1 <?xml version=
"1.0" encoding=
"utf-8"?>
2 <rss version='
2.0' xmlns:lj='http://www.livejournal.org/rss/lj/
1.0/'
>
4 <title>Petter Reinholdtsen - Entries tagged english
</title>
5 <description>Entries tagged english
</description>
6 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/
</link>
10 <title>Skolelinux
6 got a video review from Pcwizz
</title>
11 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Skolelinux_6_got_a_video_review_from_Pcwizz.html
</link>
12 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Skolelinux_6_got_a_video_review_from_Pcwizz.html
</guid>
13 <pubDate>Sun,
17 Mar
2013 10:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
14 <description><p
>Via
15 <a href=
"https://twitter.com/pcwizz/status/
313044373262716930">twitter
</a
>
16 I just discovered that
<a href=
"http://pcwizz.net/
">Pcwizz
</a
> have
17 done a
<a href=
"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPzTZ61Pcuc
">video
18 review
</a
> on Youtube of
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.no/
">Skolelinux
19 / Debian Edu
</a
> version
6. He installed the standalone profile and
20 the video show a walk-through of of the menu content, demonstration of
21 a few programs and his view of our distribution.
</p
>
23 <p
>There is also some really nice quotes (transcribed by me, might
24 have heard wrong). While looking thought the Graphics menu:
</p
>
27 "Basically everything you ever need in a school environment.
"
30 <p
>And as a general evaluation of the entire distribution:
</p
>
33 "So, yeah, a bit bloated. It kept all the Debian stuff in there, just
34 to keep it nice and GNU. So, I do not want to go on about it, but
35 lets give it
7 out of
10. I am not going to use it. That is because
36 I am not deploying a school network. There may be some mythical
37 feature to help you deploy Skolelinux on a school network.
"
40 <p
>To bad he did not test the server profile, and discovered the PXE
41 installation option. It make it possible to install only the main
42 server from CD, and the rest of the machines via the net, and might be
43 considered the mythical feature he talk about. :)
</p
>
45 <p
>While looking through the menus, there is also this funny comment
46 about the part of the K menu generated from the Debian menu subsystem:
49 "[The K menu] have a special Debian section for software that no-one
50 is going to look at, because it contain lots of junky stuff that you
51 actually don
't need in the education distribution, but have just been
52 included because it isn
't stripped out for some reason.
"
55 <p
>I guess it is yet another argument for merging the Debian menu and
56 Gnome/KDE desktop menu entries into
57 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/Proposals/DebianMenuUsingDesktopEntries
">one
58 consistent menu system
</a
> instead of two incomplete and partly
59 inconsistent menu systems.
</p
>
61 <p
>The entire video is available below for those accepting iframe
64 <iframe width=
"560" height=
"315" src=
"http://www.youtube.com/embed/wPzTZ61Pcuc
" frameborder=
"0" allowfullscreen
></iframe
>
69 <title>First Skolelinux / Debian Edu Squeeze update released
</title>
70 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Skolelinux___Debian_Edu_Squeeze_update_released.html
</link>
71 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Skolelinux___Debian_Edu_Squeeze_update_released.html
</guid>
72 <pubDate>Fri,
8 Mar
2013 09:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
73 <description><p
>Last Sunday,
2013-
03-
03,, Holger Levsen announced the first update
74 of
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Skolelinux / Debian Edu
</a
>
75 based on Debian Squeeze. This is the first update since
76 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
03/msg00001.html
">the
77 initial release
2012-
03-
11</a
>. This is the
78 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2013/
03/msg00000.html
">release
79 announcement email from Holger
</a
>:
</p
>
81 <blockquote
><p
>Hi,
</p
>
83 <p
>it
's my pleasure to announce the immediate availability of Debian
84 Edu
6.0.7+r1 (
"Debian Edu Squeeze
").
</p
>
86 <p
>Debian Edu
6.0.7+r1 is an incremental update to Debian Edu
87 6.0.4+r0, containing all the changes between Debian
6.0.4 and
6.0.7 as
88 well Debian Edu specific bugfixes and enhancements. See below (in this
89 mail) for the full list of (edu) changes. Please see
90 <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/News/
2012/
20120311">http://www.debian.org/News/
2012/
20120311</a
>
91 for more information on
"Debian Edu Squeeze
".
</p
>
93 <p
>Images are available for download at
94 <a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/
">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/
</a
></p
>
97 <br
>1fe79eb4f0f9ae1c58fc318e26cc1e2e debian-edu-
6.0.7+r1-CD.iso
98 <br
>a6ddd924a8bd9a1b5ca122e8fe1c34ec debian-edu-
6.0.7+r1-DVD.iso
99 <br
>ac6c72cd7925ccec51bfbf58e2a7c69c debian-edu-
6.0.7+r1-source-DVD.iso
</p
>
102 <br
>a4b58233b672a99c7df8dc24fb6de3327654a5c3 debian-edu-
6.0.7+r1-CD.iso
103 <br
>9b524915e0ff2aa793f13d93123e5bd2bab2dbaa debian-edu-
6.0.7+r1-DVD.iso
104 <br
>43997614893fc5e9e59ad6ce066b05d07fd836fa debian-edu-
6.0.7+r1-source-DVD.iso
</p
>
106 <p
>These images are suitable for amd64+i386.
</p
>
108 <p
>Changes for Debian Edu
6.0.7+r1 Codename
"Squeeze
", released
109 2013-
03-
03:
</p
>
112 <li
>sitesummary was updated from
0.1.3 to
0.1.8
114 <li
>Make Nagios configuration more robust and efficient
</li
>
115 <li
>Comply with
3.X kernel
</li
>
116 </ul
></li
>
117 <li
>debian-edu-doc from
1.4~
20120310~
6.0.4+r0 to
1.4~
20130228~
6.0.7+r1
119 <li
>Minor updates from the wiki
</li
>
120 <li
>Danish translation now complete
</li
>
121 </ul
></li
>
122 <li
>debian-edu-config from
1.453 to
1.455
124 <li
>Fix /etc/hosts for LTSP diskless workstations. Closes: #
699880</li
>
125 <li
>Make ltsp_local_mount script work for multiple devices.
</li
>
126 <li
>Correct Kerberos user policy: don
't expire password after
2 days.
127 Closes: #
664596</li
>
128 <li
>Handle
'#
' characters in the root or first users password.
129 Closes: #
664976</li
>
130 <li
>Fixes for gosa-sync:
132 <li
>Don
't fail if password contains
"</li
>
133 <li
>Don
't disclose new password string in syslog
</li
>
134 </ul
></li
>
135 <li
>Fixes for gosa-create:
137 <li
>Invalidate libnss cache before applying changes
</li
>
138 <li
>Multiple failures during mass user import into GOsa²
</li
>
139 <li
>gosa-netgroups plugin: don
't erase entries of attribute type
140 "memberNisNetgroup
". Closes: #
687256</li
>
141 <li
>First user now uses the same Kerberos policy as all other users
</li
>
142 </ul
></li
>
143 <li
>Add Danish web page
</li
>
145 <li
>debian-edu-install from
1.528 to
1.530
147 <li
>Improve preseeding support and documentation
</li
>
148 </ul
></li
>
151 <p
>End-user documentation in English is available at
152 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze/
">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze/
</a
>
153 - translations to French, Italian, Danish and German are available in
154 the debian-edu-doc package. (Other languages could use your help!)
</p
>
156 <p
>If you want to contribute to Debian Edu, please join our
158 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/
">debian-edu@lists.debian.org
</a
>!
159 </p
></blockquote
>
161 <p
>I am very happy to see the fruits of a year of hard work. :)
</p
>
166 <title>Frikanalen - Complete TV station organised using the web
</title>
167 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Frikanalen___Complete_TV_station_organised_using_the_web.html
</link>
168 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Frikanalen___Complete_TV_station_organised_using_the_web.html
</guid>
169 <pubDate>Sun,
3 Mar
2013 07:
15:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
170 <description><p
>Do you want to set up your own TV station, schedule videos and
171 broadcast them on the air? Using free software? With video on demand
173 <a href=
"http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition
">free and
174 open standards
</a
>? Included a web based video stream as well? And
175 administrate it all in your web browser from anywhere in the world? A
176 few years now the Norwegian public access TV-channel
177 <a href=
"http://www.frikanalen.no/
">Frikanalen
</a
> have been building a
178 system to do just this. The source code for the solution is licensed
179 using the GNU LGPL, and
180 <a href=
"http://github.com/Frikanalen
">available from github
</a
>.
</p
>
182 <p
>The idea is simple. You upload a video file over the web, and
183 attach meta information to the file. You select a time slot in the
184 program schedule, and when the time come it is played on the air and
185 in the web stream. It is also made available in a video on demand
186 solution for anyone to see it also outside its scheduled time. All
187 you need to run a TV station - using your web browser.
