X-Git-Url: http://pere.pagekite.me/gitweb/homepage.git/blobdiff_plain/bcfa7524ccdedac6146786bc5eed73cd5f22cab4..f29f99052afe6957717bd71b319c2bcc57210b7a:/blog/index.rss diff --git a/blog/index.rss b/blog/index.rss index 421d115001..e6b1048fbf 100644 --- a/blog/index.rss +++ b/blog/index.rss @@ -7,714 +7,728 @@ - New chrpath release 0.16 - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html - Tue, 14 Jan 2014 11:00:00 +0100 - <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to -find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code -analysis. It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very -useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of -the source. The company behind it provide -<a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as -a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are -already checked. A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at -the Coverity system, and discovered that the -<a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and -<a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a> -projects I am involved with was already registered. But these are -fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to -check, and decided to <ahref="scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request -checking of the chrpath project</a>. It was -added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects. Six of -these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an -error. Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction -of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it -is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in -the future end up in a library. Having fixed all defects and added -<a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a -mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to -publish a new release. These are the release notes:</p> - -<p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p> - -<ul> - - <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li> - <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li> - <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li> - -</ul> - -<p>You can -<a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the -new version 0.16 from alioth</a>. Please let us know via the Alioth -project if something is wrong with the new release. The test suite -did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also -include a test suite check.</p> + Hvordan vurderer regjeringen H.264-patentutfordringen? + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvordan_vurderer_regjeringen_H_264_patentutfordringen_.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvordan_vurderer_regjeringen_H_264_patentutfordringen_.html + Sun, 16 Nov 2014 10:30:00 +0100 + <p>For en stund tilbake spurte jeg Fornyingsdepartementet om hvilke +juridiske vurderinger rundt patentproblemstillingen som var gjort da +H.264 ble tatt inn i <a href="http://standard.difi.no/">statens +referansekatalog over standarder</a>. Stig Hornnes i FAD tipset meg +om følgende som står i oppsumeringen til høringen om +referansekatalogen versjon 2.0, som jeg siden ved hjelp av en +innsynsforespørsel fikk tak i +<a href="http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2?action=AttachFile&do=get&target=kongelig-resolusjon.pdf">PDF-utgaven av</a> +datert 2009-06-03 (saksnummer 200803291, saksbehandler Henrik +Linnestad).</p> + +<p>Der står det følgende om problemstillingen:</p> + +<p><blockquote> +<strong>4.4 Patentproblematikk</strong> + +<p>NUUG og Opera ser det som særlig viktig at forslagene knyttet til +lyd og video baserer seg på de royalty-frie standardene Vorbis, Theora +og FLAC.</p> + +<p>Kommentarene relaterer seg til at enkelte standarder er åpne, men +inneholder tekniske prosedyrer som det i USA (og noen andre land som +Japan) er gitt patentrettigheter til. I vårt tilfelle berører dette +spesielt standardene Mp3 og H.264, selv om Politidirektoratet peker på +at det muligens kan være tilsvarende problematikk også for Theora og +Vorbis. Dette medfører at det i USA kan kreves royalties for bruk av +tekniske løsninger knyttet til standardene, et krav som også +håndheves. Patenter kan imidlertid bare hevdes i de landene hvor +patentet er gitt, så amerikanske patenter gjelder ikke andre steder +enn USA.</p> + +<p>Spesielt for utvikling av fri programvare er patenter +problematisk. GPL, en "grunnleggende" lisens for distribusjon av fri +programvare, avviser at programvare kan distribueres under denne +lisensen hvis det inneholder referanser til patenterte rutiner som +utløser krav om royalties. Det er imidlertid uproblematisk å +distribuere fri programvareløsninger under GPL som benytter de +aktuelle standardene innen eller mellom land som ikke anerkjenner +patentene. Derfor finner vi også flere implementeringer av Mp3 og +H.264 som er fri programvare, lisensiert under GPL.</p> + +<p>I Norge og EU er patentlovgivningen langt mer restriktiv enn i USA, +men det er også her mulig å få patentert metoder for løsning av et +problem som relaterer seg til databehandling. Det er AIF bekjent ikke +relevante patenter i EU eller Norge hva gjelder H.264 og Mp3, men +muligheten for at det finnes patenter uten at det er gjort krav om +royalties eller at det senere vil gis slike patenter kan ikke helt +avvises.</p> + +<p>AIF mener det er et behov for å gi offentlige virksomheter mulighet +til å benytte antatt royaltyfrie åpne standarder som et likeverdig +alternativ eller i tillegg til de markedsledende åpne standardene.</p> + +</blockquote></p> + +<p>Det ser dermed ikke ut til at de har vurdert patentspørsmålet i +sammenheng med opphavsrettsvilkår slik de er formulert for f.eks. +Apple Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere Pro, Avid og Sorenson-verktøyene, +der det kreves brukstillatelse for patenter som ikke er gyldige i +Norge for å bruke disse verktøyene til annet en personlig og ikke +kommersiell aktivitet når det gjelder H.264-video. Jeg må nok lete +videre etter svar på det spørsmålet.</p> - Debian Edu interview: Dominik George - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Dominik_George.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Dominik_George.html - Wed, 25 Dec 2013 13:40:00 +0100 - <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux -project</a> consist of both newcomers and old timers, and this time I -was able to get an interview with a newcomer in the project who showed -up on the IRC channel a few weeks ago to let us know about his -successful installation of Debian Edu Wheezy in his School. Say hello -to <a href="https://www.ohloh.net/accounts/Natureshadow">Dominik -George</a>.</p> - -<!-- http://www.dominik-george.de/images/foto.jpg --> - -<p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p> - -<p>I am a 23 year-old student from Germany who has spent half of his -life with open source. In "real life", I am, as already mentioned, a -student in the fields of Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, -Information Technologies and Anglistics. Due to my (only partially -voluntary) huge engagement in the open source world, these things are -a bit vacant right now however.</p> - -<p>I also have been working as a project teacher at a Gymasnium -(public school) for various years now. I took up that work some time -around 2005 when still attending that school myself and have continued -it until today. I also had been running the (kind of very advanced) -network of that school together with a team of very interested and -talented students in the age of 11 to 15 years, who took the chance to -learn a lot about open source and networking before I left the school -to help building another school's informational education concept from -scratch.</p> - -<p>That said, one might see me as a kind of "glue" between school kids -and the elderly of teachers as well as between the open source -ecosystem and the (even more complex) educational ecosystem.</p> - -<p>When I am not busy with open source or education, I like Geocaching -and cycling.</p> - -<p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu -project?</strong></p> - -<p>I think that happened some time around 2009 when I first attended -<a href="http://www.froscon.org">FrOSCon</a> and visited the project -booth. I think I wasn't too interested back then because I used to -have an attitude of disliking software that does too much stuff on its -own. Maybe I was too inexperienced to realise the upsides of an -"out-of-the-box" solution ;).