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   3         <channel>
   4                 <title>Petter Reinholdtsen</title>
   5                 <description></description>
   6                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/</link>
   7                 <atom:link href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/index.rss" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
   8
   9         <item>
  10                 <title>How to stay with sysvinit in Debian Jessie</title>
  11                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_stay_with_sysvinit_in_Debian_Jessie.html</link>
  12                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_stay_with_sysvinit_in_Debian_Jessie.html</guid>
  13                 <pubDate>Sat, 22 Nov 2014 01:00:00 +0100</pubDate>
  14                 <description>&lt;p&gt;By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
  15 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
  16 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
  17 courtesy of
  18 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html&quot;&gt;Erich
  19 Schubert&lt;/a&gt; and
  20 &lt;a href=&quot;http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/&quot;&gt;Simon
  21 McVittie&lt;/a&gt;.
  22
  23 &lt;p&gt;If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
  24 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
  25 &lt;tt&gt;/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit&lt;/tt&gt; with this content before
  26 you upgrade:&lt;/p&gt;
  27
  28 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
  29 Package: systemd-sysv
  30 Pin: release o=Debian
  31 Pin-Priority: -1
  32 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;p&gt;
  33
  34 &lt;p&gt;This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
  35 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
  36 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
  37 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
  38 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.&lt;/p&gt;
  39
  40 &lt;p&gt;If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
  41 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
  42 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
  43 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
  44 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
  45 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
  46
  47 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
  48 preseed/late_command=&quot;in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core&quot;
  49 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;p&gt;
  50
  51 &lt;p&gt;Next, the line to use in a preseed file:&lt;/p&gt;
  52
  53 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
  54 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
  55 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;p&gt;
  56
  57 &lt;p&gt;One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
  58 the sysvinit-core package.&lt;/p&gt;
  59
  60 &lt;p&gt;I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
  61 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
  62 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
  63 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
  64 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
  65 Jessie is released.&lt;/p&gt;
  66
  67 &lt;p&gt;Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
  68 &lt;ahref=&quot;https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg&quot;&gt;a
  69 blog post by Torsten Glaser&lt;/a&gt;, added --purge to the preseed
  70 line.&lt;/p&gt;
  71 </description>
  72         </item>
  73
  74         <item>
  75                 <title>Hvordan vurderer regjeringen H.264-patentutfordringen?</title>
  76                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvordan_vurderer_regjeringen_H_264_patentutfordringen_.html</link>
  77                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvordan_vurderer_regjeringen_H_264_patentutfordringen_.html</guid>
  78                 <pubDate>Sun, 16 Nov 2014 10:30:00 +0100</pubDate>
  79                 <description>&lt;p&gt;For en stund tilbake spurte jeg Fornyingsdepartementet om hvilke
  80 juridiske vurderinger rundt patentproblemstillingen som var gjort da
  81 H.264 ble tatt inn i &lt;a href=&quot;http://standard.difi.no/&quot;&gt;statens
  82 referansekatalog over standarder&lt;/a&gt;.  Stig Hornnes i FAD tipset meg
  83 om følgende som står i oppsumeringen til høringen om
  84 referansekatalogen versjon 2.0, som jeg siden ved hjelp av en
  85 innsynsforespørsel fikk tak i
  86 &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2?action=AttachFile&amp;do=get&amp;target=kongelig-resolusjon.pdf&quot;&gt;PDF-utgaven av&lt;/a&gt;
  87 datert 2009-06-03 (saksnummer 200803291, saksbehandler Henrik
  88 Linnestad).&lt;/p&gt;
  89
  90 &lt;p&gt;Der står det følgende om problemstillingen:&lt;/p&gt;
  91
  92 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
  93 &lt;strong&gt;4.4 Patentproblematikk&lt;/strong&gt;
  94
  95 &lt;p&gt;NUUG og Opera ser det som særlig viktig at forslagene knyttet til
  96 lyd og video baserer seg på de royalty-frie standardene Vorbis, Theora
  97 og FLAC.&lt;/p&gt;
  98
  99 &lt;p&gt;Kommentarene relaterer seg til at enkelte standarder er åpne, men
 100 inneholder tekniske prosedyrer som det i USA (og noen andre land som
 101 Japan) er gitt patentrettigheter til. I vårt tilfelle berører dette