</p
>
189 <p
>There are several parts to this web based solution. I
'll mention
190 the three most important ones. The first part is the database of
191 videos and the schedule. This is written in Django and include a REST
192 API. The current database is SQLite, but the plan is to migrate it to
193 PostgreSQL. At the moment this system can be tested on
194 <a href=
"http://beta.frikanalen.tv/
">beta.frikanalen.tv
</a
>. The
195 second part is the video playout, taking the schedule information from
196 the database and providing a video stream to broadcast. This is done
197 using
<a href=
"http://www.casparcg.com/
">CasparCG from SVT
</a
> and
198 <a href=
"http://www.mltframework.org/
">Media Lovin
' Toolkit
</a
>. Video
199 signal distribution is handled using
200 <a href=
"http://www.ob-encoder.com/
">Open Broadcast Encoder
</a
>. The
201 third part is the converter, handling the transformation of uploaded
202 video files to a format useful for broadcasting, streaming and video
203 on demand. It is still very much work in progress, so it is not yet
204 decided what it will end up using. Note that the source of the latter
205 two parts are not yet pushed to github. The lead author want to clean
206 them up a bit more first.
</p
>
208 <p
>The development is coordinated on the
209 <a href=
"irc://irc.freenode.net/%
23frikanalen
">#frikanalen IRC
210 channel
</a
> (irc.freenode.net), and discussed on
211 <a href=
"http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/frikanalen
">the
212 frikanalen mailing list
</a
>. The lead developer is Benjamin Bruheim
213 (phed on IRC). Anyone is welcome to participate in the
214 development.
</p
>
219 <title>Dr. Richard Stallman, founder of Free Software Foundation, give a talk in Oslo March
1st
2013</title>
220 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dr__Richard_Stallman__founder_of_Free_Software_Foundation__give_a_talk_in_Oslo_March_1st_2013.html
</link>
221 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dr__Richard_Stallman__founder_of_Free_Software_Foundation__give_a_talk_in_Oslo_March_1st_2013.html
</guid>
222 <pubDate>Wed,
27 Feb
2013 20:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
223 <description><p
>Dr.
<a href=
"http://www.stallman.org/
">Richard Stallman
</a
>,
224 founder of
<a href=
"http://www.fsf.org/
">Free Software Foundation
</a
>,
225 is giving
<a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/
20130301-rms/
">a
226 talk in Oslo March
1st
2013 17:
00 to
19:
00</a
>. The event is public
227 and organised by
<a href=
"">Norwegian Unix Users Group (NUUG)
</a
>
228 (where I am the chair of the board) and
229 <a href=
"http://www.friprog.no/
">The Norwegian Open Source Competence
230 Center
</a
>. The title of the talk is «The Free Software Movement and
231 GNU», with this description:
233 <p
><blockquote
>
234 The Free Software Movement campaigns for computer users
' freedom to
235 cooperate and control their own computing. The Free Software Movement
236 developed the GNU operating system, typically used together with the
237 kernel Linux, specifically to make these freedoms possible.
238 </blockquote
></p
>
240 <p
>The meeting is open for everyone. Due to space limitations, the
241 doors opens for NUUG members at
16:
15, and everyone else at
16:
45. I
242 am really curious how many will show up. See
243 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/
20130301-rms/
">the event
244 page
</a
> for the location details.
</p
>
249 <title>Frikart - Free Garmin maps for European countries based on OpenStreetmap
</title>
250 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Frikart___Free_Garmin_maps_for_European_countries_based_on_OpenStreetmap.html
</link>
251 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Frikart___Free_Garmin_maps_for_European_countries_based_on_OpenStreetmap.html
</guid>
252 <pubDate>Fri,
15 Feb
2013 09:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
253 <description><p
>If you, like me, want an updated a map for your Garmin GPS, there is
254 now a great source of free maps available from
255 <a href=
"http://www.frikart.no/garmin/index.html
">Frikart
</a
>. To
256 download a map, just click on the country you are interested in, and
257 download the map type you want. There are
8 different maps available,
258 using different colours and data selection. Pick one of Roadmap, Topo
259 Summer, Topo Winter, Roadmap II, Topo Summer II, Topo Winter II,
260 "Trails - overlay map
" and
"Cross country - overlay map
" (see the web
261 page for descriptions).
</p
>
263 <p
>The maps are updated weekly, so if you find something wrong in the
264 map you can just edit the
265 <a href=
"http://www.openstreetmap.org/
">OpenStreetmap
</a
> map source
266 (anyone can contribute) and fetch a fixed map a week later. :)
</p
>
271 <title>"Electronic
" paper invoices - using vCard in a QR code
</title>
272 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_Electronic__paper_invoices___using_vCard_in_a_QR_code.html
</link>
273 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_Electronic__paper_invoices___using_vCard_in_a_QR_code.html
</guid>
274 <pubDate>Tue,
12 Feb
2013 10:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
275 <description><p
>Here in Norway, electronic invoices are spreading, and the
276 <a href=
"http://www.anskaffelser.no/e-handel/faktura
">solution promoted
277 by the Norwegian government
</a
> require that invoices are sent through
278 one of the approved facilitators, and it is not possible to send
279 electronic invoices without an agreement with one of these
280 facilitators. This seem like a needless limitation to be able to
281 transfer invoice information between buyers and sellers. My preferred
282 solution would be to just transfer the invoice information directly
283 between seller and buyer, for example using SMTP, or some HTTP based
284 protocol like REST or SOAP. But this might also be overkill, as the
285 "electronic
" information can be transferred using paper invoices too,
286 using a simple bar code. My bar code encoding of choice would be QR
287 codes, as this encoding can be read by any smart phone out there. The
288 content of the code could be anything, but I would go with
289 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VCard
">the vCard format
</a
>, as
290 it too is supported by a lot of computer equipment these days.
</p
>
292 <p
>The vCard format support extentions, and the invoice specific
293 information can be included using such extentions. For example an
294 invoice from SLX Debian Labs (picked because we
295 <a href=
"http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html
">ask
296 for donations to the Debian Edu project
</a
> and thus have bank account
297 information publicly available) for NOK
1000.00 could have these extra
302 X-INVOICE-AMOUNT:NOK1000.00
303 X-INVOICE-KID:
123412341234
304 X-INVOICE-MSG:Donation to Debian Edu
305 X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER:
16040884339
306 X-BANK-IBAN-NUMBER:NO8516040884339
307 X-BANK-SWIFT-NUMBER:DNBANOKKXXX
308 </pre
></p
>
310 <p
>The X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER field was proposed in a stackoverflow
312 <a href=
"http://stackoverflow.com/questions/
10045664/storing-bank-account-in-vcard-file
">how
313 to put bank account information into a vCard
</a
>. For payments in
314 Norway, either X-INVOICE-KID (payment ID) or X-INVOICE-MSG could be
315 used to pass on information to the seller when paying the invoice.
</p
>
317 <p
>The complete vCard could look like this:
</p
>
322 ORG:SLX Debian Labs Foundation
323 ADR;WORK:;;Gunnar Schjelderups vei
29D;OSLO;;
0485;Norway
324 URL;WORK:http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/
325 EMAIL;PREF;INTERNET:sdl-styret@rt.nuug.no
328 X-INVOICE-AMOUNT:NOK1000.00
329 X-INVOICE-MSG:Donation to Debian Edu
330 X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER:
16040884339
331 X-BANK-IBAN-NUMBER:NO8516040884339
332 X-BANK-SWIFT-NUMBER:DNBANOKKXXX
334 </pre
></p
>
336 <p
>The resulting QR code created using
337 <a href=
"http://fukuchi.org/works/qrencode/
">qrencode
</a
> would look
338 like this, and should be readable (and thus checkable) by any smart
339 phone, or for example the
<a href=
"http://zbar.sourceforge.net/
">zbar
340 bar code reader
</a
> and feed right into the approval and accounting
343 <p
><img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
02-
12-qr-invoice.png
"></p
>
345 <p
>The extension fields will most likely not show up in any normal
346 vCard reader, so those parts would have to go directly into a system
347 handling invoices. I am a bit unsure how vCards without name parts
348 are handled, but a simple test indicate that this work just fine.
</p
>
350 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
02-
12 11:
30</strong
>: Added KID to the proposal
351 based on feedback from Sturle Sunde.