</p> - -<p>The first time I actively talked to Skolelinux people was at -<a href="http://www.openrheinruhr.de">OpenRheinRuhr</a> 2011 when the -BiscuIT project, a home-grewn software used by my school for various -really cool things from timetables and class contact lists to lunch -ordering, student ID card printing and project elections first got to -a stage where it could have been published. I asked the Skolelinux -guys running the booth if the project were interested in it and gave a -small demonstration, but there wasn't any real feedback and the guys -seemed rather uninterested.</p> - -<p>After I left the school where I developed the software, it got -mostly lost, but I am now reimplementing it for my new school. I have -reusability and compatibility in mind, and I hop there will be a new -basis for contributing it to the Skolelinux project ;)!</p> - -<p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian -Edu?</strong></p> - -<p>The most important advantage seems to be that it "just -works". After overcoming some minor (but still very annoying) glitches -in the installer, I got a fully functional, working school network, -without the month-long hassle I experienced when setting all that up -from scratch in earlier years. And above that, it rocked - I didn't -have any real hardware at hand, because the school was just founded -and has no money whatsoever, so I installed a combined server (main -server, terminal services and workstation) in a VM on my personal -notebook, bridging the LTSP network interface to the ethernet port, -and then PXE-booted the Windows notebooks that were lying around from -it. I could use 8 clients without any performance issues, by using a -tiny little VM on a tiny little notebook. I think that's enough to say -that it rocks!</p> - -<p>Secondly, there are marketing reasons. Life's bad, and so no -politician will ever permit a setup described as "Debian, an universal -operating system, with some really cool educational tools" while they -will be jsut fine with "Skolelinux, a single-purpose solution for your -school network", even if both turn out to be the very same thing (yes, -this is unfair towards the Skolelinux project, and must not be taken -too seriously - you get the idea, anyway).</p> - -<p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian -Edu?</strong></p> - -<p>I have not been involved with Skolelinux long enough to really -answer this question in a fair way. Thus, please allow me to put it in -other words: "What do you expect from Skolelinux to keep liking it?" I -can list a few points about that:</p> + A Debian package for SMTP via Tor (aka SMTorP) using exim4 + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Debian_package_for_SMTP_via_Tor__aka_SMTorP__using_exim4.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Debian_package_for_SMTP_via_Tor__aka_SMTorP__using_exim4.html + Mon, 10 Nov 2014 13:40:00 +0100 + <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private, +without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal +democracy. But this right is under serious attack these days.</p> + +<p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet +surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by +the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email, +is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor. Such SMTP option would be +a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email +between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails +to the people peeking on the wire. I +<a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed +this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a +lot of useful feedback and suggestions. It also became obvious to me +that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and +documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both +<a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the +Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems +propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p> + +<p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service +providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses +looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion. With such addresses +the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will +go to the correct SMTP server. To do this, one need to configure the +Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept +emails for this .onion domain. To learn more about Exim configuration +in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I +set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to +set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian. Getting it to work +were fairly easy, and +<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the +source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github. I +plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a +useful approach.</p> + +<p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any +mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to +get rid of exim4). Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned +above, build the deb and install it on the machine. Next, run +<tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow +the instructions to get the service up and running. Restart tor and +exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like +this:</p> + +<p><blockquote><pre> +torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \ + --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor. Replace the email +address with your own address to test your server. :)</p> + +<p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made +easier and more automatic. Especially the tor setup need more work. +Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task +should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb +architecture independent. It would probably also make the code easier +to review. The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for +exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd. It would be better if +no daemon and no socket is needed. I suspect it is possible to get +exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a +socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this +system.</p> + +<p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the +<tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over +SMTorP. :)</p> + + + + + First Jessie based Debian Edu released (alpha0) + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Jessie_based_Debian_Edu_released__alpha0_.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Jessie_based_Debian_Edu_released__alpha0_.html + Mon, 27 Oct 2014 20:40:00 +0100 + <p>I am happy to report that I on behalf of the Debian Edu team just +sent out +<a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2014/10/msg00000.html">this +announcement</a>:</p> + +<pre> +The Debian Edu Team is pleased to announce the release of Debian Edu +Jessie 8.0+edu0~alpha0 + +Debian Edu is a complete operating system for schools. Through its +various installation profiles you can install servers, workstations +and laptops which will work together on the school network. With +Debian Edu, the teachers themselves or their technical support can +roll out a complete multi-user multi-machine study environment within +hours or a few days. Debian Edu comes with hundreds of applications +pre-installed, but you can always add more packages from Debian. + +For those who want to give Debian Edu Jessie a try, download and +installation instructions are available, including detailed +instructions in the manual[1] explaining the first steps, such as +setting up a network or adding users. Please note that the password +for the user your prompted for during installation must have a length +of at least 5 characters! + + [1] &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie">https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie</a> &gt; + +Would you like to give your school's computer a longer life? Are you +tired of sneaker administration, running from computer to computer +reinstalling the operating system? Would you like to administrate all +the computers in your school using only a couple of hours every week? +Check out Debian Edu Jessie! + +Skolelinux is used by at least two hundred schools all over the world, +mostly in Germany and Norway. + +About Debian Edu and Skolelinux +=============================== + +Debian Edu, also known as Skolelinux[2], is a Linux distribution based +on Debian providing