 102 spesielt standardene Mp3 og H.264, selv om Politidirektoratet peker på
 103 at det muligens kan være tilsvarende problematikk også for Theora og
 104 Vorbis.  Dette medfører at det i USA kan kreves royalties for bruk av
 105 tekniske løsninger knyttet til standardene, et krav som også
 106 håndheves. Patenter kan imidlertid bare hevdes i de landene hvor
 107 patentet er gitt, så amerikanske patenter gjelder ikke andre steder
 108 enn USA.&lt;/p&gt;
 109
 110 &lt;p&gt;Spesielt for utvikling av fri programvare er patenter
 111 problematisk. GPL, en &quot;grunnleggende&quot; lisens for distribusjon av fri
 112 programvare, avviser at programvare kan distribueres under denne
 113 lisensen hvis det inneholder referanser til patenterte rutiner som
 114 utløser krav om royalties. Det er imidlertid uproblematisk å
 115 distribuere fri programvareløsninger under GPL som benytter de
 116 aktuelle standardene innen eller mellom land som ikke anerkjenner
 117 patentene. Derfor finner vi også flere implementeringer av Mp3 og
 118 H.264 som er fri programvare, lisensiert under GPL.&lt;/p&gt;
 119
 120 &lt;p&gt;I Norge og EU er patentlovgivningen langt mer restriktiv enn i USA,
 121 men det er også her mulig å få patentert metoder for løsning av et
 122 problem som relaterer seg til databehandling. Det er AIF bekjent ikke
 123 relevante patenter i EU eller Norge hva gjelder H.264 og Mp3, men
 124 muligheten for at det finnes patenter uten at det er gjort krav om
 125 royalties eller at det senere vil gis slike patenter kan ikke helt
 126 avvises.&lt;/p&gt;
 127
 128 &lt;p&gt;AIF mener det er et behov for å gi offentlige virksomheter mulighet
 129 til å benytte antatt royaltyfrie åpne standarder som et likeverdig
 130 alternativ eller i tillegg til de markedsledende åpne standardene.&lt;/p&gt;
 131
 132 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 133
 134 &lt;p&gt;Det ser dermed ikke ut til at de har vurdert patentspørsmålet i
 135 sammenheng med opphavsrettsvilkår slik de er formulert for f.eks.
 136 Apple Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere Pro, Avid og Sorenson-verktøyene,
 137 der det kreves brukstillatelse for patenter som ikke er gyldige i
 138 Norge for å bruke disse verktøyene til annet en personlig og ikke
 139 kommersiell aktivitet når det gjelder H.264-video.  Jeg må nok lete
 140 videre etter svar på det spørsmålet.&lt;/p&gt;
 141 </description>
 142         </item>
 143
 144         <item>
 145                 <title>A Debian package for SMTP via Tor (aka SMTorP) using exim4</title>
 146                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Debian_package_for_SMTP_via_Tor__aka_SMTorP__using_exim4.html</link>
 147                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Debian_package_for_SMTP_via_Tor__aka_SMTorP__using_exim4.html</guid>
 148                 <pubDate>Mon, 10 Nov 2014 13:40:00 +0100</pubDate>
 149                 <description>&lt;p&gt;The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
 150 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
 151 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.&lt;/p&gt;
 152
 153 &lt;p&gt;A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
 154 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
 155 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
 156 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
 157 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
 158 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
 159 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
 160 &lt;a href=&quot;http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html&quot;&gt;proposed
 161 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October&lt;/a&gt; and got a
 162 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
 163 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
 164 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
 165 &lt;a href=&quot;https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP&quot;&gt;the
 166 Mailpile&lt;/a&gt; and &lt;a href=&quot;http://dee.su/cables&quot;&gt;the Cables&lt;/a&gt; systems
 167 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.&lt;/p&gt;
 168
 169 &lt;p&gt;To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
 170 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
 171 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
 172 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
 173 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
 174 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
 175 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
 176 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
 177 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
 178 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
 179 were fairly easy, and
 180 &lt;a href=&quot;https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp&quot;&gt;the
 181 source code for the Debian package&lt;/a&gt; is available from github.  I
 182 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
 183 useful approach.&lt;/p&gt;
 184
 185 &lt;p&gt;If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
 186 mail system installed (or run &lt;tt&gt;apt-get purge exim4-config&lt;/tt&gt; to
 187 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
 188 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
 189 &lt;tt&gt;/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service&lt;/tt&gt; and follow
 190 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
