlet inn av +appen er for stort, effekten pÃ¥ neste krise for klar og gevinsten for +liten.

+ +

For Ã¥ si det med forhenvÃ¦rende leder i Datatilsynet, Georg Apenes, +som skrev i en kronikk den gang Datatilsynet vernet +privatsfÃ¦ren at +Â«SENTRALT +I en liberal forestillingsverden finner vi aksept av borgerens rett +til Ã¥ kunne velge Ã¥ vÃ¦re i fred; Ã¥ vÃ¦re u-iakttatt, uregistrert og +anonymÂ». Det er ikke uten grunn han startet kronikken med +Â«Personvern et fremmedord i enkelte av de statsorganene som samler +inn, oppbevarer og bruker personopplysningerÂ». Der har nok +statsorganene bare blitt dÃ¥rligere pÃ¥ 13 Ã¥r.

+ +

Det er jo ogsÃ¥ verdt Ã¥ merke seg at personvernrÃ¥det i EU (EDPB) +mener smittestopp-appen +opererer +i strid med prinsippet om dataminimering. OgsÃ¥ de ser at det +finnes mye bedre mÃ¥ter Ã¥ gjÃ¸re dette pÃ¥.

+ + +

Som vanlig, hvis du bruker Bitcoin og Ã¸nsker Ã¥ vise din stÃ¸tte til +det jeg driver med, setter jeg pris pÃ¥ om du sender Bitcoin-donasjoner +til min adresse +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b. +Merk, betaling med bitcoin er ikke anonymt. :)

- Tags: debian, english, video. + Tags: norsk, surveillance.

@@ -169,121 +71,31 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

What is the most supported MIME type in Debian in 2018?

9th July 2018

Five years ago, -I -measured what the most supported MIME type in Debian was, by -analysing the desktop files in all packages in the archive. Since -then, the DEP-11 AppStream system has been put into production, making -the task a lot easier. This made me want to repeat the measurement, -to see how much things changed. Here are the new numbers, for -unstable only this time: - -

Debian Unstable:

- -

-  count MIME type
-  ----- -----------------------
-     56 image/jpeg
-     55 image/png
-     49 image/tiff
-     48 image/gif
-     39 image/bmp
-     38 text/plain
-     37 audio/mpeg
-     34 application/ogg
-     33 audio/x-flac
-     32 audio/x-mp3
-     30 audio/x-wav
-     30 audio/x-vorbis+ogg
-     29 image/x-portable-pixmap
-     27 inode/directory
-     27 image/x-portable-bitmap
-     27 audio/x-mpeg
-     26 application/x-ogg
-     25 audio/x-mpegurl
-     25 audio/ogg
-     24 text/html
-

- -

The list was created like this using a sid chroot: "cat -/var/lib/apt/lists/*sid*_dep11_Components-amd64.yml.gz| zcat | awk '/^ -- \S+\/\S+$/ {print $2 }' | sort | uniq -c | sort -nr | head -20"

- -

It is interesting to see how image formats have passed text/plain -as the most announced supported MIME type. These days, thanks to the -AppStream system, if you run into a file format you do not know, and -want to figure out which packages support the format, you can find the -MIME type of the file using "file --mime <filename>", and then -look up all packages announcing support for this format in their -AppStream metadata (XML or .desktop file) using "appstreamcli -what-provides mimetype <mime-type>. For example if you, like -me, want to know which packages support inode/directory, you can get a -list like this:

- -

-% appstreamcli what-provides mimetype inode/directory | grep Package: | sort
-Package: anjuta
-Package: audacious
-Package: baobab
-Package: cervisia
-Package: chirp
-Package: dolphin
-Package: doublecmd-common
-Package: easytag
-Package: enlightenment
-Package: ephoto
-Package: filelight
-Package: gwenview
-Package: k4dirstat
-Package: kaffeine
-Package: kdesvn
-Package: kid3
-Package: kid3-qt
-Package: nautilus
-Package: nemo
-Package: pcmanfm
-Package: pcmanfm-qt
-Package: qweborf
-Package: ranger
-Package: sirikali
-Package: spacefm
-Package: spacefm
-Package: vifm
-%
-

- -

Using the same method, I can quickly discover that the Sketchup file -format is not yet supported by any package in Debian:

- -

-% appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/vnd.sketchup.skp
-Could not find component providing 'mimetype::application/vnd.sketchup.skp'.
-%
-

- -

Yesterday I used it to figure out which packages support the STL 3D -format:

- -

-% appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/sla|grep Package
-Package: cura
-Package: meshlab
-Package: printrun
-%
-

- -

PS: A new version of Cura was uploaded to Debian yesterday.