an out-of-the box environment of a completely +configured school network. Immediately after installation a school +server running all services needed for a school network is set up just +waiting for users and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable +Web-UI. A netbooting environment is prepared using PXE, so after +initial installation of the main server from CD or USB stick all other +machines can be installed via the network. The provided school server +provides LDAP database and Kerberos authentication service, +centralized home directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other +services. The desktop contains more than 60 educational software +packages[3] and more are available from the Debian archive, and +schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE, Xfce and MATE desktop +environment. + + [2] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">http://www.skolelinux.org/</a> &gt; + [3] &lt;URL: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html</a> &gt; + +Full release notes and manual +============================= + +Below the download URLs there is a list of some of the new features +and bugfixes of Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie. The full +list is part of the manual. (See the feature list in the manual[4] for +the English version.) For some languages manual translations are +available, see the manual translation overview[5]. + + [4] &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/Features">https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/Features</a> &gt; + [5] &lt;URL: <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/</a> &gt; + +Where to get it +--------------- + +To download the multiarch netinstall CD release (624 MiB) you can use + + * <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso</a> + * <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso</a> + * rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso . + +The SHA1SUM of this image is: 361188818e036ce67280a572f757de82ebfeb095 + +New features for Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie released 2014-10-27 +=============================================================================== + + +Installation changes +-------------------- + + * PXE installation now installs firmware automatically for the hardware present. + +Software updates +---------------- + +Everything which is new in Debian Jessie 8.0, eg: + + * Linux kernel 3.16.x + * Desktop environments KDE "Plasma" 4.11.12, GNOME 3.14, Xfce 4.10, + LXDE 0.5.6 and MATE 1.8 (KDE "Plasma" is installed by default; to + choose one of the others see manual.) + * the browsers Iceweasel 31 ESR and Chromium 38 + * !LibreOffice 4.3.3 + * GOsa 2.7.4 + * LTSP 5.5.4 + * CUPS print system 1.7.5 + * new boot framework: systemd + * Educational toolbox GCompris 14.07 + * Music creator Rosegarden 14.02 + * Image editor Gimp 2.8.14 + * Virtual stargazer Stellarium 0.13.0 + * golearn 0.9 + * tuxpaint 0.9.22 + * New version of debian-installer from Debian Jessie. + * Debian Jessie includes about 42000 packages available for + installation. + * More information about Debian Jessie 8.0 is provided in the release + notes[6] and the installation manual[7]. + + [6] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes">http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes</a> &gt; + [7] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual">http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual</a> &gt; + +Fixed bugs +---------- + + * Inserting incorrect DNS information in Gosa will no longer break + DNS completely, but instead stop DNS updates until the incorrect + information is corrected (Debian bug #710362) + * and many others. + +Documentation and translation updates +------------------------------------- + + * The Debian Edu Jessie Manual is fully translated to German, French, + Italian, Danish and Dutch. Partly translated versions exist for + Norwegian Bokmal and Spanish. + +Other changes +------------- + + * Due to new Squid settings, powering off or rebooting the main + server takes more time. + * To manage printers localhost:631 has to be used, currently www:631 + doesn't work. + +Regressions / known problems +---------------------------- + + * Installing LTSP chroot fails with a bug related to eatmydata about + exim4-config failing to run its postinst (see Debian bug #765694 + and Debian bug #762103). + * Munin collection is not properly configured on clients (Debian bug + #764594). The fix is available in a newer version of munin-node. + * PXE setup for Main Server and Thin Client Server setup does not + work when installing on a machine without direct Internet access. + Will be fixed when Debian bug #766960 is fixed in Jessie. -<ul> +See the status page[8] for the complete list. - <li>always strive to get all things integrated into Debian upstream - <li>be open to discussion about changes and the like, even with newcomers - <li>be helpful at being helpful ;) + [8] &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie</a> &gt; -</ul> +How to report bugs +------------------ + +&lt;URL: <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a> &gt; + +About Debian +============ + +The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly +free community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of +the largest and most influential open source projects. Thousands of +volunteers from all over the world work together to create and +maintain Debian software. Available in 70 languages, and supporting a +huge range of computer types, Debian calls itself the universal +operating system. -<p>I'm really sorry I cannot say much more about that :(!</p> - -<p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p> - -<p>First of all, all software I use is free and open. I have abandoned -all non-free software (except for firmware on my darned phone) this -year.</p> - -<p>I run Debian GNU/Linux on all PC systems I use. On that, I mostly -run text tools. I use -<a href="https://www.mirbsd.org/mksh.htm">mksh</a> as shell, -<a href="https://www.mirbsd.org/jupp.htm">jupp</a> as very advanced -text editor (I even got the developer to help me write a script/macro -based full-featured student management software with the two), -<a href="http://mcabber.com/">mcabber</a> for XMPP and -<a href="http://www.irssi.org/">irssi</a> for IRC. For that overly -coloured world called the WWW, I use -<a href="https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/">Iceweasel -(Firefox)</a>. Oh, and <a href="http://www.mutt.org/">mutt</a> for -e-mail.</p> - -<p>However, while I am personally aware of the fact that text tools -are more efficient and powerful than anything else, I also use (or at -least operate) some tools that are suitable to bring open source to -kids. One of these things is <a href="http://jappix.org/">Jappix</a>, -which I already introduced to some kids even before they got aware of -Facebook, making them see for themselves that they do not need -Facebook now ;).</p> - -<p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to -get schools to use free software?</strong></p> - -<p>Well, that's a two-sided thing. One side is what I believe, and one -side is what I have experienced.</p> - -<p>I believe that the right strategy is showing them the benefits. But -that won't work out as long as the acceptance of free alternatives -grows globally. What I mean is that if all the kids are almost forced -to use Windows, Facebook, Skype, you name it at home, they will not -see why they would want to use alternatives at school. I have seen -students take seat in front of a fully-functional, modern Debian -desktop that could do anything their Windows at home could do, and -they jsut refused to use it because "Linux sucks". It is something -that makes the council of our city spend around 600000 € to buy -software - not including hardware, mind you - for operating school -networks, and for installing a system that, as has been proved, does -not work. For those of you readers who are good at maths, have you -already found out how many lives could have been saved with that money -if we had instead used it to bring education to parts of the world -that need it? I have, and found it to be nothing less dramatic than -plain criminal.