 191 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
 192 this:&lt;/p&gt;
 193
 194 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 195 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
 196   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
 197 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 198
 199 &lt;p&gt;This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
 200 address with your own address to test your server. :)&lt;/p&gt;
 201
 202 &lt;p&gt;The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
 203 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
 204 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
 205 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
 206 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
 207 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
 208 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
 209 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
 210 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
 211 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
 212 system.&lt;/p&gt;
 213
 214 &lt;p&gt;Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
 215 &lt;tt&gt;fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion&lt;/tt&gt; mail address, deliverable over
 216 SMTorP. :)&lt;/p&gt;
 217 </description>
 218         </item>
 219
 220         <item>
 221                 <title>First Jessie based Debian Edu released (alpha0)</title>
 222                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Jessie_based_Debian_Edu_released__alpha0_.html</link>
 223                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Jessie_based_Debian_Edu_released__alpha0_.html</guid>
 224                 <pubDate>Mon, 27 Oct 2014 20:40:00 +0100</pubDate>
 225                 <description>&lt;p&gt;I am happy to report that I on behalf of the Debian Edu team just
 226 sent out
 227 &lt;a href=&quot;https://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2014/10/msg00000.html&quot;&gt;this
 228 announcement&lt;/a&gt;:&lt;/p&gt;
 229
 230 &lt;pre&gt;
 231 The Debian Edu Team is pleased to announce the release of Debian Edu
 232 Jessie 8.0+edu0~alpha0
 233
 234 Debian Edu is a complete operating system for schools. Through its
 235 various installation profiles you can install servers, workstations
 236 and laptops which will work together on the school network. With
 237 Debian Edu, the teachers themselves or their technical support can
 238 roll out a complete multi-user multi-machine study environment within
 239 hours or a few days. Debian Edu comes with hundreds of applications
 240 pre-installed, but you can always add more packages from Debian.
 241
 242 For those who want to give Debian Edu Jessie a try, download and
 243 installation instructions are available, including detailed
 244 instructions in the manual[1] explaining the first steps, such as
 245 setting up a network or adding users. Please note that the password
 246 for the user your prompted for during installation must have a length
 247 of at least 5 characters!
 248
 249  [1] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie&quot;&gt;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 250
 251 Would you like to give your school&#39;s computer a longer life? Are you
 252 tired of sneaker administration, running from computer to computer
 253 reinstalling the operating system? Would you like to administrate all
 254 the computers in your school using only a couple of hours every week?
 255 Check out Debian Edu Jessie!
 256
 257 Skolelinux is used by at least two hundred schools all over the world,
 258 mostly in Germany and Norway.
 259
 260 About Debian Edu and Skolelinux
 261 ===============================
 262
 263 Debian Edu, also known as Skolelinux[2], is a Linux distribution based
 264 on Debian providing an out-of-the box environment of a completely
 265 configured school network. Immediately after installation a school
 266 server running all services needed for a school network is set up just
 267 waiting for users and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable
 268 Web-UI. A netbooting environment is prepared using PXE, so after
 269 initial installation of the main server from CD or USB stick all other
 270 machines can be installed via the network.  The provided school server
 271 provides LDAP database and Kerberos authentication service,
 272 centralized home directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other
 273 services.  The desktop contains more than 60 educational software
 274 packages[3] and more are available from the Debian archive, and
 275 schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE, Xfce and MATE desktop
 276 environment.
 277
 278  [2] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.skolelinux.org/&quot;&gt;http://www.skolelinux.org/&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 279  [3] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html&quot;&gt;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 280
 281 Full release notes and manual
 282 =============================
 283
 284 Below the download URLs there is a list of some of the new features
 285 and bugfixes of Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie. The full
 286 list is part of the manual. (See the feature list in the manual[4] for
 287 the English version.) For some languages manual translations are
 288 available, see the manual translation overview[5].