</p
>
356 <title>Sleep until morning - home automation for the kids
</title>
357 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sleep_until_morning___home_automation_for_the_kids.html
</link>
358 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sleep_until_morning___home_automation_for_the_kids.html
</guid>
359 <pubDate>Sun,
10 Feb
2013 12:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
360 <description><p
><img align=
"left
" style=
"margin-right:
25px;
" src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
02-
10-morning-light.jpeg
"></p
>
362 <p
>With kids in the house, one challenge is getting them to sleep
363 during the night and wake up when it is morning. I mean, when I
364 believe it is morning, and not two hours earlier. In our household we
365 have decided that
07:
00 is the turning point, but getting the kids to
366 sleep until
07:
00 is a small challenge every day. They have adapted
367 quite well, and rarely wake up at
05:
00 any more, but some times wake
368 up at times like
05:
50,
06:
15,
06:
30 or
06:
45, and it is hard to put
369 the awake one to bed again without disturbing and waking the rest.
370 And I understand perfectly well that they fail to sleep until
07:
00
371 some times, as there is no way for them to know if it is before or
372 after the magic moment without coming and asking us parents.
</p
>
374 <p
>But yesterday I came up with a method to solve this problem. It
375 involve home automation. A few years ago I bought a
376 <a href=
"http://www.telldus.se/products/tellstick
">Tellstick
</a
> and RF
377 switches at the local
<a href=
"http://www.clasohlson.com/
">Clas
378 Ohlson
</a
> shop, allowing me to control lights and other electrical
379 gadgets using my Linux server. When I moved from the old flat to a
380 small house, I put away all this equipment as most of the lighting in
381 the house was not using wall sockets and thus not easy to connect to
382 the gadgets I had. But recently I bought a
383 <a href=
"http://www.telldus.se/products/tellstick_net
">Tellstick
384 Net
</a
> to be able to read sensor input as well as control power
385 sockets. I want to control ovens in the basement to avoid the pipes
386 to freeze, and monitor the humidity to detect flooding. The default
387 setup for Tellstick Net is to be controlled by the vendor web service,
388 which to me is a security problem, but it is also possible to build
390 <a href=
"http://developer.telldus.com/blog/
2012/
03/
02/help-us-develop-local-access-using-tellstick-net-build-your-own-firmware
">firmware
391 with local access
</A
> instead of being controlled by a Swedish
392 company, thanks to the release of the GPL licensed firmware source
393 code. I plan to get that running before I let it control anything
394 important. But while working on this, one idea to make it easier for
395 the kids came to me yesterday. We can set up a night light controlled
396 by the computer, and turn it automatically on at
07:
00. The kids can
397 then check the light in the morning to know if they are supposed to
398 get up or not. They joined me in setting everything up, and I
399 repeated the concept several times before bed times to make sure they
400 remembered to check the light before getting up in the morning.
</p
>
402 <p
>We tested it this morning, and all the kids stayed in bed until
403 after
07:
00, and every one of them commented on the fact that the
404 "morning light
" was turned on and signalled that the morning had
405 arrived. So this look like a success, and I am excited to see how
406 this develops the next few days. :) I really hope this can allow us
407 all to sleep a bit longer in the morning.
</p
>
409 <p
>A nice advantage of this setup is that we can remote control when
410 to tell the kids to get up. We do not have to wait until
07:
00, and
411 can also delay it if we want to.
</p
>
416 <title>Bitcoin GUI now available from Debian/unstable (and Ubuntu/raring)
</title>
417 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Bitcoin_GUI_now_available_from_Debian_unstable__and_Ubuntu_raring_.html
</link>
418 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Bitcoin_GUI_now_available_from_Debian_unstable__and_Ubuntu_raring_.html
</guid>
419 <pubDate>Sat,
2 Feb
2013 09:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
420 <description><p
>My
421 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html
">last
422 bitcoin related blog post
</a
> mentioned that the new
423 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin
">bitcoin package
</a
> for
424 Debian was waiting in NEW. It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
425 2013-
01-
19, and have been available in unstable since then. It was
426 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
427 version too.
</p
>
429 <p
>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
430 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
431 architectures. For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
432 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
433 architectures (
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
672524">BTS #
672524</a
>).
434 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
435 no-one have been able to propose a fix. If you got an idea what is
436 failing, please let us know via the BTS.
</p
>
438 <p
>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
439 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
440 if it run short on space (
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
696715">BTS
441 #
696715</a
>). So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
444 <p
>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
445 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
446 <b
><a href=
"bitcoin:
15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog
">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
</a
></b
>.
</p
>
451 <title>Welcome to the world, Isenkram!
</title>
452 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html
</link>
453 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html
</guid>
454 <pubDate>Tue,
22 Jan
2013 22:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
455 <description><p
>Yesterday, I
456 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
">asked
457 for testers
</a
> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
458 pluggable hardware devices, which I
459 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
">set
460 out to create
</a
> earlier this month. Several valuable testers showed
461 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
462 people. But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
463 for this project. Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
464 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name. In the
465 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
466 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git
">collab-maint
</a
>
467 repository in Debian. The new name? It is
<strong
>Isenkram
</strong
>.
468 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use
</p
>
471 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
472 cd isenkram
&& git-buildpackage -us -uc
475 <p
>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet. If you
476 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
477 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
478 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)
</p
>
480 <p
>If you wonder what
'isenkram
' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
481 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc. Typical hardware
482 stuff, in other words. I
've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
483 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
486 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
01-
26</strong
>: Added -us -us to build
487 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
490 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
01-
27</strong
>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
491 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.
</p
>
496 <title>First prototype ready making hardware easier to use in Debian
</title>
497 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
</link>
498 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
</guid>
499 <pubDate>Mon,
21 Jan
2013 12:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
500 <description><p
>Early this month I set out to try to
501 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
">improve
502 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices
</a
>. Now my
503 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience. To test
505 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/
">source
506 from the Debian Edu subversion repository
</a
>, build and install the
507 package. You might have to log out and in again activate the
508 autostart script.
</p
>
510 <p
>The design is simple:
</p
>
514 <li
>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
515 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.
</li
>
517 <li
>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
518 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
519 initially did.
</li
>
521 <li
>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
522 the APT database, a database
523 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup
">available
524 via HTTP
</a
> and a database available as part of the package.
</li
>
526 <li
>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
527 isn
't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
528 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
529 package or packages.
</li
>
531 <li
>If the user click on the
'install package now
' button, ask
532 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.
</li
>
534 <li
>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
535 package while showing progress information in a window.
</li
>
539 <p
>I still need to come up with a better name for the system. Here
540 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action. First the
541 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
542 approve all the dependencies. Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.
</p
>
544 <p
><img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
01-
21-hw-support-
1-notification.png
">
545 <br
><img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
01-
21-hw-support-
2-password.png
">
546 <br
><img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
01-
21-hw-support-
3-dependencies.png
">
547 <br
><img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
01-
21-hw-support-
4-installing.png
">
548 <br
><img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
01-
21-hw-support-
5-installing-details.png
" width=
"70%
"></p
>
550 <p
>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
551 is already useful. The database of hardware to package mappings also
552 need more work. It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
553 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
554 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
555 method. I
've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
556 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
557 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.
</p
>
559 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
01-
21 16:
50</strong
>: Due to popular demand,
560 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
561 '<tt
>svn checkout
562 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
563 hw-support-handler; debuild
</tt
>'. If you lack debuild, install the
564 devscripts package.
</p
>
566 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
01-
23 12:
00</strong
>: The project is now
567 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
568 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository. See
569 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html
">build
570 instructions
</a
> for details.
</p
>
575 <title>Thank you Thinkpad X41, for your long and trustworthy service
</title>
576 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html
</link>
577 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html
</guid>
578 <pubDate>Sat,
19 Jan
2013 09:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
579 <description><p
>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died. It died quietly and
580 suddenly in bed. With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
581 black. The power button was no longer able to turn it on. It was a
582 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had. Better than both
583 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S. Far better than the
584 Compaq I had before that. Now I need to find a replacement. To keep
585 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
586 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
587 not a durable solution.
589 <p
>My laptop needs are fairly modest. This is my wishlist from when I
590 got a new one more than
10 years ago. It still holds true.:)
</p
>
594 <li
>Lightweight (around
1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
596 <li
>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.
</li
>
597 <li
>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.
</li
>
598 <li
>Long battery life time. Preferable a week.
</li
>
599 <li
>Internal WIFI network card.
</li
>
600 <li
>Internal Twisted Pair network card.
</li
>
601 <li
>Some USB slots (
2-
3 is plenty)
</li
>
602 <li
>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.
</li
>
603 <li
>Video resolution at least
1024x768, with size around
12" (A4 paper
605 <li
>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
606 X.org packages.
</li
>
607 <li
>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
612 <p
>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
613 list. The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
614 last
10-
15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
615 at other features to choose my laptop. But are there still made as
616 robust laptops as my X41? The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
617 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
618 Lenovo took over. But I
've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
619 still be useful.
</p
>
621 <p
>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
622 external keyboard? I
'll have to check the
623 <a href=
"http://www.linux-laptop.net/
">Linux Laptops site
</a
> for
624 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
625 of the vendors listed on the
<a href=
"http://linuxpreloaded.com/
">Linux
626 Pre-loaded site
</a
>.