</p> - -<p>That said, the only feasible way appears to be the bottom up -method. We have to bring free software to kids and parents. I have -founded an association named -<a href="https://www.teckids.org">Teckids</a> here in Germany that does -just that. We organise several events for kids and adolescents in the -area of free and open source software, for example the -<a href="http://kids.froscon.org">FrogLabs</a>, which share staff with -Teckids and are the youth programme of -<a href="http://www.froscon.org">the Free and Open Source Software -Conference (FrOSCon)</a>. We do a lot more than most other conferences -- this year, we first offered the FrogLabs as a holiday camp for kids -aged 10 to 16. It was a huge success, with approx. 30 kids taking part -and learning with and about free software through a whole weekend. All -of us had a lot of fun, and the results were really exciting.</p> - -<p>Apart from that, we are preparing a campaign that is supposed to bring -the message of free alternatives to stuff kids use every day to them and -their parents, e.g. the use of Jabber / Jappix instead of Facebook and -Skype. To make that possible, we are planning to get together a team of -clever kids who understand very well what their peers need and can bring -it across to them. So we will have a peer-driven network of adolescents -who teach each other and collect feedback from the community of minors. -We then take that feedback and our own experience to work closely with -open source projects, such as Skolelinux or Jappix, at improving their -software in a way that makes it more and more attractive for the target -group. At least I hope that we will have good cooperation with -Skolelinux in the future ;)!</p> - -<p>So in conclusion, what I believe is that, if it weren't for the world -being so bad, it should be very clear to the political decision makers -that the only way to go nowadays is free software for various reasons, -but I have learnt that the only way that seems to work is bottom up.</p> - -<!-- - -> * Who should be interviewed with this questions in the future? - -That's probably the hardest question of them all, as I do not know the -community. However, I would be willing to do the following: - - <li>Run an interview with a German headteacher who is very open to - free software, and also prefers it, but cannot really use it because - of the decision makers above; - <li>Run interviews with some kids, both with and without previous - knowledge about free software - -If that is wanted, just let me know ;). - ---> +Contact Information +For further information, please visit the Debian web pages[9] or send +mail to press@debian.org. + + [9] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.debian.org/">http://www.debian.org/</a> &gt; +</pre> - Dugnadsnett for alle stiller på Oslo Maker Faire i januar 2014 - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnadsnett_for_alle_stiller_p__Oslo_Maker_Faire_i_januar_2014.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnadsnett_for_alle_stiller_p__Oslo_Maker_Faire_i_januar_2014.html - Tue, 10 Dec 2013 19:20:00 +0100 - <p>Helga 18. og 19. januar 2014 arrangeres -<a href="http://makerfaireoslo.no/no/program/dugnadsnett">Oslo Maker -Faire</a>, og <a href="http://www.dugnadsnett.no/">Dugnadsnett for -alle</a> har fått plass! Planen er å ha et bord med en plakat der vi -forteller om hva Dugnadsnett for alle er for noe, og et lite verksted -der vi hjelper folk som er interessert i å få opp sin egen mesh-node. -Jeg gleder meg til å se hvordan prosjektet blir mottatt der.</p> - -<p>Målet med dugnadsnett for alle i Oslo er å få på plass et datanett -for kommunikasjon ved hjelp av radio-repeaterstasjoner (kalt -mesh-noder) som gjør at en kan direkte kommunisere med slekt, venner -og bekjente i Oslo via andre som deltar i dugnadsnettet, samt gjøre -det mulig komme ut på internett via dugnadsnettet. Første delmål er å -kunne sende SMS-meldinger vha. IP-telefoni løsningen -<a href="http://www.servalproject.org/">Serval project</a> mellom -deltagerne i Dugnadsnett for alle i Oslo. Formålet er å ta tilbake -kontrollen over egen nett-infrastruktur og gjøre det dyrere å bedrive -massiv innsamling av informasjon om borgernes bruk av datanett.</p> - -<p>Høres dette interessant ut? Bli med på prosjektet, fortell oss -hvor du kunne tenke deg å sette opp en radio-repeater (slik at folk i -nærheten kan finne hverandre ved hjelp av -<a href="http://flynor.net/mesh/mesh.php">kartet over planlagte og -eksisterende radio-repeatere</A>), bli med på epostlisten -<a href="http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/dugnadsnett">dugnadsnett -(at) nuug.no</a> og stikk innom -<a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/#dugnadsnett.no">IRC-kanalen -#dugnadsnett.no</a>. Så langt er det planlagt over 40 -radio-repeatere, med VPN-forbindelser via Internet for å la de delene -av nettet som ikke når hverandre via radio kunne snakke med hverandre -likevel.</p> + I spent last weekend recording MakerCon Nordic + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_spent_last_weekend_recording_MakerCon_Nordic.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_spent_last_weekend_recording_MakerCon_Nordic.html + Thu, 23 Oct 2014 23:00:00 +0200 + <p>I spent last weekend at <a href="http://www.makercon.no/">Makercon +Nordic</a>, a great conference and workshop for makers in Norway and +the surrounding countries. I had volunteered on behalf of the +Norwegian Unix Users Group (NUUG) to video record the talks, and we +had a great and exhausting time recording the entire day, two days in +a row. There were only two of us, Hans-Petter and me, and we used the +regular video equipment for NUUG, with a +<a href="http://dvswitch.alioth.debian.org/wiki/">dvswitch</a>, a +camera and a VGA to DV convert box, and mixed video and slides +live.</p> + +<p>Hans-Petter did the post-processing, consisting of uploading the +around 180 GiB of raw video to Youtube, and the result is +<a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/MakerConNordic/">now becoming +public</a> on the MakerConNordic account. The videos have the license +NUUG always use on our recordings, which is +<a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/no/">Creative +Commons Navngivelse-Del på samme vilkår 3.0 Norge</a>. Many great +talks available. Check it out! :)</p> - Debian Edu interview: Klaus Knopper - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Klaus_Knopper.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Klaus_Knopper.html - Fri, 6 Dec 2013 09:50:00 +0100 - <p>It has been a while since I managed to publish the last interview, -but the <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / -Skolelinux</a> community is still going strong, and yesterday we even -had a new school administrator show up on -<a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-edu">#debian-edu</a> to share -his success story with installing Debian Edu at their school. This -time I have been able to get some helpful comments from the creator of -Knoppix, Klaus Knopper, who was involved in a Skolelinux project in -Germany a few years ago.</p> - -<p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p> - -<p>I am Klaus Knopper. I have a master degree in electrical -engineering, and is currently professor in information management at -the university of applied sciences Kaiserslautern / Germany and -freelance Open Source software developer and consultant.</p> - -<p>All of this is pretty much of the work I spend my days with. Apart -from teaching, I'm also conducting some more or less experimental -projects like the <a href="http://www.knoppix.org">Knoppix GNU/Linux live -system</a> (Debian-based like Skolelinux), -<a href="http://www.knopper.net/knoppix-adriane/index-en.html">ADRIANE</a> -(a blind-friendly talking desktop system) and -<a href="http://www.knopper.net/linbo/index-en.html">LINBO</a> -(Linux-based network boot console, a fast remote install and repair -system supporting various operating systems).</p> - -<p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu -project?</strong></p> - -<p>The credit for this have to go to Kurt Gramlich, who is the German -coordinator for Skolelinux. We were looking for an all-in-one open -source community-supported distribution for schools, and Kurt -introduced us to Skolelinux for this purpose.</p> - -<p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian -Edu?</strong></p> - -<ul> - <li>Quick installation,</li> - <li>works (almost) out of the box,</li> - <li>contains many useful software packages for teaching and learning,</li> - <li>is a purely community-based distro and not controlled by a - single company,</li> - <li>has a large number of supporters and teachers who share their - experience and problem solutions.