 289
 290  [4] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/Features&quot;&gt;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/Features&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 291  [5] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/&quot;&gt;http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 292
 293 Where to get it
 294 ---------------
 295
 296 To download the multiarch netinstall CD release (624 MiB) you can use
 297
 298  * &lt;a href=&quot;ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso&quot;&gt;ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso&lt;/a&gt;
 299  * &lt;a href=&quot;http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso&quot;&gt;http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso&lt;/a&gt;
 300  * rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso .
 301
 302 The SHA1SUM of this image is: 361188818e036ce67280a572f757de82ebfeb095
 303
 304 New features for Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie released 2014-10-27
 305 ===============================================================================
 306
 307
 308 Installation changes
 309 --------------------
 310
 311  * PXE installation now installs firmware automatically for the hardware present.
 312
 313 Software updates
 314 ----------------
 315
 316 Everything which is new in Debian Jessie 8.0, eg:
 317
 318  * Linux kernel 3.16.x
 319  * Desktop environments KDE &quot;Plasma&quot; 4.11.12, GNOME 3.14, Xfce 4.10,
 320    LXDE 0.5.6 and MATE 1.8 (KDE &quot;Plasma&quot; is installed by default; to
 321    choose one of the others see manual.)
 322  * the browsers Iceweasel 31 ESR and Chromium 38
 323  * !LibreOffice 4.3.3
 324  * GOsa 2.7.4
 325  * LTSP 5.5.4
 326  * CUPS print system 1.7.5
 327  * new boot framework: systemd
 328  * Educational toolbox GCompris 14.07
 329  * Music creator Rosegarden 14.02
 330  * Image editor Gimp 2.8.14
 331  * Virtual stargazer Stellarium 0.13.0
 332  * golearn 0.9
 333  * tuxpaint 0.9.22
 334  * New version of debian-installer from Debian Jessie.
 335  * Debian Jessie includes about 42000 packages available for
 336    installation.
 337  * More information about Debian Jessie 8.0 is provided in the release
 338    notes[6] and the installation manual[7].
 339
 340  [6] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes&quot;&gt;http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 341  [7] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual&quot;&gt;http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 342
 343 Fixed bugs
 344 ----------
 345
 346  * Inserting incorrect DNS information in Gosa will no longer break
 347    DNS completely, but instead stop DNS updates until the incorrect
 348    information is corrected (Debian bug #710362)
 349  * and many others.
 350
 351 Documentation and translation updates
 352 -------------------------------------
 353
 354  * The Debian Edu Jessie Manual is fully translated to German, French,
 355    Italian, Danish and Dutch. Partly translated versions exist for
 356    Norwegian Bokmal and Spanish.
 357
 358 Other changes
 359 -------------
 360
 361  * Due to new Squid settings, powering off or rebooting the main
 362    server takes more time.
 363  * To manage printers localhost:631 has to be used, currently www:631
 364    doesn&#39;t work.
 365
 366 Regressions / known problems
 367 ----------------------------
 368
 369  * Installing LTSP chroot fails with a bug related to eatmydata about
 370    exim4-config failing to run its postinst (see Debian bug #765694
 371    and Debian bug #762103).
 372  * Munin collection is not properly configured on clients (Debian bug
 373    #764594).  The fix is available in a newer version of munin-node.
 374  * PXE setup for Main Server and Thin Client Server setup does not
 375    work when installing on a machine without direct Internet access.
 376    Will be fixed when Debian bug #766960 is fixed in Jessie.
 377
 378 See the status page[8] for the complete list.
 379
 380  [8] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie&quot;&gt;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 381
 382 How to report bugs
 383 ------------------
 384
 385 &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs&quot;&gt;http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 386
 387 About Debian
 388 ============
 389
 390 The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly
 391 free community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of
 392 the largest and most influential open source projects. Thousands of
 393 volunteers from all over the world work together to create and
 394 maintain Debian software. Available in 70 languages, and supporting a
 395 huge range of computer types, Debian calls itself the universal
 396 operating system.