- -

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

Ny URL til den frie norske stavekontrollen

21st March 2020

Det er lenge siden jeg har sett pÃ¥ den norske stavekontrollen, sist +jeg skrev om temaet var i 2016, og i mellomtiden har nettstedet +no.speling.org forsvunnet, og bÃ¥de git-depotet pÃ¥ Alioth og +mailman-tjenesten som hadde epostlistene for oversettelser blitt lagt +ned. Men bokmÃ¥l og nynorsk trenger fortsatt stavekontroll, sÃ¥ etter +et par purringer fra en som har lyst til Ã¥ forbedre stavekontrollen +har jeg endelig fÃ¥tt lagt ut ny offentlig kopi av git-depotet. Jeg +valgte gitlab foran github.. Siste utgave av stavekontrollen kan +hentes ned fra +https://gitlab.com/norwegian-language-tools/spell-norwegian. +Ingen ny versjon i denne omgang altsÃ¥, bare et nytt sted Ã¥ samle +forbedringer til den frie norske stavekontrollen. :) + +

- Tags: debian, english, isenkram. + Tags: norsk, stavekontroll.

@@ -291,74 +103,95 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

Debian APT upgrade without enough free space on the disk...

8th July 2018

Quite regularly, I let my Debian Sid/Unstable chroot stay untouch -for a while, and when I need to update it there is not enough free -space on the disk for apt to do a normal 'apt upgrade'. I normally -would resolve the issue by doing 'apt install <somepackages>' to -upgrade only some of the packages in one batch, until the amount of -packages to download fall below the amount of free space available. -Today, I had about 500 packages to upgrade, and after a while I got -tired of trying to install chunks of packages manually. I concluded -that I did not have the spare hours required to complete the task, and -decided to see if I could automate it. I came up with this small -script which I call 'apt-in-chunks':

- -

-#!/bin/sh
-#
-# Upgrade packages when the disk is too full to upgrade every
-# upgradable package in one lump.  Fetching packages to upgrade using
-# apt, and then installing using dpkg, to avoid changing the package
-# flag for manual/automatic.
-
-set -e
-
-ignore() {
-    if [ "$1" ]; then
-	grep -v "$1"
-    else
-	cat
-    fi
-}
-
-for p in $(apt list --upgradable | ignore "$@" |cut -d/ -f1 | grep -v '^Listing...'); do
-    echo "Upgrading $p"
-    apt clean
-    apt install --download-only -y $p
-    for f in /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb; do
-	if [ -e "$f" ]; then
-	    dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb
-	    break
-	fi
-    done
-done
-

- -

The script will extract the list of packages to upgrade, try to -download the packages needed to upgrade one package, install the -downloaded packages using dpkg. The idea is to upgrade packages -without changing the APT mark for the package (ie the one recording of -the package was manually requested or pulled in as a dependency). To -use it, simply run it as root from the command line. If it fail, try -'apt install -f' to clean up the mess and run the script again. This -might happen if the new packages conflict with one of the old -packages. dpkg is unable to remove, while apt can do this.

- -

It take one option, a package to ignore in the list of packages to -upgrade. The option to ignore a package is there to be able to skip -the packages that are simply too large to unpack. Today this was -'ghc', but I have run into other large packages causing similar -problems earlier (like TeX).

- -

Update 2018-07-08: Thanks to Paul Wise, I am aware of two -alternative ways to handle this. The "unattended-upgrades ---minimal-upgrade-steps" option will try to calculate upgrade sets for -each package to upgrade, and then upgrade them in order, smallest set -first. It might be a better option than my above mentioned script. -Also, "aptutude upgrade" can upgrade single packages, thus avoiding -the need for using "dpkg -i" in the script above.

Nikita version 0.5 released - updated free software archive API server

2nd March 2020

Today, after many months of development, a new release of +Nikita +Noark 5 core project was finally +announced +on the project mailing list. The Nikita free software solution is +an implementation of the Norwegian archive standard Noark 5 used by +government offices in Norway. These were the changes in version 0.5 +since version 0.4, see the email link above for links to a demo +site:

+ +

Updated to Noark 5 versjon 5.0 API specification. +
- Changed formatting of _links from [] to {} to match IETF draft + on JSON HAL.
- Merged Registrering og Basisregistrering in version 4 to + combined Registrering.
- DokumentObjekt is now subtype of ArkivEnhet.
- Introducing new entity Arkivnotat.
- Changed all relation keys to use /v5/ instead of /v4/.
- Corrected to use new official relation keys when possible.
- Renamed Sakspart to Part and connect it to Mappe, Registrering + and Dokumentbeskrivelse instead of only Saksmappe.
- Moved Korrespondansepart connection from Journalpost to + Registrering.
- Moved Part and Korrespondansepart from package sakarkiv to + arkivstruktur.
- Renamed presedensstatus to presedensStatus.
- Use new JSON content-type "application/vnd.noark5+json".
- Updated prepopulated format list to use PRONOM codes.
- Implemented endpoint for system information.
- Implemented national identifiers for both file and record.
- Implemented comments.
- implemented sign off.
- implemented conversion.
Improved/implemented OData search and paging support for more entities.
No longer exposes attribute Dokumentobjekt.referanseDokumentfil, + one should use the relation in _links instead.
Corrected relation keys under + https://rel.arkivverket.no/noark5/v5/api/administrasjon/, replacing + 'administrasjon' with 'admin'.
Fixed several security and stability issues discovered by Coverity.
Corrected handling ETag errors, now return code 409.
Improved handling of Kryssreferanse.
Changed internal database model to use UUID/SystemID as primary keys + in tables.
Changed internal database table names to use package prefix.
Changed time zone handling for date and datetime attributes, to be + more according to the new definition in the API specification.
Change revoke-token to only drop token on POST requests, not GET.
Updated to newer Spring version.
Changed primary key and URL component for metadata code lists to + use the 'kode' value instead of a SystemID.
Corrected implementation of Part and Sakspart.
Changed instance lists with subtypes (like .../registrering/ and + .../mappe/) to include the attributes and _links entries for the + subtype in the supertype lists.
Adjusted _links relations to make it possible to figure out the + entity of an instance using the self->href->relation key lookup + method.
Fixed several end points to make sure GET, PUT, POST and DELETE + match each other.
Updated DELETE endpoints to work with UUID based entity + identifiers.
Restructured code to use more common URL related constants in entry + point values and replace @RequestMapping with method specific + annotations.
Added first unit test code.
Updated web GUI to work with the updated API.
Changed integer fields, enforce them as numeric.
Rewrote and simplify metadata handling to use common service and + controller code instead of duplicating for each type.
Implemented the remaining metadata types.
Changed Country list source from Wikipedia to Debian iso-codes and + updated the list of Countries.
Many many corrections and improvements.

+ +

If free and open standardized archiving API sound interesting to +you, please contact us on IRC +(#nikita on +irc.freenode.net) or email +(nikita-noark +mailing list).

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address @@ -367,7 +200,7 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: english, noark5, nuug, offentlig innsyn, standard.

@@ -375,23 +208,31 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

The worlds only stone power plant?

30th June 2018

So far, at least hydro-electric power, coal power, wind power, -solar power, and wood power are well known. Until a few days ago, I -had never heard of stone power. Then I learn about a quarry in a -mountain in -Bremanger i -Norway, where -the -Bremanger Quarry company is extracting stone and dumping the stone -into a shaft leading to its shipping harbour. This downward movement -in this shaft is used to produce electricity. In short, it is using -falling rocks instead of falling water to produce electricity, and -according to its own statements it is producing more power than it is -using, and selling the surplus electricity to the Norwegian power -grid. I find the concept truly amazing. Is this the worlds only -stone power plant?

Blockchain and IoT articles accepted into Records Management Journal

27th February 2020

On Tuesday, two scietific articles we have been working on for a +while, was finally accepted for publication into +Records +Management Journal. Still waiting for the assigned DOI urls to +start working, but you can have a look at the LaTeX originals here.

+ +

The first article is +"A +record-keeping approach to managing IoT-data for government +agencies" (DOI +10.1108/RMJ-09-2019-0056) by Thomas SÃ¸dring, Petter Reinholdtsen +and David Massey, and sketches some approaches for storing measurement +data (aka Internet of Things sensor data) in a archive, thus providing +a well defined mechanism for screening and deletion of the information

+ +

The second article is +"Publishing +and using record-keeping structural information in a blockchain" +(DOI +10.1108/RMJ-09-2019-0050 ) by Thomas SÃ¸dring, Petter Reinholdtsen +and Svein Ãlnes, where we describe a way for third parties to validate +authenticity and thus improve trust in the records kept in a +archive.

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address @@ -400,7 +241,7 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

- Tags: english. + Tags: english, noark5.