</p
>
631 <title>How to find a browser plugin supporting a given MIME type
</title>
632 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_find_a_browser_plugin_supporting_a_given_MIME_type.html
</link>
633 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_find_a_browser_plugin_supporting_a_given_MIME_type.html
</guid>
634 <pubDate>Fri,
18 Jan
2013 10:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
635 <description><p
>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
636 install to get support for a given MIME type. Thanks to
637 <a href=
"https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins
">specifications
638 done by Ubuntu
</a
> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
639 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
640 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
641 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:
</p
>
647 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
652 version = pkg.candidate
654 version = pkg.installed
657 record = version.record
658 if not record.has_key(
'Npp-MimeType
'):
660 mime_types = record[
'Npp-MimeType
'].split(
',
')
662 t = t.rstrip().strip()
664 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
666 mimetype =
"audio/ogg
"
667 if
1 < len(sys.argv):
668 mimetype = sys.argv[
1]
669 print
"Browser plugin packages supporting %s:
" % mimetype
670 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
671 print
" %s
" %pkg
674 <p
>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:
</p
>
677 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
678 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
680 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
681 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
686 <p
>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
687 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
688 packages. It would be great if Debian supported such feature too. Is
689 anyone working on adding it?
</p
>
691 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
01-
18 14:
20</strong
>: The Debian BTS
692 request for icweasel support for this feature is
693 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
484010">#
484010</a
> from
2008 (and
694 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
698426">#
698426</a
> from today). Lack
695 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
696 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.
</p
>
701 <title>What is the most supported MIME type in Debian?
</title>
702 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_.html
</link>
703 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_.html
</guid>
704 <pubDate>Wed,
16 Jan
2013 10:
10:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
705 <description><p
>The
<a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal
">DEP-
11
706 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive
</a
>, is a
707 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
708 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
709 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing. With such
710 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
711 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
712 downloaded by the browser.
</p
>
714 <p
>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
715 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
716 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there. The result
718 <a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest
">Skolelinux FTP
719 site
</a
>. Using the collected information, it become possible to
720 answer the question in the title. Here are the
20 most supported MIME
721 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
722 The complete list is available from the link above.
</p
>
724 <p
><strong
>Debian Stable:
</strong
></p
>
728 ----- -----------------------
751 <p
><strong
>Debian Testing:
</strong
></p
>
755 ----- -----------------------
778 <p
><strong
>Debian Unstable:
</strong
></p
>
782 ----- -----------------------
805 <p
>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
806 information mentioned in DEP-
11. I have not yet had time to look at
807 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
810 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
01-
16 13:
35</strong
>: Updated numbers after
811 discovering a typo in my script.
</p
>
816 <title>Using modalias info to find packages handling my hardware
</title>
817 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_modalias_info_to_find_packages_handling_my_hardware.html
</link>
818 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_modalias_info_to_find_packages_handling_my_hardware.html
</guid>
819 <pubDate>Tue,
15 Jan
2013 08:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
820 <description><p
>Yesterday, I wrote about the
821 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html
">modalias
822 values provided by the Linux kernel
</a
> following my hope for
823 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
">better
824 dongle support in Debian
</a
>. Using this knowledge, I have tested how
825 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
826 to hardware. This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
827 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
828 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
831 <p
>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
832 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
833 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
836 <p
><blockquote
>
837 Package: package-name
838 <br
>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)
</p
>
839 </blockquote
></p
>
841 <p
>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
842 for a given modalias value using this file.
</p
>
844 <p
>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
845 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class
0E01):
</p
>
847 <p
><blockquote
>
849 <br
>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)
</p
>
850 </blockquote
></p
>
852 <p
>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
853 CardBus bridge (bus class
0607) PCI device is present:
</p
>
855 <p
><blockquote
>
857 <br
>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
858 </blockquote
></p
>
860 <p
>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
861 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs
04D8:F8DA:
</p
>
863 <p
><blockquote
>
864 Package: colorhug-client
865 <br
>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)
</p
>
866 </blockquote
></p
>
868 <p
>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
869 file in the Debian archive. Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
870 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.
</p
>
872 <p
>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
873 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
874 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
875 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
876 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information. I
've
877 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
878 is working as it should with my prototype. It even made it to Ubuntu
881 <p
>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
882 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
883 implementation of the lookup code. The idea is to create files for
884 each modalias and let the shell do the matching. Please check out and
886 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co
">hw-support-lookup
</a
>
887 shell script. It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
888 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
889 repository where I currently work on my prototype.
</p
>
891 <p
>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
892 install yubikey-personalization:
</p
>
894 <p
><blockquote
>
895 % ./hw-support-lookup
896 <br
>yubikey-personalization
898 </blockquote
></p
>
900 <p
>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
901 propose to install the pcmciautils package:
</p
>
903 <p
><blockquote
>
904 % ./hw-support-lookup
905 <br
>pcmciautils
907 </blockquote
></p
>
909 <p
>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
910 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co
">my
911 database
</a
>, please tell me about it.
</p
>
913 <p
>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
914 packages and hardware. One source would be to look at packages with
915 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
916 extract their modalias information. Another would be to look at
917 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
918 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
919 generate a modalias matching rule. I have not tested any of these to
920 see if it work.
</p
>
922 <p
>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
923 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
924 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
925 <a href=
"irc://irc.debian.org/%
23debian-devel
">#debian-devel
</a
>.
</p
>
930 <title>Modalias strings - a practical way to map
"stuff
" to hardware
</title>
931 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html
</link>
932 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html
</guid>
933 <pubDate>Mon,
14 Jan
2013 11:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
934 <description><p
>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
935 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
936 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
937 to document the details. Here are my findings so far, also available
939 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/
">the
940 Debian Edu subversion repository
</a
>:
942 <p
><strong
>Modalias decoded
</strong
></p
>
944 <p
>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
945 values stands for. It is in part based on information from
946 &lt;URL:
<a href=
"https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias
">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias
</a
> &gt;,
947 &lt;URL:
<a href=
"http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/
26132/how-to-assign-usb-driver-to-device
">http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/
26132/how-to-assign-usb-driver-to-device
</a
> &gt;,
948 &lt;URL:
<a href=
"http://code.metager.de/source/history/linux/stable/scripts/mod/file2alias.c
">http://code.metager.de/source/history/linux/stable/scripts/mod/file2alias.c
</a
> &gt; and
949 &lt;URL:
<a href=
"http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/dmidecode/dmidecode.c?root=dmidecode
&view=markup
">http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/dmidecode/dmidecode.c?root=dmidecode
&view=markup
</a
> &gt;.
951 <p
>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
952 this shell script:
</p
>
955 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -
0 cat | sort -u
958 <p
>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
959 using modinfo:
</p
>
962 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
963 alias: serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
964 alias: serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
968 <p
><strong
>PCI subtype
</strong
></p
>
970 <p
>A typical PCI entry can look like this. This is an Intel Host
971 Bridge memory controller:
</p
>
973 <p
><blockquote
>
974 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
975 </blockquote
></p
>
977 <p
>This represent these values:
</p
>
982 sv
00001028 (subvendor)
983 sd
000001AD (subdevice)
989 <p
>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from
'lspci
990 -n
' as
8086:
2770. The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
991 0600. The
0600 class is a host bridge. Other useful bus values are
992 0300 (VGA compatible card) and
0200 (Ethernet controller).
</p
>
994 <p
>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
997 <p
><strong
>USB subtype
</strong
></p
>
999 <p
>Some typical USB entries can look like this. This is an internal
1000 USB hub in a laptop:
</p
>
1002 <p
><blockquote
>
1003 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
1004 </blockquote
></p
>
1006 <p
>Here is the values included in this alias:
</p
>
1009 v
1D6B (device vendor)
1010 p
0001 (device product)
1012 dc
09 (device class)
1013 dsc
00 (device subclass)
1014 dp
00 (device protocol)
1015 ic
09 (interface class)
1016 isc
00 (interface subclass)
1017 ip
00 (interface protocol)
1020 <p
>The
0900 device class/subclass means hub. Some times the relevant
1021 class is in the interface class section. For a simple USB web camera,
1022 these alias entries show up:
</p
>
1024 <p
><blockquote
>
1025 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
1026 <br
>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
1027 <br
>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
1028 <br
>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
1029 </blockquote
></p
>
1031 <p
>Interface class
0E01 is video control,
0E02 is video streaming (aka
1032 camera),
0101 is audio control device and
0102 is audio streaming (aka
1033 microphone). Thus this is a camera with microphone included.
</p
>
1035 <p
><strong
>ACPI subtype
</strong
></p
>
1037 <p
>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff. This is an IR
1038 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:
</p
>
1040 <p
><blockquote
>
1041 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
1042 </blockquote
></p
>
1044 <p
>The values between the colons are IDs.