 397
 398 Contact Information
 399 For further information, please visit the Debian web pages[9] or send
 400 mail to press@debian.org.
 401
 402  [9] &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.debian.org/&quot;&gt;http://www.debian.org/&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;
 403 &lt;/pre&gt;
 404 </description>
 405         </item>
 406
 407         <item>
 408                 <title>I spent last weekend recording MakerCon Nordic</title>
 409                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_spent_last_weekend_recording_MakerCon_Nordic.html</link>
 410                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_spent_last_weekend_recording_MakerCon_Nordic.html</guid>
 411                 <pubDate>Thu, 23 Oct 2014 23:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
 412                 <description>&lt;p&gt;I spent last weekend at &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.makercon.no/&quot;&gt;Makercon
 413 Nordic&lt;/a&gt;, a great conference and workshop for makers in Norway and
 414 the surrounding countries.  I had volunteered on behalf of the
 415 Norwegian Unix Users Group (NUUG) to video record the talks, and we
 416 had a great and exhausting time recording the entire day, two days in
 417 a row.  There were only two of us, Hans-Petter and me, and we used the
 418 regular video equipment for NUUG, with a
 419 &lt;a href=&quot;http://dvswitch.alioth.debian.org/wiki/&quot;&gt;dvswitch&lt;/a&gt;, a
 420 camera and a VGA to DV convert box, and mixed video and slides
 421 live.&lt;/p&gt;
 422
 423 &lt;p&gt;Hans-Petter did the post-processing, consisting of uploading the
 424 around 180 GiB of raw video to Youtube, and the result is
 425 &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.youtube.com/user/MakerConNordic/&quot;&gt;now becoming
 426 public&lt;/a&gt; on the MakerConNordic account.  The videos have the license
 427 NUUG always use on our recordings, which is
 428 &lt;a href=&quot;http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/no/&quot;&gt;Creative
 429 Commons Navngivelse-Del på samme vilkår 3.0 Norge&lt;/a&gt;.  Many great
 430 talks available.  Check it out! :)&lt;/p&gt;
 431 </description>
 432         </item>
 433
 434         <item>
 435                 <title>listadmin, the quick way to moderate mailman lists - nice free software</title>
 436                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/listadmin__the_quick_way_to_moderate_mailman_lists___nice_free_software.html</link>
 437                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/listadmin__the_quick_way_to_moderate_mailman_lists___nice_free_software.html</guid>
 438                 <pubDate>Wed, 22 Oct 2014 20:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
 439                 <description>&lt;p&gt;If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
 440 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
 441 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
 442 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
 443 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
 444 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
 445 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
 446 &lt;a href=&quot;http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin&quot;&gt;the
 447 listadmin program&lt;/a&gt;.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
 448 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
 449 lists I recently took over:&lt;/p&gt;
 450
 451 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 452 % time listadmin xiph
 453 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
 454 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
 455
 456 real    0m1.709s
 457 user    0m0.232s
 458 sys     0m0.012s
 459 %
 460 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 461
 462 &lt;p&gt;In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
 463 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
 464 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
 465 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
 466 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
 467 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
 468 program.&lt;/p&gt;
 469
 470 &lt;p&gt;If you install
 471 &lt;a href=&quot;https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin&quot;&gt;the listadmin
 472 package&lt;/a&gt; from Debian and create a file &lt;tt&gt;~/.listadmin.ini&lt;/tt&gt;
 473 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:&lt;/p&gt;
 474
 475 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 476 username username@example.org
 477 spamlevel 23
 478 default discard
 479 discard_if_reason &quot;Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list.&quot;
 480
 481 password secret
 482 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
 483 mailman-list@lists.example.com
 484
 485 password hidden
 486 other-list@otherserver.example.org
 487 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 488
 489 &lt;p&gt;There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
 490 learn the details.&lt;/p&gt;
 491
 492 &lt;p&gt;If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
 493 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
 494 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
 495 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:&lt;/p&gt;
 496
 497 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 498 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
 499 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 500
 501 &lt;p&gt;If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
 502 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
 503 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
 504 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
 505 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
 506 email.&lt;/p&gt;
 507
 508 &lt;p&gt;Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
 509 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
 510 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
 511 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
 512 software.&lt;/p&gt;
 513
 514 &lt;p&gt;As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 515 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 516 &lt;b&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&amp;label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog&quot;&gt;15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/b&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
 517
 518 &lt;p&gt;Update 2014-10-27: Added missing &#39;username&#39; statement in
 519 configuration example.  Also, I&#39;ve been told that the