@@ -408,66 +249,45 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

Add-on to control the projector from within Kodi

26th June 2018

My movie playing setup involve Kodi, -OpenELEC (probably soon to be -replaced with LibreELEC) and an -Infocus IN76 video projector. My projector can be controlled via both -a infrared remote controller, and a RS-232 serial line. The vendor of -my projector, InFocus, had been -sensible enough to document the serial protocol in its user manual, so -it is easily available, and I used it some years ago to write -a -small script to control the projector. For a while now, I longed -for a setup where the projector was controlled by Kodi, for example in -such a way that when the screen saver went on, the projector was -turned off, and when the screen saver exited, the projector was turned -on again.

- -

A few days ago, with very good help from parts of my family, I -managed to find a Kodi Add-on for controlling a Epson projector, and -got in touch with its author to see if we could join forces and make a -Add-on with support for several projectors. To my pleasure, he was -positive to the idea, and we set out to add InFocus support to his -add-on, and make the add-on suitable for the official Kodi add-on -repository.

- -

The Add-on is now working (for me, at least), with a few minor -adjustments. The most important change I do relative to the master -branch in the github repository is embedding the -pyserial module in -the add-on. The long term solution is to make a "script" type -pyserial module for Kodi, that can be pulled in as a dependency in -Kodi. But until that in place, I embed it.

- -

The add-on can be configured to turn on the projector when Kodi -starts, off when Kodi stops as well as turn the projector off when the -screensaver start and on when the screesaver stops. It can also be -told to set the projector source when turning on the projector. - -

If this sound interesting to you, check out -the -project github repository. Perhaps you can send patches to -support your projector too? As soon as we find time to wrap up the -latest changes, it should be available for easy installation using any -Kodi instance.

- -

For future improvements, I would like to add projector model -detection and the ability to adjust the brightness level of the -projector from within Kodi. We also need to figure out how to handle -the cooling period of the projector. My projector refuses to turn on -for 60 seconds after it was turned off. This is not handled well by -the add-on at the moment.

- -

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

Redaksjon pÃ¥ plass for Noark 5 tjenestegrensesnitt

5th February 2020

Arbeidet med Ã¥ lage et godt, fritt og Ã¥pent standardisert maskinelt +grensesnitt for arkivering, med tilhÃ¸rende fri +programvareimplementasjon fortsetter. Jeg snakker om +Noark +5 Tjenestegrensesnitt og +Nikita. +Siste nytt etter +seminaret +for noen dager siden, er vi i Nikita-prosjektet har fÃ¥tt beskjed +fra Arkivverket at det blir satt ned en redaksjon for Ã¥ videreutvikle +spesifikasjonen. Redaksjonen bestÃ¥r av Mona Danielsen og Anne Sofie +Knutsen ved arkivverket, Thomas SÃ¸dring ved OsloMet, og meg selv fra +NUUG. De to sistenevnte tar seg av de Ã¥penbare forbedringene, mens +hele redaksjonen diskuterer tvilstilfeller. Jeg hÃ¥per dette vil bidra +til at vi lykkes i Ã¥ gjÃ¸re denne protokollspesifikasjonen sÃ¥ entydig +og klar at den vil bidra til et velfungerende marked for +arkivsystemer, og sikre at programmer som trenger Ã¥ snakke med +arkivsystemet kan snakke med enhver implementasjon av +API-spesifikasjonen. Nikita er den fÃ¸rste implementasjonen, men det +bÃ¸r blir flere.

+ +

Det gjenstÃ¥r riktig nok endel fÃ¸r vi er i mÃ¥l, selv om svÃ¦rt mye +allerede er pÃ¥ plass. Med innspill og forslag til forbedringer fra +alle som vil ha et leverandÃ¸ruavhengig og fullstendig +datamaskinlesbart grensesnitt til arkivet, sÃ¥ tror jeg vi vil +lykkes.

+ +

- Tags: english, multimedia, video. + Tags: noark5, norsk, standard.

@@ -475,71 +295,35 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

youtube-dl for nedlasting fra NRK med undertekster - nice free software

28th April 2018

I VHS-kassettenes -tid var det rett frem Ã¥ ta vare pÃ¥ et TV-program en Ã¸nsket Ã¥ kunne se -senere, uten Ã¥ vÃ¦re avhengig av at programmet ble sendt pÃ¥ nytt. -Kanskje Ã¸nsket en Ã¥ se programmet pÃ¥ hytten der det ikke var -TV-signal, eller av andre grunner ha det tilgjengelig for fremtidig -fornÃ¸yelse. Dette er blitt vanskeligere med introduksjon av -digital-TV og webstreaming, der opptak til harddisk er utenfor de -flestes kontroll hvis de bruker ufri programvare og bokser kontrollert -av andre. Men for NRK her i Norge, finnes det heldigvis flere fri -programvare-alternativer, som jeg har -skrevet -om -fÃ¸r. -SÃ¥ lenge kilden for nedlastingen er lovlig lagt ut pÃ¥ nett (hvilket -jeg antar NRK gjÃ¸r), sÃ¥ er slik lagring til privat bruk ogsÃ¥ lovlig i -Norge.