</p
>
1046 <p
><strong
>DMI subtype
</strong
></p
>
1048 <p
>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
1049 and model. This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
1050 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:
</p
>
1052 <p
><blockquote
>
1053 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(
1.66):bd06/
15/
2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
1054 </blockquote
></p
>
1056 <p
>The values present are
</p
>
1059 bvn IBM (BIOS vendor)
1060 bvr
1UETB
6WW(
1.66) (BIOS version)
1061 bd
06/
15/
2005 (BIOS date)
1062 svn IBM (system vendor)
1063 pn
2371H4G (product name)
1064 pvr ThinkPadX40 (product version)
1065 rvn IBM (board vendor)
1066 rn
2371H4G (board name)
1067 rvr NotAvailable (board version)
1068 cvn IBM (chassis vendor)
1069 ct
10 (chassis type)
1070 cvr NotAvailable (chassis version)
1073 <p
>The chassis type
10 is Notebook. Other interesting values can be
1074 found in the dmidecode source:
</p
>
1078 4 Low Profile Desktop
1091 17 Main Server Chassis
1092 18 Expansion Chassis
1094 20 Bus Expansion Chassis
1095 21 Peripheral Chassis
1097 23 Rack Mount Chassis
1106 <p
>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
1107 table. For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
1108 claim it is a desktop.
</p
>
1110 <p
><strong
>SerIO subtype
</strong
></p
>
1112 <p
>This type is used for PS/
2 mouse plugs. One example is from my
1113 test machine:
</p
>
1115 <p
><blockquote
>
1116 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
1117 </blockquote
></p
>
1119 <p
>The values present are
</p
>
1128 <p
>This type is supported by the psmouse driver. I am not sure what
1129 the valid values are.
</p
>
1131 <p
><strong
>Other subtypes
</strong
></p
>
1133 <p
>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
1134 file2alias.c. There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
1135 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
1136 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
1137 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro. I did not spend time documenting all of
1138 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
1139 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.
</p
>
1141 <p
><strong
>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values
</strong
></p
>
1143 <p
>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
1144 one can use the following shell script:
</p
>
1147 for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -
0 cat | sort -u); do \
1148 echo
"$id
" ; \
1149 /sbin/modprobe --show-depends
"$id
"|sed
's/^/ /
' ; \
1153 <p
>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
1154 list is very long on my test machine):
</p
>
1158 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
1160 FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
1162 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
1163 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
1164 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
1165 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
1166 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
1167 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
1168 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
1169 insmod /lib/modules/
2.6.32-
5-
686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
1173 <p
>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
1174 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
1175 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
1176 <a href=
"irc://irc.debian.org/%
23debian-devel
">#debian-devel
</a
>.
</p
>
1178 <p
><strong
>Update
2013-
01-
15:
</strong
> Rewrite
"cat $(find ...)
" to
1179 "find ... -print0 | xargs -
0 cat
" to make sure it handle directories
1180 in /sys/ with space in them.
</p
>
1185 <title>Moved the pymissile Debian packaging to collab-maint
</title>
1186 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Moved_the_pymissile_Debian_packaging_to_collab_maint.html
</link>
1187 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Moved_the_pymissile_Debian_packaging_to_collab_maint.html
</guid>
1188 <pubDate>Thu,
10 Jan
2013 20:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1189 <description><p
>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
1190 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
1191 Launcher and updated the Debian package
1192 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile
">pymissile
</a
> to make
1193 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in. I
1194 also added a
"Modaliases
" header to test it in the Debian archive and
1195 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
1196 plug in his rocket launcher. In the process I moved the source to a
1197 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
1198 contribute.
<a href=
"http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/
">Upstream
</a
>
1199 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
1200 years of relative silence. The new git repository is not listed in
1201 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
1202 bit more before I upload the new version. If you want to check out
1203 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
1204 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git
">gitweb
1205 view
</a
> or use
"<tt
>git clone
1206 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git
</tt
>".
</p
>
1211 <title>Lets make hardware dongles easier to use in Debian
</title>
1212 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
</link>
1213 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html
</guid>
1214 <pubDate>Wed,
9 Jan
2013 15:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1215 <description><p
>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
1216 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
1217 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
1218 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
1219 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
1220 machine. Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
1221 Linux distribution. When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
1222 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
1223 I need to talk to it. When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
1224 yubikey-personalization package. The information required to do this
1225 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.
</p
>
1227 <p
>Some years ago, I proposed to
1228 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/
2010/
05/msg01206.html
">use
1229 the discover subsystem to implement this
</a
>. The idea is fairly
1234 <li
>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
1235 starting when a user log in.
</li
>
1237 <li
>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
1238 hardware is inserted into the computer.
</li
>
1240 <li
>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
1241 database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
1242 packages.
</li
>
1244 <li
>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
1245 package, and make it easy to install it.
</li
>
1249 <p
>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
1250 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
1251 discover database to find packages and
1252 <a href=
"http://www.packagekit.org/
">PackageKit
</a
> to install
1255 <p
>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
1256 draft package is now checked into
1257 <a href=
"http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/
">the
1258 Debian Edu subversion repository
</a
>. In the process, I updated the
1259 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html
">discover-data
</a
>
1260 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
1261 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
1262 2.2013.01.09 to unstable. I also discovered that the current
1263 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html
">discover
</a
>
1264 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
1265 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present. I ported it to use
1266 libusb as a fall back option to get it working. The fixed package
1267 version
2.1.2-
6 is now in experimental (didn
't upload it to unstable
1268 because of the freeze).
</p
>
1270 <p
>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
1271 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
1272 inserted):
</p
>
1274 <p align=
"center
"><img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/
2013-
01-
09-hw-autoinstall.png
"></p
>
1276 <p
>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
1277 install the proposed packages by pressing the
"Please install
1278 program(s)
" button should to be implemented.
</p
>
1280 <p
>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
1281 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
1282 from hardware to Debian packages. Check if
'discover-pkginstall -l
'
1283 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
1284 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
1285 reportbug if it isn
't. Or, if you know of a better way to provide
1286 such mapping, please let me know.
</p
>
1288 <p
>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
1289 should be considered before it is ready for production use. Is dbus
1290 the correct way to detect new hardware? At the moment I look for HAL
1291 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
1292 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop. Are there better events to use?
1293 How should the user be notified? Is the desktop notification
1294 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
1295 popup instead? How should packages be installed? When should they
1296 not be installed?
</p
>
1298 <p
>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
1299 please send me an email. :)
</p
>
1304 <title>New IRC channel for LEGO designers using Debian
</title>
1305 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html
</link>
1306 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html
</guid>
1307 <pubDate>Wed,
2 Jan
2013 15:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1308 <description><p
>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
1309 <a href=
"http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx
">LEGO Mindstorm
1310 NXT
</a
>. My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
1311 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
1312 already in Debian Squeeze. If Debian support for LEGO is something
1313 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
1314 <a href=
"irc://irc.debian.org/%
23debian-lego
">#debian-lego
</a
> (server
1315 irc.debian.org). There is a lot that could be done to improve the
1316 Debian support for LEGO designers. For example both CAD software
1317 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)
</p
>
1319 <p
>Update
2012-
01-
03: A
1320 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners
">project page
</a
>
1321 including links to Lego related packages is now available.
</p
>
1326 <title>A Christmas present for Skolelinux / Debian Edu
</title>
1327 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Christmas_present_for_Skolelinux___Debian_Edu.html
</link>
1328 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Christmas_present_for_Skolelinux___Debian_Edu.html
</guid>
1329 <pubDate>Fri,
28 Dec
2012 09:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1330 <description><p
>I was happy to discover a few days ago that the
1331 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Skolelinux / Debian Edu
</a
>
1332 project also this year received a Christmas present from Another
1333 Agency in Trondheim. NOK
1000,- showed up on our donation account
1334 December
24th. I want to express our thanks for this very welcome
1335 present. As the Debian Edu / Skolelinux project is very short on
1336 funding these days, and thus lack the money to do regular developer
1337 gatherings, this donation was most welcome. One developer gathering
1338 cost around NOK
15&nbsp;
000,-, so we need quite a lot more to keep the
1339 development pace we want. Thus, I hope their example this year is
1340 followed by many others. :)
</p
>
1342 <p
>The public list of donors can be found on
1343 <a href=
"http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html
">the
1344 donation page
</a
> for the project, which also contain instructions if
1345 you want to donate to the project.
</p
>
1350 <title>How to backport bitcoin-qt version
0.7.2-
2 to Debian Squeeze
</title>
1351 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html
</link>
1352 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html
</guid>
1353 <pubDate>Tue,
25 Dec
2012 20:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1354 <description><p
>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
1355 year! I hope next year will prove to be a good year.