</li> -</ul> - -<p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian -Edu?</strong></p> - -<ul> - <li>Skolelinux is - as we had to learn - not easily upgradable to - the next version. Opposed to its genuine Debian base, upgrading to - a new version means a full new installation from scratch to get it - working again reliably. - - <li>Skolelinux is based on Debian/stable, and therefore always a - little outdated in terms of program versions compared to Edubuntu or - similar educational Linux distros, which rather use Debian/testing - as their base. - - <li>Skolelinux has some very self-opinionated and stubborn default - configuration which in my opinion adds unnecessary complexity and is - not always suitable for a schools needs, the preset network - configuration is actually a core definition feature of Skolelinux - and not easy to change, so schools sometimes have to change their - network configuration to make it "Skolelinux-compatible". - - <li>Some proposed extensions, which were made available as - contribution, like secure examination mode and lecture material - distribution and collection, were not accepted into the mainline - Skolelinux development and are now not easy to maintain in the - future because of Skolelinux somewhat undeterministic update - schemes.</li> - - <li>Skolelinux has only a very tiny number of base developers - compared to Debian.</li> - -</ul> - -<p>For these reasons and experience from our project, I would now -rather consider using plain Debian for schools next time, until -Skolelinux is more closely integrated into Debian and becomes -upgradeable without reinstallation.</p> - -<p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p> - -<p>GNU/Linux with LXDE desktop, bash for interactive dialog and -programming, texlive for documentation and correspondence, -occasionally LibreOffice for document format conversion. Various -programming languages for teaching.</p> - -<p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to -get schools to use free software?</strong></p> - -<p>Strong arguments are</p> - -<ul> - - <li>Knowledge is free, and so should be methods and tools for - teaching and learning.</li> - - <li>Students can learn with and use the same software at school, at - home, and at their working place without running into license or - conversion problems.</li> - - <li>Closed source or proprietary software hides knowledge rather - than exposing it, and proprietary software vendors try to bind - customers to certain products. But teachers need to teach - science, not products.</li> - - <li>If you have everything you for daily work as open source, what - would you need proprietary software for?</li> - -</ul> + listadmin, the quick way to moderate mailman lists - nice free software + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/listadmin__the_quick_way_to_moderate_mailman_lists___nice_free_software.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/listadmin__the_quick_way_to_moderate_mailman_lists___nice_free_software.html + Wed, 22 Oct 2014 20:00:00 +0200 + <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on +alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to +operate. First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password +and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate +and various options for each email address. This take a while for +every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good +job as a list moderator. But there is a quick alternative, +<a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the +listadmin program</a>. It allow you to check lists for new messages +to moderate in a fraction of a second. Here is a test run on two +lists I recently took over:</p> + +<p><blockquote><pre> +% time listadmin xiph +fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue +fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue + +real 0m1.709s +user 0m0.232s +sys 0m0.012s +% +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that +there are no message in the moderation queue. Every morning I +currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two +minutes. When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days +ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue. It took me +less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin +program.</p> + +<p>If you install +<a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin +package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt> +with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p> + +<p><blockquote><pre> +username username@example.org +spamlevel 23 +default discard +discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list." + +password secret +adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list} +mailman-list@lists.example.com + +password hidden +other-list@otherserver.example.org +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>There are other options to set as well. Check the manual page to +learn the details.</p> + +<p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where +the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a +generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment +variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p> + +<p><blockquote><pre> +PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you +can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the +initial screen dump (the xiph argument). Using an argument, only +lists matching the argument string will be processed. This make it +quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your +email.</p> + +<p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68 +mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the +process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of +time I could spend elsewhere over the years. It truly is nice free +software.</p> + +<p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +<b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p> + +<p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in +configuration example. Also, I've been told that the +PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone. Not +sure why.</p> - Dugnadsnett for alle, a wireless community network in Oslo, take shape - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnadsnett_for_alle__a_wireless_community_network_in_Oslo__take_shape.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnadsnett_for_alle__a_wireless_community_network_in_Oslo__take_shape.html - Sat, 30 Nov 2013 10:10:00 +0100 - <p>If you want the ability to electronically communicate directly with -your neighbors and friends using a network controlled by your peers in -stead of centrally controlled by a few corporations, or would like to -experiment with interesting network technology, the -<a href="http://www.dugnadsnett.no/">Dugnasnett for alle i Oslo</a> -might be project for you. 39 mesh nodes are currently being planned, -in the freshly started initiative from NUUG and Hackeriet to create a -wireless community network. The work is inspired by -<a href="http://freifunk.net/">Freifunk</a>, -<a href="http://www.awmn.net/">Athens Wireless Metropolitan -Network</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roofnet">Roofnet</a> -and other successful mesh networks around the globe. Two days ago we -held a workshop to try to get people started on setting up their own -mesh node, and there we decided to create a new mailing list -<a href="http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/dugnadsnett">dugnadsnett -(at) nuug.no</a> and IRC channel -<a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/#dugnadsnett.no">#dugnadsnett.no</a> to -coordinate the work. See also the NUUG blog post -<a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/E_postliste_og_IRC_kanal_for_Dugnadsnett_for_alle_i_Oslo.shtml">announcing -the mailing list and IRC channel</a>.</p> + Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html + Fri, 17 Oct 2014 14:10:00 +0200 + <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the +problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly. +And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian. +Normally something more is needed. But thanks to +<a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram +package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy +to do this using simple preseeding.