- -

Sist jeg sÃ¥ pÃ¥ saken, i 2016, nevnte jeg at -youtube-dl ikke kunne -bake undertekster fra NRK inn i videofilene, og at jeg derfor -foretrakk andre alternativer. Nylig oppdaget jeg at dette har endret -seg. Fordelen med youtube-dl er at den er tilgjengelig direkte fra -Linux-distribusjoner som Debian -og Ubuntu, slik at en slipper Ã¥ -finne ut selv hvordan en skal fÃ¥ dem til Ã¥ virke.

- -

For Ã¥ laste ned et NRK-innslag med undertekster, og fÃ¥ den norske -underteksten pakket inn i videofilen, sÃ¥ kan fÃ¸lgende kommando -brukes:

- -

-youtube-dl --write-sub --sub-format ttml \
-  --convert-subtitles srt --embed-subs \
-  https://tv.nrk.no/serie/ramm-ferdig-gaa/MUHU11000316/27-04-2018
-

- -

URL-eksemplet er dagens toppsak pÃ¥ tv.nrk.no. Resultatet er en -MP4-fil med filmen og undertekster som kan spilles av med VLC. Merk -at VLC ikke viser frem undertekster fÃ¸r du aktiverer dem. For Ã¥ gjÃ¸re -det, hÃ¸yreklikk med musa i fremviservinduet, velg menyvalget for -undertekst og sÃ¥ norsk sprÃ¥k. Jeg testet ogsÃ¥ '--write-auto-sub', -men det kommandolinjeargumentet ser ikke ut til Ã¥ fungere, sÃ¥ jeg -endte opp med settet med argumentlisten over, som jeg fant i en -feilrapport i youtube-dl-prosjektets samling over feilrapporter.

- -

Denne stÃ¸tten i youtube-dl gjÃ¸r det svÃ¦rt enkelt Ã¥ lagre -NRK-innslag, det vÃ¦re seg nyheter, filmer, serier eller dokumentater, -for Ã¥ ha dem tilgjengelig for fremtidig referanse og bruk, uavhengig -av hvor lenge innslagene ligger tilgjengelig hos NRK. SÃ¥ fÃ¥r det ikke -hjelpe at NRKs jurister mener at det er -vesensforskjellig -Ã¥ legge tilgjengelig for nedlasting og for streaming, nÃ¥r det rent -teknisk er samme sak.

- -

Programmet youtube-dl stÃ¸tter ogsÃ¥ en rekke andre nettsteder, se -prosjektoversikten for -en -komplett liste.

Artikkel om Noark 5 Tjenestegrensesnitt og Nikita i ArkivrÃ¥d nummer 3 for 2019

26th December 2019

Like fÃ¸r julaften ble en artikkel jeg har skrevet om vedlikehold av +Noark +5 Tjenestegrensesnitt og Nikita publisert i tidsskriftet ArkivrÃ¥d. +Det er basert pÃ¥ +min bloggpost +om samme tema som ble publisert 2019-03-11. Jeg oppdaget nettopp +at nettsiden til tidsskriftet ArkivrÃ¥d er oppdatert med siste utgave, +og artikkelen dermed er tilgjengelig for alle. Du finner den i +PDF-en +til nummer 2019/3 pÃ¥ side 30-33. Jeg hÃ¥per leserne av +tidsskriftet fÃ¥r lyst til Ã¥ sjekke ut tjenestegrensesnittet og at +artikkelen vil gjÃ¸re det enklere for flere Ã¥ bidra til en enda bedre, +klarere og mer entydig API-spesifikasjon. Det kan gjÃ¸re at +arkivsystemet +Nikita kan bli enda bedre nÃ¥r spesifikasjonen forbedres.

+ +

- Tags: multimedia, nice free software, norsk, video, web. + Tags: noark5, norsk, standard.

@@ -547,27 +331,61 @@ komplett liste.