</p
>
1357 <p
><a href=
"http://www.bitcoin.org/
">Bitcoin
</a
>, the digital
1358 decentralised
"currency
" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
1359 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
1360 experiment. And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
1361 <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/
">Debian
</a
> is about to improve a bit.
1362 The
<a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin
">new debian source
1363 package
</a
> (version
0.7.2-
2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
1364 in
<a href=
"http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html
">the NEW queue
</A
>
1365 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
1368 <p
>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
1369 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
1370 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:
</p
>
1372 <blockquote
><pre
>
1373 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
1375 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=
1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
1376 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
1377 </pre
></blockquote
>
1379 <p
>You might have to install some build dependencies as well. The
1380 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
1381 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment. Note that the
1382 client will download the complete set of bitcoin
"blocks
", which need
1383 around
5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment. Make sure your
1384 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
1385 all the blocks. The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
1386 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
1387 not be able to get all the features out of the client.
</p
>
1389 <p
>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1390 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1391 <b
><a href=
"bitcoin:
15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog
">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
</a
></b
>.
</p
>
1396 <title>A word on bitcoin support in Debian
</title>
1397 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html
</link>
1398 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html
</guid>
1399 <pubDate>Fri,
21 Dec
2012 23:
59:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1400 <description><p
>It has been a while since I wrote about
1401 <a href=
"http://www.bitcoin.org/
">bitcoin
</a
>, the decentralised
1402 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
1403 have been busy elsewhere. But two days ago, I started looking at the
1404 state of
<a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin
">bitcoin in
1405 Debian
</a
> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet. The package
1406 is now maintained by a
1407 <a href=
"https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/
">team of
1408 people
</a
>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team. We
1409 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
1410 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
1411 Wheezy. It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
1412 backports). The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
1413 it from entering testing. To try to help the team and improve the
1414 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
1415 reports. I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
1417 <a href=
"https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin
">PPA for
1418 Ubuntu
</a
>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
1419 Debian package.
</p
>
1421 <p
>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
1422 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
1423 improve the package. It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
1424 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
1425 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
1426 setup. As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
1427 <a href=
"http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-
20121217/
000041.html
">a
1428 patch to backport
</a
> the latest version. Jonas is going to look at
1429 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
1430 new version to unstable.
1432 <p
>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
1433 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system. I
1434 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
1435 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
1436 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
1437 transactions to Wikileaks. But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
1438 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
1439 they sell products and services. Improving the bitcoin support in
1440 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
1441 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
1442 pay with bitcoin is still not very good. The bitcoin: URI is a step
1443 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
1444 use. Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
1445 quick transaction. I believe there are other clients available, but
1446 have not tested them.
</p
>
1449 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html
">experiment
1450 with bitcoins
</a
> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
1451 I received
20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
1452 years ago, as can be
1453 <a href=
"http://blockexplorer.com/address/
15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
">seen
1454 on the blockexplorer service
</a
>. Thank you everyone for your
1455 donation. The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
1456 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
1457 number of users have gone up since then. If you use bitcoin and want
1458 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
1459 the same address as last time,
1460 <b
><a href=
"bitcoin:
15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog
">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
</a
></b
>.
</p
>
1465 <title>Ledger - double-entry accounting using text based storage format
</title>
1466 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ledger___double_entry_accounting_using_text_based_storage_format.html
</link>
1467 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ledger___double_entry_accounting_using_text_based_storage_format.html
</guid>
1468 <pubDate>Tue,
18 Dec
2012 23:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1469 <description><p
>A few days ago I came across
1470 <a href=
"http://joeyh.name/blog/entry/hledger/
">a blog post from Joey
1471 Hess
</a
> describing
<a href=
"http://ledger-cli.org/
">ledger
</a
> and
1472 hledger, a text based system for double-entry accounting. I found it
1473 interesting, as I am involved with several organizations where
1474 accounting is an issue, and I have not really become too friendly with
1475 the different web based systems we use. I find it hard to find what I
1476 look for in the menus and even harder try to get sensible data out of
1477 the systems. Ledger seem different. The accounting data is kept in
1478 text files that can be stored in a version control system, and there
1480 are at least
<a href=
"https://github.com/ledger/ledger/wiki/Ports
">five
1481 different implementations
</a
> able to read the format. An example
1482 entry look like this, and is simple enough that it will be trivial to
1483 generate entries based on CVS files fetched from the bank:
</p
>
1485 <blockquote
><pre
>
1486 2004-
05-
27 Book Store
1487 Expenses:Books $
20.00
1489 </pre
></blockquote
>
1491 <p
>The concept seemed interesting enough for me to check it out and
1492 look for others using it. I found blog posts from
1493 <a href=
"http://blog.spang.cc/posts/hledger_rocks_my_world/
">Christine
1495 <a href=
"http://bugsplat.info/
2010-
05-
23-keeping-finances-with-ledger.html
">Pete
1497 <a href=
"http://blog.andrewcantino.com/blog/
2010/
11/
06/command-line-accounting-with-ledger-and-reckon/
">Andrew
1498 Cantino
</a
> and
1499 <a href=
"http://blog.iphoting.com/blog/
2012/
11/
29/command-line-double-entry-accounting/
">Ronald
1500 Ip
</a
> describing how they use it, as well as a post from
1501 <a href=
"https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/ledger-cli/r0oWjwbQ9Bo
">Bradley
1502 M. Kuhn
</a
> at the Software Freedom Conservancy. All seemed like good
1503 recommendations fitting my need.
</p
>
1505 <p
>The
<a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/l/ledger.html
">ledger
</a
>
1506 package is available in Debian Squeeze, while the
1507 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/h/haskell-hledger.html
">hledger
</a
>
1508 package only is available in Debian Sid. As I use Squeeze, ledger
1509 seemed the best choice to get started.
</p
>
1511 <p
>To get some real data to test on, I wrote a
1512 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/tools/lodo2ledger
">web scraper
</a
> for
1513 <a href=
"http://www.lodo.no/
">LODO
</a
>, the accounting system used by
1514 the
<a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/
">NUUG
</a
> association, and started to
1515 play with the data set. I
'm not really deeply into accounting, but I
1516 am able to get a simple balance and accounting status for example
1517 using the
"<tt
>ledger balance
</tt
>" command. But I will have to
1518 gather more experience before I know if the ledger way is a good fit
1519 for the organisations I am involved in.
</p
>
1524 <title>Scripting the Cerebrum/bofhd user administration system using XML-RPC
</title>
1525 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Scripting_the_Cerebrum_bofhd_user_administration_system_using_XML_RPC.html
</link>
1526 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Scripting_the_Cerebrum_bofhd_user_administration_system_using_XML_RPC.html
</guid>
1527 <pubDate>Thu,
6 Dec
2012 10:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1528 <description><p
>Where I work at the
<a href=
"http://www.uio.no/
">University of
1529 Oslo
</a
>, we use the
1530 <a href=
"http://sourceforge.net/projects/cerebrum/
">Cerebrum user
1531 administration system
</a
> to maintain users, groups, DNS, DHCP, etc.
1532 I
've known since the system was written that the server is providing
1533 an
<a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML-RPC
">XML-RPC
</a
> API, but
1534 I have never spent time to try to figure out how to use it, as we
1535 always use the bofh command line client at work. Until today. I want
1536 to script the updating of DNS and DHCP to make it easier to set up
1537 virtual machines. Here are a few notes on how to use it with
1540 <p
>I started by looking at the source of the Java
1541 <a href=
"http://cerebrum.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/cerebrum/trunk/cerebrum/clients/jbofh/
">bofh
1542 client
</a
>, to figure out how it connected to the API server. I also
1543 googled for python examples on how to use XML-RPC, and found
1544 <a href=
"http://tldp.org/HOWTO/XML-RPC-HOWTO/xmlrpc-howto-python.html
">a
1545 simple example in
</a
> the XML-RPC howto.
</p
>
1547 <p
>This simple example code show how to connect, get the list of
1548 commands (as a JSON dump), and how to get the information about the
1549 user currently logged in:
</p
>
1551 <blockquote
><pre
>
1552 #!/usr/bin/env python
1555 server_url =
'https://cerebrum-uio.uio.no:
8000';
1556 username = getpass.getuser()
1557 password = getpass.getpass()
1558 server = xmlrpclib.Server(server_url);
1559 #print server.get_commands(sessionid)
1560 sessionid = server.login(username, password)
1561 print server.run_command(sessionid,
"user_info
", username)
1562 result = server.logout(sessionid)
1564 </pre
></blockquote
>
1566 <p
>Armed with this knowledge I can now move forward and script the DNS
1567 and DHCP updates I wanted to do.
</p
>
1572 <title>Why isn
't the value of copyright taxed?