 520 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
 521 sure why.&lt;/p&gt;
 522 </description>
 523         </item>
 524
 525         <item>
 526                 <title>Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</title>
 527                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html</link>
 528                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html</guid>
 529                 <pubDate>Fri, 17 Oct 2014 14:10:00 +0200</pubDate>
 530                 <description>&lt;p&gt;When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
 531 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
 532 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
 533 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
 534 &lt;a href=&quot;https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html&quot;&gt;my isenkram
 535 package&lt;/a&gt; and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
 536 to do this using simple preseeding.&lt;/p&gt;
 537
 538 &lt;p&gt;The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
 539 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
 540 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
 541 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
 542 of this story.)&lt;/p&gt;
 543
 544 &lt;p&gt;To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
 545 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
 546 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
 547 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
 548 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
 549 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
 550 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
 551 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
 552 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
 553 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.&lt;/p&gt;
 554
 555 &lt;p&gt;Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
 556 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
 557 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
 558 hardware it is the only option in Debian.&lt;/p&gt;
 559
 560 &lt;p&gt;The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
 561 firmware installed automatically by the installer:&lt;/p&gt;
 562
 563 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 564 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
 565 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
 566 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 567
 568 &lt;p&gt;The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
 569 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
 570 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
 571 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
 572 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
 573 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
 574 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
 575 implemented in the package currently in unstable.&lt;/p&gt;
 576
 577 &lt;p&gt;If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
 578 this recipe work for you. :)&lt;/p&gt;
 579
 580 &lt;p&gt;So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
 581 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
 582 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
 583 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
 584 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):&lt;/p&gt;
 585
 586 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 587 Task: isenkram-packages
 588 Section: hardware
 589 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
 590  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
 591  proposed.
 592 Test-new-install: show show
 593 Relevance: 8
 594 Packages: for-current-hardware
 595
 596 Task: isenkram-firmware
 597 Section: hardware
 598 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
 599  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
 600  packages are proposed.
 601 Test-new-install: mark show
 602 Relevance: 8
 603 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
 604 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 605
 606 &lt;p&gt;The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
 607 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
 608 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
 609 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
 610 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
 611
 612 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 613 #!/bin/sh
 614 #
 615 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
 616 export PATH
 617 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
 618 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 619
 620 &lt;p&gt;With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
 621 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)&lt;/p&gt;
 622
 623 &lt;p&gt;If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
 624 installed, run &lt;tt&gt;DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
 625 --new-install&lt;/tt&gt; to get the list of packages that tasksel would
 626 install.&lt;/p&gt;
 627
 628 &lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/&quot;&gt;Debian Edu&lt;/a&gt; will be
 629 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
 630 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.&lt;/p&gt;
 631 </description>
 632         </item>
 633
 634         <item>
 635                 <title>Ubuntu used to show the bread prizes at ICA Storo</title>
 636                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ubuntu_used_to_show_the_bread_prizes_at_ICA_Storo.html</link>
 637                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ubuntu_used_to_show_the_bread_prizes_at_ICA_Storo.html</guid>
 638                 <pubDate>Sat, 4 Oct 2014 15:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
 639                 <description>&lt;p&gt;Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
 640 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
 641 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
 642 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:&lt;/p&gt;
 643
 644 &lt;p align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;&lt;img width=&quot;70%&quot; src=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg&quot;&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 645
 646 &lt;p&gt;If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
 647 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
 648 &lt;a href=&quot;http://revealingerrors.com/&quot;&gt;errors can reveal&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