Stortingsflertallet gÃ¥r inn for ny IP-basert sensurinfrastruktur i Norge

24th April 2018

VG, -Dagbladet -og -NRK -melder i dag at flertallet i Familie- og kulturkomiteen pÃ¥ Stortinget -har bestemt seg for Ã¥ introdusere en ny sensurinfrastruktur i Norge. -Fra fÃ¸r har Norge en Â«frivilligÂ» sensurinfrastruktur basert pÃ¥ -DNS-navn, der de stÃ¸rste ISP-ene basert pÃ¥ en liste med DNS-navn -forgifter DNS-svar og omdirigerer til et annet IP-nummer enn det som -ligger i DNS. NÃ¥ kommer altsÃ¥ IP-basert omdirigering i tillegg. NÃ¥r -infrastrukturen er pÃ¥ plass, er sensur av IP-adresser redusert et -spÃ¸rsmÃ¥l om hvilke IP-nummer som skal blokkeres. Listen over -IP-adresser vil naturligvis endre seg etter hvert som myndighetene -endrer seg. Det er ingen betryggende tanke.

MeningslÃ¸st, men for hvem...

25th December 2019

En historie som har betydd endel for meg, og som jeg av og til +tenker pÃ¥ nÃ¥r hverdagen tynger, ble sÃ¥ vidt jeg har klart Ã¥ finne ut, +skrevet av Loren +Eiseley i +flere ulike varianter. PÃ¥ norsk tror jeg den gÃ¥r under navnet +Â«Gutten og sjÃ¸stjernenÂ», og jeg fant en oversettelse av en utgave av den +hos +Quora. +Fant ogsÃ¥ en +filmatisering, men den versjonen jeg liker best fant jeg +hos +Goodreads. Jeg oversatte den utgaven til norsk i gÃ¥r, og har lyst +til Ã¥ dele den med deg: + +

Mens jeg tok en pause fra skrivingen og vandret pÃ¥ en +Ã¸de strand ved daggry, sÃ¥ jeg en gutt i det fjerne bÃ¸ye seg ned og +kaste noe mens han vandret mot meg over den endelÃ¸se stranden. Da han +kom nÃ¦rmere, kunne jeg se at han kastet sjÃ¸stjerner, som var etterlatt +i sanden av tidevannet, tilbake i havet. Da han var nÃ¦r nok spurte jeg +ham hvorfor han jobbet sÃ¥ hardt pÃ¥ denne merkelige oppgaven. Han sa at +solen snart ville stÃ¥ opp og tÃ¸rke sjÃ¸stjernene slik at de ville +dÃ¸.
+ +
Jeg sa til ham at dette var helt meningslÃ¸st. Det var kilometer pÃ¥ +kilometer med strand, og det lÃ¥ sjÃ¸stjerner hele veien. En person +alene kunne ikke gjÃ¸re noen forskjell. Han smilte da han plukket opp +neste sjÃ¸stjerne. Mens han kastet den sÃ¥ langt ut i havet som han +klarte sa han, Â«for denne gjÃ¸r det en forskjellÂ». Jeg droppet +skrivingen og tilbrakte resten av morgenen med Ã¥ kaste +sjÃ¸stjerner.
+ +
- Loren Eiseley
+

+ +

Kanskje noe du ogsÃ¥ kan ha glede av Ã¥ tenke pÃ¥ nÃ¥r ting virker +hÃ¥plÃ¸st?

+ +

Teksten er gjengitt og oversatt basert pÃ¥ utgaven pÃ¥ Good Read, +uten tillatelse fra noen andre enn meg selv. Jeg hÃ¥per pÃ¥ tilgivelse, +hvis det er et problem for noen, da det er gjort i beste mening. Hvis +eventuell rettighetshaver tar kontakt vil jeg fjerne teksten og i +stedet legge ut henvendelsen der teksten kreves fjernet.

+ +

- Tags: norsk, sikkerhet. + Tags: norsk.

@@ -575,40 +393,27 @@ endrer seg. Det er ingen betryggende tanke.

En grunn til Ã¥ takke nei til usikker digital post

2nd April 2018

Brevpost er beskyttet av straffelovens bestemmelse som gjÃ¸r det -kriminelt Ã¥ Ã¥pne andres brev. Dette fÃ¸lger av (ny) straffelovs -Â§ 205 -(Krenkelse av retten til privat kommunikasjon), som sier at Â«Med -bot eller fengsel inntil 2 Ã¥r straffes den som uberettiget ... c) -Ã¥pner brev eller annen lukket skriftlig meddelelse som er adressert -til en annen, eller pÃ¥ annen mÃ¥te skaffer seg uberettiget tilgang til -innholdet.Â» Dette gjelder sÃ¥vel postbud som alle andre som har -befatning med brevet etter at avsender har befatning med et lukket -brev. Tilsvarende stÃ¥r ogsÃ¥ tidligere utgaver av den norske -straffeloven.