</title>
1573 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_the_value_of_copyright_taxed_.html
</link>
1574 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_the_value_of_copyright_taxed_.html
</guid>
1575 <pubDate>Sat,
17 Nov
2012 11:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1576 <description><p
>While working on a
1577 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig
">Norwegian
1578 translation of the Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig
</a
> (
76% done),
1579 which cover the problems with todays copyright law and how it stifles
1580 creativity, one idea occurred to me. The idea is to get the tax
1581 office to help make more works enter the public domain and also help
1582 make it easier to clear rights for using copyrighted works.
</p
>
1584 <p
>I mentioned this idea briefly during Yesterdays
1585 <a href=
"http://www.farmann.no/
2012/
11/
14/john-perry-barlow-in-oslo-friday-nov-
16
1586 -
15-
30-
19-
00/
">presentation
1587 by John Perry Barlow
</a
>, and concluded that it was best to put it
1588 in writing for a wider audience. The idea is not really based on the
1589 argument that copyrighted works are
"intellectual property
", as the
1590 core requirement is that copyrighted work have value for the copyright
1591 holder and the tax office like to collect their share from any value
1592 controlled by the citizens in a country. I
'm sharing the idea here to
1593 let others consider it and perhaps shoot it down with a fresh set of
1594 arguments.
</p
>
1596 <p
>Most valuables are taxed by the government. At least here in
1597 Norway, the amount of money you have, the value of our land property,
1598 the value of your house, the value of your car, the value of our
1599 stocks and other valuables are all added together. If the tax value
1600 of these values exceed your debt, you have to pay the tax office some
1601 taxes for these values. And copyrighted work have value. It have
1602 value for the rights holder, who can earn money selling access to the
1603 work. But it is not included in the tax calculations? Why not?
</p
>
1605 <p
>If the government want to tax copyrighted works, it would want to
1606 maintain a database of all the copyrighted works and who are the
1607 rights holders for a given works, to be able to associate the works
1608 value to the right citizen or company for tax purposes. If such
1609 database exist, it will become a lot easier to find out who to talk to
1610 for clearing permissions to use a copyrighted work, which is a very
1611 hard operation with todays copyright law. To ensure that copyright
1612 holders keep the database up-to-date, it would have to become a
1613 requirement to be able to collect money for granting access to
1614 copyrighted works that the work is listed in the database with the
1615 correct right holder.
</p
>
1617 <p
>If copyright causes copyright holders to have to pay more taxes,
1618 they will have a small incentive to
"disown
" their copyright, and let
1619 the work enter the public domain. For works with several right holders
1620 one of the right holders could state (and get it registered in the
1621 database) that she do not need to be consulted when clearing rights to
1622 use the work in question and thus will not get any income from that
1623 work. Stating this would have to be impossible to revert and stop the
1624 tax office from adding the value of that work to the given citizens
1625 tax calculation. I assume the copyright law would stay the same,
1626 allowing creators to pick a license of their choosing, and also
1627 allowing them to put their work directly in the public domain. The
1628 existence of such database will make it even easier to clear rights,
1629 and if the right holders listed in the database is taxed, this system
1630 would increase the amount of works that enter the public domain.
</p
>
1632 <p
>The effect would be that the tax office help to make it easier to
1633 get rights to use the works that have not yet entered the public
1634 domain and help to get more work into the public domain and .
</p
>
1636 <p
>Why have such taxing not happened yet? I am sure the tax office
1637 would like to tax copyrighted work values if they could.
</p
>
1642 <title>Debian Edu interview: Angela Fuß
</title>
1643 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Angela_Fu_.html
</link>
1644 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Angela_Fu_.html
</guid>
1645 <pubDate>Wed,
14 Nov
2012 21:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1646 <description><p
>Here is another interview with one of the people in the
<a
1647 href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
>
1648 community. I am running short on people willing to be interviewed, so
1649 if you know about someone I should interview, Please send me an email.
1650 After asking for many months, I finally managed to lure another one of
1651 the people behind the German
1652 "<a href=
"http://wiki.it-zukunft-schule.de/
">IT-Zukunft Schule
</a
>"
1653 project out from maternity leave to conduct an interview. Give a warm
1654 welcome to Angela Fuß. :)
</p
>
1656 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
1658 <p
>I am a
39-year-old woman living in the very north of Germany near
1659 Denmark. I live in a patchwork family with
"my man
" Mike Gabriel, my
1660 two daughters, Mikes daughter and Mikes and my rather newborn son.
1662 <p
>At the moment - because of our little baby - I am spending most of
1663 the day by being a caring and organising mom for all the kids.
1664 Besides that I am really involved into and occupied with several inner
1665 growth processes: New born souls always bring the whole familiar
1666 system into movement and that needs time and focus ;-). We are also
1667 in the middle of buying a house and moving to it.
</p
>
1669 <p
>In
2013 I will work again in my job in a German foundation for
1670 nature conservation. I am doing public relation work there. Besides
1671 that - and that is the connection to Skolelinux / Debian Edu - I am
1672 working in our own school project
"IT-Zukunft Schule
" in North
1673 Germany. I am responsible for the quality assurance, the customer
1674 relationship management and the communication processes in the
1677 <p
>Since
2001 I constantly have been training myself in communication
1678 and leadership. Besides that I am a forester, a landscaping gardener
1679 and a yoga teacher.
</p
>
1681 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
1682 project?
</strong
></p
>
1684 <p
>I fell in love with Mike ;-).
</p
>
1686 <p
>Very soon after getting to know him I was completely enrolled into
1687 Free Software. At this time Mike did IT-services for one newly
1688 founded school in Kiel. Other schools in Kiel needed concepts for
1689 their IT environment. Often when Mike came home from working at the
1690 newly founded school I found myself listening to his complaints about
1691 several points where the communication with the schools head or the
1692 teachers did not work. So we were clear that he would not work for
1693 one more school if we did not set up a structure for communication
1694 between him, the schools head, the teachers, the students and the
1697 <p
>Together with our friend and hardware supplier Andreas Buchholz we
1698 started to get an overview of free software solutions suitable for
1699 schools. One day before Christmas
2010 Mike and I had a date with Kurt
1700 Gramlich in Gütersloh. As Kurt and I are really interested in building
1701 networks of people and in being in communication we dived into
1702 Skolelinux and brought it to the first grammar schools in Northern
1705 <p
>For information about our school project you can read
1706 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Mike_Gabriel.html
">the
1707 interview with Mike Gabriel
</a
>.
</p
>
1709 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
1710 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
1712 <p
>First I have to say: I cannot answer this question technically. My
1713 answer comes rather from a social point of view.
</p
>
1715 <p
>The biggest advantage of Skolelinux / Debian Edu I see is the large
1716 and strong international community of Debian Developers in the
1717 background which is very alive and connected over mailinglists, blogs
1718 and meetings. My constant feeling for the Debian Community is: If
1719 something does not work they will somehow fix it. All is well
1720 ;-). This is of course a user experience. What I also get as a big
1721 advantage of Skolelinux / Debian Edu is that everybody who uses it and
1722 works with it can also contribute to it - that includes students,
1723 teachers, parents...
</p
>
1725 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
1726 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
1728 <p
>I will answer this question relating to the internal structure of
1729 Skolelinux / Debian Edu.
</p
>
1731 <p
>What I see as a major disadvantage is that there is a gap between
1732 the group of developers for Debian Edu and the people who make the
1733 marketing, that means the people that bring Skolelinux to the
1734 schools. There is a lack of communication between these two groups and
1735 I think that does not really work for Skolelinux / Debian Edu.
</p
>
1737 <p
>Further I appreciate that Skolelinux / Debian Edu is known as a
1738 do-ocracy. Nevertheless I keep asking myself if at some points a
1739 democracy or some kind of hierarchical project structure would be good
1740 and helpful. I am also missing some kind of contact between the
1741 Skolelinux / Debian Edu communities in Europe or on an international
1742 level. I think it would be good if there was more sharing between the
1743 different countries using Skolelinux / Debian Edu.
</p
>
1745 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
1747 <p
>On my laptop I am still using an Ubuntu
10.04 with a Gnome Desktop
1748 on. As applications I use Openoffice.org, Gedit, Firefox, Pidgin,
1749 LaTeX and GnuCash. For mails I am using Horde. And I am really fond of
1750 my N900 running with Maemo.
</p
>
1752 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
1753 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
1755 <p
>I am really convinced that in our school project
"IT-Zukunft
1756 Schule
" we have developed (and keep developing) a great way to get
1757 schools to use Free Software. We have written a detailed concept for
1758 that so I cannot explain the whole thing here. But in a nutshell the
1759 strategy has three crucial pillars:
</p
>
1763 <li
>We really take time to get what sort of stories, questions and
1764 concerns the schools head and the teachers have about using different
1765 kinds of IT and we take time to enrol them into Free Software.