 649 </description>
 650         </item>
 651
 652         <item>
 653                 <title>New lsdvd release version 0.17 is ready</title>
 654                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_lsdvd_release_version_0_17_is_ready.html</link>
 655                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_lsdvd_release_version_0_17_is_ready.html</guid>
 656                 <pubDate>Sat, 4 Oct 2014 08:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
 657                 <description>&lt;p&gt;The &lt;a href=&quot;https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/&quot;&gt;lsdvd project&lt;/a&gt;
 658 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
 659 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
 660 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
 661 Dibb.&lt;/p&gt;
 662
 663 &lt;p&gt;I just wrapped up
 664 &lt;a href=&quot;https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/&quot;&gt;a
 665 new lsdvd release&lt;/a&gt;, available in git or from
 666 &lt;a href=&quot;https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/&quot;&gt;the
 667 download page&lt;/a&gt;.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
 668 0.17.&lt;/p&gt;
 669
 670 &lt;ul&gt;
 671
 672  &lt;li&gt;Ignore &#39;phantom&#39; audio, subtitle tracks&lt;/li&gt;
 673  &lt;li&gt;Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
 674    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection&lt;/li&gt;
 675  &lt;li&gt;Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles&lt;/li&gt;
 676  &lt;li&gt;Fix pallete display of first entry&lt;/li&gt;
 677  &lt;li&gt;Fix include orders&lt;/li&gt;
 678  &lt;li&gt;Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway&lt;/li&gt;
 679  &lt;li&gt;Fix the chapter count&lt;/li&gt;
 680  &lt;li&gt;Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
 681    the palette size is the same.&lt;/li&gt;
 682  &lt;li&gt;Fix array printing.&lt;/li&gt;
 683  &lt;li&gt;Correct subsecond calculations.&lt;/li&gt;
 684  &lt;li&gt;Add sector information to the output format.&lt;/li&gt;
 685  &lt;li&gt;Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
 686    with more GCC compiler warnings.&lt;/li&gt;
 687
 688 &lt;/ul&gt;
 689
 690 &lt;p&gt;This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
 691 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
 692 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)&lt;/p&gt;
 693 </description>
 694         </item>
 695
 696         <item>
 697                 <title>How to test Debian Edu Jessie despite some fatal problems with the installer</title>
 698                 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_Debian_Edu_Jessie_despite_some_fatal_problems_with_the_installer.html</link>
 699                 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_Debian_Edu_Jessie_despite_some_fatal_problems_with_the_installer.html</guid>
 700                 <pubDate>Fri, 26 Sep 2014 12:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
 701                 <description>&lt;p&gt;The &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.skolelinux.org/&quot;&gt;Debian Edu / Skolelinux
 702 project&lt;/a&gt; provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
 703 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
 704 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
 705 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
 706 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
 707 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
 708 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
 709 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
 710 future.  The
 711 &lt;a href=&quot;https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie&quot;&gt;current
 712 status&lt;/a&gt; can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
 713 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
 714 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
 715 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.&lt;/p&gt;
 716
 717 &lt;p&gt;First, download the test ISO via
 718 &lt;a href=&quot;ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso&quot;&gt;ftp&lt;/a&gt;,
 719 &lt;a href=&quot;http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso&quot;&gt;http&lt;/a&gt;
 720 or rsync (use
 721 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
 722 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
 723 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
 724 install with some tweaking.&lt;/p&gt;
 725
 726 &lt;p&gt;When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
 727 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run&lt;/p&gt;
 728
 729 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
 730 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
 731 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
 732
 733 &lt;p&gt;and add &#39;exit 0&#39; as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
 734 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
 735 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
 736 due to a known bug in eatmydata.&lt;/p&gt;
 737
 738 &lt;p&gt;When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
 739 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
 740 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
 741 your need.&lt;/p&gt;
 742
 743 &lt;p&gt;If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
 744 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
 745 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
 746 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
 747 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
 748 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
 749 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
 750 days.&lt;/p&gt;
 751
 752 &lt;p&gt;I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
 753 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
 754 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
 755 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
 756 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
 757 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
 758 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
 759 provided in bug &lt;a href=&quot;https://bugs.debian.org/702711&quot;&gt;#702711&lt;/a&gt;.
 760 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.&lt;/p&gt;
 761
 762 &lt;p&gt;I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
 763 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
 764 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.&lt;/p&gt;
 765 </description>
 766         </item>
 767
 768         </channel>
 769 </rss>