- -

NÃ¥r en registrerer seg pÃ¥ usikre digitale postkasselÃ¸sningene, som -f.eks. Digipost og e-Boks, og slik tar disse i bruk, sÃ¥ gir en de som -stÃ¥r bak lÃ¸sningene tillatelse til Ã¥ Ã¥pne sine brev. Dette er -nÃ¸dvendig for at innholdet i digital post skal kunne vises frem til -mottaker via tjenestens websider. Dermed gjelder ikke straffelovens -paragraf om forbud mot Ã¥ Ã¥pne brev, da tilgangen ikke lenger er -uberettiget. En gir altsÃ¥ fremmede tilgang til Ã¥ lese sin -korrespondanse. I tillegg vil bruk av slike usikre digitale -postbokser fÃ¸re til at det blir registrert nÃ¥r du leser brevene, hvor -du befinner deg (vha. tilkoblingens IP-adresse), hvilket utstyr du -bruker og en rekke annen personlig informasjon som ikke er -tilgjengelig nÃ¥r papirpost brukes. Jeg foretrekker at det er -lovmessig beskyttelse av min korrespondanse, som jo inneholder privat -og personlig informasjon. Det bidrar til litt bedre vern av personlig -integritet i dagens norske samfunn.

Artikkel om Nikita i Arkheion nummer 2019/2

9th December 2019

Jeg hadde i dag gleden av Ã¥ oppdage at en artikkel om +arkivsystemet +Nikita som vi skrev i sommer, nÃ¥ er publisert i +Arkheion, fagtidsskrift for kommunial +arkivsektor. Du finner artikkelen pÃ¥ side 30-33 i nummer 2019/2, +PDF kan lastes ned fra nettstedet til tidsskriftet. Kanskje +publiseringen kan fÃ¸re til at noen flere fÃ¥r Ã¸ynene opp for verdien av +et Ã¥pent standardisert API for arkivering og sÃ¸k i arkivet.

+ +

- Tags: norsk, personvern, surveillance. + Tags: noark5, norsk, standard.

@@ -616,34 +421,54 @@ integritet i dagens norske samfunn.

Self-appointed leaders of the Free World

22nd March 2018

The leaders of the worlds have started to congratulate the -re-elected Russian head of state, and this causes some criticism. I -am though a little fascinated by a comment from USA senator John McCain, -sited -by The Hill and others: - -

-
"An American president does not lead the Free World by -congratulating dictators on winning sham elections."
-

- -

While I totally agree with the senator here, the way the quote is -phrased make me suspect that he is unaware of the simple fact that USA -have not lead the Free World since at least before its government -kidnapped a -completely innocent Canadian citizen in transit on his way home to -Canada via John F. Kennedy International Airport in September 2002 and -sent him to be tortured in Syria for a year.

- -

USA might be running ahead, but the path they are taking is not the -one taken by any Free World.

When terms and policy turn users away

7th December 2019

When asked to accept terms of use and privacy policies that state +it will to remove rights I otherwise had or accept unreasonable terms +undermining my privacy, I choose away the service. I simply do not +have the conscience to accept terms I have no indention of upholding. +But how are the system and service providers to know how many people +they scared away? Normally I just quietly walk away. But today, I +tried a new approach. I sent the following email (removing the +specifics, as I am not out to take the specific service in question) +to the service provider I decided to not use, to at least give them +one data point on how many users are unhappy with their terms:

+ +

+From: Petter Reinholdtsen +
Subject: When terms of use turn users away +
To: [contact@some.site] +
Date: Sat, 07 Dec 2019 16:30:56 +0100 + +
Dear [Site Owner],
+ +
I was eager to test the system, as it seemed like a fun and +interesting application of [some] technology, but after reading the +terms of use and privacy policy on <URL: +https://www.[some.site]/terms-of-use > and <URL: +https://www.[some.site]/privacy-policy > I want you to know that I +decided to turn away. There were several provisions in the terms and +policy turning me off, but the final term that convinced me was being +asked to sign away my right to reverse engineer.
+ +
-- +
Happy hacking +
Petter Reinholdtsen
+

+ +

I do not expect much to come out of it, but sharing it here in case +others want to give something similar a try too. If companies +discover their terms scare away enough people, perhaps they will be +improved...