</p> + +<p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install +firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by +the kernel modules for the hardware). (It can also install user space +programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus +of this story.)</p> + +<p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding +values are needed. First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed +into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed +in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system. This is done by +preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the +isenkram-cli package. The package name is next passed to debootstrap +for installation. With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel +will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific +packages for the machine being installed and install them, because +isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p> + +<p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because +most firmware unfortunately is non-free. This is done by preseeding +the apt-mirror-setup step. This is unfortunate, but for a lot of +hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p> + +<p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get +firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p> + +<p><blockquote><pre> +base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli +apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install +both firmware and user space packages when using this method. It also +do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later. Installing both +firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you +want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware +and one for user space programs. The firmware task is enabled by +default, while the one for user space programs is not. This split is +implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p> + +<p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how +this recipe work for you. :)</p> + +<p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work. First and +foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever +files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/. So the +isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find. First there +is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p> + +<p><blockquote><pre> +Task: isenkram-packages +Section: hardware +Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram) + Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are + proposed. +Test-new-install: show show +Relevance: 8 +Packages: for-current-hardware + +Task: isenkram-firmware +Section: hardware +Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram) + Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware + packages are proposed. +Test-new-install: mark show +Relevance: 8 +Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task +should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in +/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/. The scripts use other scripts to get a +list of packages to install. The for-current-hardware-firmware script +look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine: + +<p><blockquote><pre> +#!/bin/sh +# +PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH +export PATH +isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by +tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p> + +<p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is +installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test +--new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would +install.</p> + +<p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be +pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to +install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p> - Hvor godt fungerer Linux-klienter mot MS Exchange? - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvor_godt_fungerer_Linux_klienter_mot_MS_Exchange_.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvor_godt_fungerer_Linux_klienter_mot_MS_Exchange_.html - Tue, 26 Nov 2013 18:50:00 +0100 - <p>Jeg -<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_pent_m_te_p__onsdag_om_bruken_av_Microsoft_Exchange_ved_Universitetet_i_Oslo.html">skrev -i juni om protestene</a> på planene til min arbeidsplass, -<a href="http://www.uio.no/">Universitetet i Oslo</a>, om å gå bort fra -fri programvare- og åpne standardløsninger for å håndtere epost, -vekk fra IETF-standarden SIEVE for filtrering av epost og over til -godseide spesifikasjoner og epostsystemet Microsoft Exchange. -Protestene har fått litt ny omtale i media de siste dagene, i tillegg -til de oppslagene som kom i mai.</p> - -<ul> - -<li>2013-11-26 <a href="http://www.version2.dk/artikel/gigantisk-outlook-konvertering-moeder-protester-paa-universitet-55147">Gigantisk Outlook-konvertering møder protester på universitet</a> - versjon2.dk</li> - -<li>2013-11-25 - <a href="http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article279407.ece">Microsoft-protest - på Universitetet</a> - Computerworld</li> - -<li>2013-11-25 - <a href="http://www.uniforum.uio.no/nyheter/2013/11/uio-bor-bruke-apen-programvare.html">Kjemper - mot innføring av Microsoft Exchange på UiO</a> - Uniforum</li> - -<li>2013-11-25 - <a href="http://www.uniforum.uio.no/nyheter/2013/11/uio-utsetter-innforing-av-nytt-e-postsystem.html">Utsetter - innføring av nytt e-postsystem</a> - Uniforum</li> - -<li>2013-05-29 - <a href="http://universitas.no/nyhet/58462/forsvarer-nytt-it-system">Forsvarer - nytt IT-system</a> - Universitas</li> - -<li>2013-05-23 - <a href="http://www.uniforum.uio.no/nyheter/2013/05/uio-innforer-nytt-epost-og-kalendersystem.html">UiO - innfører nytt epost- og kalenderverktøy</a> - Uniforum</li> - -<li>2013-05-22 - <a href="http://universitas.no/nyhet/58424/protestgruppe-vil-stanse-it-system">Protestgruppe - vil stanse IT-system</a> - Universitas</li> - -<li>2013-05-15 - <a href="http://www.uniforum.uio.no/leserbrev/2013/uio-ma-ha-kontroll-over-sitt-eget-epostsystem.html">UiO - må ha kontroll over sitt eget epostsystem</a> - Uniforum</li> - -</ul> - -<p>Prosjektledelsen har fortalt at dette skal fungere like godt for -Linux-brukere som for brukere av Microsoft Windows og Apple MacOSX, -men jeg lurer på hva slags erfaringer Linux-brukere i eksisterende -miljøer som bruker MS Exchange har gjort. Hvis du har slik erfaring -hadet det vært veldig fint om du kan send et leserbrev til -<a href="http://www.uniforum.uio.no/">Uniforum</a> og fortelle om hvor -greit det er å bruke Exchange i kryss-platform-miljøer? De jeg har -snakket med sier en greit får lest e-posten sin hvis Exchange har -slått på IMAP-funksjonalitet, men at kalender og møtebooking ikke -fungerer godt for Linux-klienter. Jeg har ingen personlig erfaring å -komme med, så jeg er nysgjerrig på hva andre kan dele av erfaringer -med universitetet.</p> - -<p>Mitt ankerpunkt mot å bytte ut fri programvare som fungerer godt -med godseid programvare er at en mister kontroll over egen -infrastruktur, låser seg inn i en løsning det vil bli dyrt å komme ut -av, uten at en får funksjonalitet en ikke kunne skaffet seg med fri -programvare, eventuelt videreutviklet med de pengene som brukes på -overgangen til MS Exchange. Personlig planlegger jeg å fortsette å -laste ned all eposten min til lokal maskin for indeksering og lesing -med <a href=="http://notmuchmail.org">notmuch</a>, så jeg håper jeg -ikke blir veldig skadelidende av overgangen.</p> - -<p><a href="http://dinis.linguateca.pt/Diana/ImotMSUiO.html">Underskriftslista -for oss som er mot endringen</a>, som omtales i artiklene, er fortsatt -åpen for de som vil signere på oppropet. Akkurat nå er det 298 -personer som har signert.</p> + Ubuntu used to show the bread prizes at ICA Storo + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ubuntu_used_to_show_the_bread_prizes_at_ICA_Storo.