+ +

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

- Tags: english. + Tags: english, personvern.

@@ -651,63 +476,61 @@ one taken by any Free World.

Facebooks ability to sell your personal information is the real Cambridge Analytica scandal

21st March 2018

So, Cambridge Analytica is getting some well deserved criticism for -(mis)using information it got from Facebook about 50 million people, -mostly in the USA. What I find a bit surprising, is how little -criticism Facebook is getting for handing the information over to -Cambridge Analytica and others in the first place. And what about the -people handing their private and personal information to Facebook? -And last, but not least, what about the government offices who are -handing information about the visitors of their web pages to Facebook? -No-one who looked at the terms of use of Facebook should be surprised -that information about peoples interests, political views, personal -lifes and whereabouts would be sold by Facebook.

- -

What I find to be the real scandal is the fact that Facebook is -selling your personal information, not that one of the buyers used it -in a way Facebook did not approve when exposed. It is well known that -Facebook is selling out their users privacy, but a scandal -nevertheless. Of course the information provided to them by Facebook -would be misused by one of the parties given access to personal -information about the millions of Facebook users. Collected -information will be misused sooner or later. The only way to avoid -such misuse, is to not collect the information in the first place. If -you do not want Facebook to hand out information about yourself for -the use and misuse of its customers, do not give Facebook the -information.

- -

Personally, I would recommend to completely remove your Facebook -account, and take back some control of your personal information. -According -to The Guardian, it is a bit hard to find out how to request -account removal (and not just 'disabling'). You need to -visit -a specific Facebook page and click on 'let us know' on that page -to get to the -real account deletion screen. Perhaps something to consider? I -would not trust the information to really be deleted (who knows, -perhaps NSA, GCHQ and FRA already got a copy), but it might reduce the -exposure a bit.

- -

If you want to learn more about the capabilities of Cambridge -Analytica, I recommend to see the video recording of the one hour talk -Paul-Olivier Dehaye gave to NUUG last april about - -Data collection, psychometric profiling and their impact on -politics.

- -

And if you want to communicate with your friends and loved ones, -use some end-to-end encrypted method like -Signal or -Ring, and stop sharing your private -messages with strangers like Facebook and Google.

What would it cost to store all 2018 phone calls in Norway?

25th November 2019

Four years ago, I did a back of the envelope calculation on +how +much it would cost to store audio recordings of all the phone calls in +Norway, and came up with NOK 2.1 million / EUR 250 000 for the +year 2013. It is time to repeat the calculation using updated +numbers. The calculation is based on how much data storage is needed +for each minute of audio, how many minutes all the calls in Norway +sums up to, multiplied by the cost of data storage.

+ +

The number of phone call minutes for 2018 was fetched from +the NKOM statistics +site, and for 2018, land line calls are listed as 434 238 000 +minutes, while mobile phone calls are listed with 7 542 006 000 +minutes. The total number of minutes is thus 7 976 244 000. For +simplicity, I decided to ignore any advantages in audio compression the +last four years, and continue to assume 60 Kbytes/min as the last +time.

+ +

Storage prices still varies a lot, but as last time, I decide to +take a reasonable big and cheap hard drive, and double its price to +include the surrounding costs into account. A 10 TB disk cost less +than 4500 NOK / 450 EUR these days, and doubling it give 9000 NOK per +10 TB.

+ +

So, with the parameters in place, lets update the old table +estimating cost for calls in a given year:

+ + + + + + + + + + +

Year	Call minutes	Size	Price in NOK / EUR
2005	24 000 000 000	1.3 PiB	1 170 000 / 117 000
2012	18 000 000 000	1.0 PiB	900 000 / 90 000
2013	17 000 000 000	950 TiB	855 000 / 85 500
2018	7 976 244 000	445 TiB	401 100 / 40 110

+ +

Both the cost of storage and the number of phone call minutes have +dropped since the last time, bringing the cost down to a level where I +guess even small organizations can afford to store the audio recording +from every phone call taken in a year in Norway. Of course, this is +just the cost of buying the storage equipment. Maintenance, need to +be included as well, but the volume of a single year is about a single +rack of hard drives, so it is not much more than I could fit in my own +home. Wonder how much the electricity bill would raise if I had that +kind of storage? I doubt it would be more than a few tens of thousand +NOK per year.

- Tags: english, personvern. + Tags: english, personvern, surveillance.

@@ -722,6 +545,42 @@ messages with strangers like Facebook and Google.

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