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ubuntu_used_to_show_the_bread_prizes_at_ICA_Storo.html + Sat, 4 Oct 2014 15:20:00 +0200 + <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen. Above the +bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu +with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck +on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p> + +<p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p> + +<p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known +about this hidden Linux installation. It is interesting what +<a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p> - New chrpath release 0.15 - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html - Sun, 24 Nov 2013 09:30:00 +0100 - <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that -development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my -acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath, -the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already -compiled ELF programs. The update was triggered by the persistence of -Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get -support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he -is working on. I checked the -<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>, -<a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and -<a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a> -packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from -OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes. -These are the release notes:</p> - -<p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p> + New lsdvd release version 0.17 is ready + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_lsdvd_release_version_0_17_is_ready.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_lsdvd_release_version_0_17_is_ready.html + Sat, 4 Oct 2014 08:40:00 +0200 + <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a> +got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original +developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood. +This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve +Dibb.</p> + +<p>I just wrapped up +<a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a +new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from +<a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the +download page</a>. This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version +0.17.</p> <ul> - <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work - with newer architectures. Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads - up.</li> - - <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li> - - <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and - Matthias Klose.</li> - - <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by - Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li> - - <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in - .dynamic is a NULL terminated string. Based on patch found in - Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li> + <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li> + <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is + non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li> + <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li> + <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li> + <li>Fix include orders</li> + <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li> + <li>Fix the chapter count</li> + <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising + the palette size is the same.</li> + <li>Fix array printing.</li> + <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li> + <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li> + <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings + with more GCC compiler warnings.</li> </ul> -<p>You can -<a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the -new version 0.15 from alioth</a>. Please let us know via the Alioth -project if something is wrong with the new release. The test suite -did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also -include a testsuite check.</p> +<p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various +Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the +project the last nine years. Please check it out. :)</p> - RSS-kilde for fritekstsøk i offentlige anbud hos Doffin - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RSS_kilde_for_friteksts_k_i_offentlige_anbud_hos_Doffin.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RSS_kilde_for_friteksts_k_i_offentlige_anbud_hos_Doffin.html - Fri, 22 Nov 2013 13:40:00 +0100 - <p>I fjor sommer lagde jeg en -<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/SQL_database_med_anbud_publisert_p__Doffin.html">offentlig -tilgjengelig SQL-database over offentlig anbud</a> basert på skraping -av HTML-data fra Doffin. Den har stått og gått siden da, og har nå -ca. 28000 oppføringer. Jeg oppdaget da jeg tittet innom at noen -oppføringer var ikke blitt med, antagelig på grunn av at de fikk -tildelt sekvensnummer i Doffin en godt stund før de ble publisert, -slik at min nettsideskraper som fortsatte skrapingen der den slapp -sist ikke fikk dem med seg. Jeg har fikset litt slik at skraperen nå -ser litt tilbake i tid for å se om den har gått glipp av noen -oppføringer, og har skrapet på nytt fra midten av september 2013 og -fremover. Det bør dermed bli en mer komplett database for kommende -måneder. Hvis jeg får tid skal jeg forsøke å skrape "glemte" data fra -før midten av september 2013, men tør ikke garantere at det blir -prioritert med det første. </p> - -<p>Men målet med denne bloggposten er å vise hvordan denne -Doffin-databasen kan brukes og integreres med en RSS-leser, slik at en -kan la datamaskinen holde et øye med Doffin-annonseringer etter -nøkkelord. En kan lage sitt eget søk ved å besøke -<ahref="https://classic.scraperwiki.com/docs/api?name=norwegian-doffin#sqlite">API-et -hos Scraperwiki</a>, velge format rss2 og så legge inn noe ala dette i -"query in SQL":</p> - -<p><pre> -select title, scrapedurl as link, abstract as description, - publishdate as pubDate from 'swdata' - where abstract like '%linux%' or title like '%linux%' - order by seq desc limit 20 -</pre></p> - -<p>Dette vil søke opp alle anbud med ordet linux i oppsummering eller -tittel. En kan lage mer avanserte søk hvis en ønsker det. URL-en som -dukker opp nederst på siden kan en så gi til sin RSS-leser (jeg bruker -akregator selv), og så automatisk få beskjed hvis det dukker opp anbud -med det aktuelle nøkkelordet i teksten. Merk at kapasiteten og -ytelsen hos Scraperwiki er begrenset, så ikke be RSS-leseren hente ned -oftere enn en gang hver dag.</p> - -<p>Du lurer kanskje på hva slags informasjon en kan få ut fra denne -databasen. Her er to RSS-kilder, med søkeordet -"<a href="https://api.scraperwiki.com/api/1.0/datastore/sqlite?format=rss2&name=norwegian-doffin&query=select%20title%2C%20scrapedurl%20as%20link%2C%20abstract%20as%20description%2C%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20publishdate%20as%20pubDate%20from%20'swdata'%0A%20%20%20where%20abstract%20like%20'%25linux%25'%20or%20title%20like%20'%25linux%25'%0A%20%20%20order%20by%20seq%20desc%20limit%2020">linux</a>", -søkeordet -"<a href="https://api.scraperwiki.com/api/1.0/datastore/sqlite?format=rss2&name=norwegian-doffin&query=select%20title%2C%20scrapedurl%20as%20link%2C%20abstract%20as%20description%2C%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20publishdate%20as%20pubDate%20from%20'swdata'%0A%20%20%20where%20abstract%20like%20'%25fri%20programvare%25'%20or%20title%20like%20'%25fri%20programvare%25'%0A%20%20%20order%20by%20seq%20desc%20limit%2020">fri -programvare</a>" -og søkeordet -"<a href="https://api.scraperwiki.com/api/1.0/datastore/sqlite?format=rss2&name=norwegian-doffin&query=select%20title%2C%20scrapedurl%20as%20link%2C%20abstract%20as%20description%2C%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20publishdate%20as%20pubDate%20from%20'swdata'%0A%20%20%20where%20abstract%20like%20'%25odf%25'%20or%20title%20like%20'%25odf%25'%0A%20%20%20order%20by%20seq%20desc%20limit%2020">odf</a>". -Det er bare å søke på det en er interessert i. Kopier gjerne -datasettet og sett opp din egen tjeneste hvis du vil gjøre mer -avanserte søk. SQLite-filen med Doffin-oppføringer kan lastes med fra -Scraperwiki for de som vil grave dypere.</p> - - - - - All drones should be radio marked with what they do and who they belong to - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/All_drones_should_be_radio_marked_with_what_they_do_and_who_they_belong_to.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/All_drones_should_be_radio_marked_with_what_they_do_and_who_they_belong_to.html - Thu, 21 Nov 2013 15:40:00 +0100 - <p>Drones, flying robots, are getting more and more popular. The most -know ones are the killer drones used by some government to murder -people they do not like without giving them the chance of a fair -trial, but the technology have many good uses too, from mapping and -forest maintenance to photography and search and rescue. I am sure it -is just a question of time before "bad drones" are in the hands of -private enterprises and not only state criminals but petty criminals -too. The drone technology is very useful and very dangerous. To have -some control over the use of drones, I agree with Daniel Suarez in his -TED talk -"<a href="https://archive.org/details/DanielSuarez_2013G">The kill -decision shouldn't belong to a robot</a>", where he suggested this -little gem to keep the good while limiting the bad use of drones:</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>Each robot and drone should have a cryptographically signed -I.D. burned in at the factory that can be used to track its movement -through public spaces. We have license plates on cars, tail numbers on -aircraft. This is no different. And every citizen should be able to -download an app that shows the population of drones and autonomous -vehicles moving through public spaces around them, both right now and -historically. And civic leaders should deploy sensors and civic drones -to detect rogue drones, and instead of sending killer drones of their -own up to shoot them down, they should notify humans to their -presence. And in certain very high-security areas, perhaps civic -drones would snare them and drag them off to a bomb disposal facility.</p> - -<p>But notice, this is more an immune system than a weapons system. It -would allow us to avail ourselves of the use of autonomous vehicles -and drones while still preserving our open, civil society.</p> - -</blockquote> - -<p>The key is that <em>every citizen</em> should be able to read the -radio beacons sent from the drones in the area, to be able to check -both the government and others use of drones. For such control to be -effective, everyone must be able to do it. What should such beacon -contain? At least formal owner, purpose, contact information and GPS -location. Probably also the origin and target position of the current -flight. And perhaps some registration number to be able to look up -the drone in a central database tracking their movement. Robots -should not have privacy. It is people who need privacy.</p> + How to test Debian Edu Jessie despite some fatal problems with the installer + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_Debian_Edu_Jessie_despite_some_fatal_problems_with_the_installer.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_Debian_Edu_Jessie_despite_some_fatal_problems_with_the_installer.html + Fri, 26 Sep 2014 12:20:00 +0200 + <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux +project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a +powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing +web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE +boot of both clients without disk and the installation to install Debian +Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small +to mention here). We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on +the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the +freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the +future. The +<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current +status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of +work left. Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer, +but it is possible to work around these to get anyway. Here is a +recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p> + +<p>First, download the test ISO via +<a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>, +<a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a> +or rsync (use +ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso). +The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every +12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to +install with some tweaking.</p> + +<p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2 +(use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p> + +<p><blockquote><pre> +nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install +</pre></blockquote></p> + +<p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata +optimization. Return to the installation, select the profile you want +and continue. Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install +due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p> + +<p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if +this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be. All my +test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit +your need.</p> + +<p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as +root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the +education-desktop-XXX metapackage. XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce +or mate. If you want several desktop options, install more than one +metapackage. Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working +graphical login screen. This workaround should no longer be needed +once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two +days.</p> + +<p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new +tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to +update the debian-cd git repository. The eatmydata, grub and desktop +issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up +on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again. Well the +eatmydata optimization is really just disabled. The proper fix +require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch +provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>. +The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p> + +<p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are +quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based +installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p> - Lets make a wireless community network in Oslo! - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_wireless_community_network_in_Oslo_.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_wireless_community_network_in_Oslo_.html - Wed, 13 Nov 2013 21:00:00 +0100 - <p>Today NUUG and Hackeriet announced -<a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Bli_med___bygge_dugnadsnett_for_alle_i_Oslo.shtml">our -plans to join forces and create a wireless community network in -Oslo</a>. The workshop to help people get started will take place -Thursday 2013-11-28, but we already are collecting the geolocation of -people joining forces to make this happen. We have -<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/meshfx-node/blob/master/oslo-nodes.geojson">9 -locations plotted on the map</a>, but we will need more before we have -a connected mesh spread across Oslo. If this sound interesting to -you, please join us at the workshop. If you are too impatient to wait -15 days, please join us on the IRC channel -<a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/%23nuug">#nuug on irc.freenode.net</a> -right away. :)</p> + Suddenly I am the new upstream of the lsdvd command line tool + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Suddenly_I_am_the_new_upstream_of_the_lsdvd_command_line_tool.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Suddenly_I_am_the_new_upstream_of_the_lsdvd_command_line_tool.html + Thu, 25 Sep 2014 11:20:00 +0200 + <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a> +to handle my fairly large DVD collection. It is a nice command line +tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length, +etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format. But lsdvd have not seen +any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting +its use with some DVDs. Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I +sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the +project, without any reply. But I use it regularly and would like to +get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version +into Debian</a>. So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with +the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that +he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take +over. And yesterday, I became project admin.</p> + +<p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian +maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream +project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly, +collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place. +I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git +repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too. If you got +a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out +<a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join +<a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing +list</a>. :)</p>