</li
>
1767 <li
>Our solution for schools is never just technical. In the centre
1768 are always the people who are going to use the software. From the very
1769 beginning of the planning for a school, we tell the schools head that
1770 they are paying us not only for a technical solution for their school,
1771 they also pay us for leading all the communication processes
1772 needed. If they do not want that, we are not working with them because
1773 we cannot give a guarantee for the quality of our work then.
</li
>
1775 <li
>Another focus lies in the training of teachers and students in
1776 co-administrating the IT-System at their school. They start getting in
1777 contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu community and they get the
1778 offer to become more and more independent from us.
</li
>
1785 <title>The European Central Bank (ECB) take a look at bitcoin
</title>
1786 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_European_Central_Bank__ECB__take_a_look_at_bitcoin.html
</link>
1787 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_European_Central_Bank__ECB__take_a_look_at_bitcoin.html
</guid>
1788 <pubDate>Sun,
4 Nov
2012 08:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
1789 <description><p
>Slashdot just ran a story about the European Central Bank (ECB)
1790 <a href=
"http://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/other/virtualcurrencyschemes201210en.pdf
">releasing
1791 a report (PDF)
</a
> about virtual currencies and
1792 <a href=
"http://www.bitcoin.org/
">bitcoin
</a
>. It is interesting to
1793 see how a member of the bitcoin community
1794 <a href=
"http://blog.bitinstant.com/blog/
2012/
10/
30/the-ecb-report-on-bitcoin-and-virtual-currencies.html
">receive
1795 the report
</a
>. As for the future, I suspect the central banks and
1796 the governments will outlaw bitcoin if it gain any popularity, to avoid
1797 competition. My thoughts go to the
1798 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wörgl
">Wörgl experiment
</a
> with
1799 negative inflation on cash which was such a success that it was
1800 terminated by the Austrian National Bank in
1933. A successful
1801 alternative would be a threat to the current money system and gain
1802 powerful forces to work against it.
</p
>
1804 <p
>While checking out the current status of bitcoin, I also discovered
1805 that the community already seem to have
1806 <a href=
"http://www.theverge.com/
2012/
8/
27/
3271637/bitcoin-savings-trust-pyramid-scheme-shuts-down
">experienced
1807 its first pyramid game / Ponzi scheme
</a
>. Not very surprising, given
1808 how members of
"small
" communities tend to trust each other. I guess
1809 enterprising crocks will try again and again, as they do anywhere
1810 wealth is available.
</p
>
1815 <title>12 years of outages - summarised by Stuart Kendrick
</title>
1816 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/
12_years_of_outages___summarised_by_Stuart_Kendrick.html
</link>
1817 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/
12_years_of_outages___summarised_by_Stuart_Kendrick.html
</guid>
1818 <pubDate>Fri,
26 Oct
2012 14:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
1819 <description><p
>I work at the
<a href=
"http://www.uio.no/
">University of Oslo
</a
>
1820 looking after the computers, mostly on the unix side, but in general
1821 all over the place. I am also a member (and currently leader) of
1822 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/
">the NUUG association
</a
>, which in turn
1823 make me a member of
<a href=
"http://www.usenix.org/
">USENIX
</a
>. NUUG
1824 is an member organisation for us in Norway interested in free
1825 software, open standards and unix like operating systems, and USENIX
1826 is a US based member organisation with similar targets. And thanks to
1827 these memberships, I get all issues of the great USENIX magazine
1828 <a href=
"https://www.usenix.org/publications/login
">;login:
</a
> in the
1829 mail several times a year. The magazine is great, and I read most of
1830 it every time.
</p
>
1832 <p
>In the last issue of the USENIX magazine ;login:, there is an
1833 article by
<a href=
"http://www.skendric.com/
">Stuart Kendrick
</a
> from
1834 Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center titled
1835 "<a href=
"https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/october-
2012-volume-
37-number-
5/what-takes-us-down
">What
1836 Takes Us Down
</a
>" (longer version also
1837 <a href=
"http://www.skendric.com/problem/incident-analysis/
2012-
06-
30/What-Takes-Us-Down.pdf
">available
1838 from his own site
</a
>), where he report what he found when he
1839 processed the outage reports (both planned and unplanned) from the
1840 last twelve years and classified them according to cause, time of day,
1841 etc etc. The article is a good read to get some empirical data on
1842 what kind of problems affect a data centre, but what really inspired
1843 me was the kind of reporting they had put in place since
2000.
<p
>
1845 <p
>The centre set up a mailing list, and started to send fairly
1846 standardised messages to this list when a outage was planned or when
1847 it already occurred, to announce the plan and get feedback on the
1848 assumtions on scope and user impact. Here is the two example from the
1849 article: First the unplanned outage:
1851 <blockquote
><pre
>
1852 Subject: Exchange
2003 Cluster Issues
1853 Severity: Critical (Unplanned)
1854 Start: Monday, May
7,
2012,
11:
58
1855 End: Monday, May
7,
2012,
12:
38
1856 Duration:
40 minutes
1857 Scope: Exchange
2003
1858 Description: The HTTPS service on the Exchange cluster crashed, triggering
1861 User Impact: During this period, all Exchange users were unable to
1862 access e-mail. Zimbra users were unaffected.
1864 </pre
></blockquote
>
1866 Next the planned outage:
1868 <blockquote
><pre
>
1869 Subject: H Building Switch Upgrades
1870 Severity: Major (Planned)
1871 Start: Saturday, June
16,
2012,
06:
00
1872 End: Saturday, June
16,
2012,
16:
00
1875 Description: Currently, Catalyst
4006s provide
10/
100 Ethernet to end-
1876 stations. We will replace these with newer Catalyst
1878 User Impact: All users on H2 will be isolated from the network during
1879 this work. Afterward, they will have gigabit
1882 </pre
></blockquote
>
1884 <p
>He notes in his article that the date formats and other fields have
1885 been a bit too free form to make it easy to automatically process them
1886 into a database for further analysis, and I would have used ISO
8601
1887 dates myself to make it easier to process (in other words I would ask
1888 people to write
'2012-
06-
16 06:
00 +
0000' instead of the start time
1889 format listed above). There are also other issues with the format
1890 that could be improved, read the article for the details.
</p
>
1892 <p
>I find the idea of standardising outage messages seem to be such a
1893 good idea that I would like to get it implemented here at the
1894 university too. We do register
1895 <a href=
"http://www.uio.no/tjenester/it/aktuelt/planlagte-tjenesteavbrudd/
">planned
1896 changes and outages in a calendar
</a
>, and report the to a mailing
1897 list, but we do not do so in a structured format and there is not a
1898 report to the same location for unplanned outages. Perhaps something
1899 for other sites to consider too?
</p
>
1904 <title>Amazon steal books from customer and throw out her out without any explanation
</title>
1905 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Amazon_steal_books_from_customer_and_throw_out_her_out_without_any_explanation.html
</link>
1906 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Amazon_steal_books_from_customer_and_throw_out_her_out_without_any_explanation.html
</guid>
1907 <pubDate>Mon,
22 Oct
2012 20:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
1908 <description><p
>A blog post from Martin Bekkelund today tell the story of
1909 <a href=
"http://www.bekkelund.net/
2012/
10/
22/outlawed-by-amazon-drm/
">how
1910 Amazon erased the books from a customer
's kindle, locked the account
1911 and refuse to tell the customer why
</a
>. If a real book store did
1912 this to a customer, it would be called breaking into private property
1913 and theft. The story has spread around the net today. A bit more
1914 background information is available in Norwegian from
1915 <a href=
"http://www.digi.no/
904658/hun-ble-kastet-ut-av-amazon
">digi.no
</a
>.
1916 It is no surprise that digital restriction mechanisms (DRM) are used
1917 this way, as it has been warned about such abuse since DRM was
1918 introduced many years back. And Amazon proved in
2009 that it was
1920 <a href=
"http://boingboing.net/
2009/
07/
20/amazons-orwellian-de.html
">
1921 break into customers equipment and remove the books
</a
> people had
1922 bought, when it removed the book
1984 by George Orwell from all the
1923 customers who had bought it. From the official comments, it even
1925 <a href=
"http://www.nytimes.com/
2009/
07/
18/technology/companies/
18amazon.html
">Amazon
1926 would never do that again
</a
>. And here we are, three years
1929 <p
>And thought this action is
1930 <a href=
"http://www.itavisen.no/
904648/forbrukerraadet-helt-haarreisende
">against
1931 Norwegian regulations and law
</a
>, it is according to the terms of use
1932 as written by Amazon, and it is hard to hold Amazon accountable to
1933 Norwegian laws. It is just yet another example of unacceptable terms
1934 of use on the web, and how they are used to remove customer
1937 <p
>Luckily for electronic books, there are alternatives without
1938 unacceptable terms. For example
1939 <a href=
"http://www.gutenberg.org/
">Project Gutenberg
</a
> (about
40,
000
1940 books),
<a href=
"http://runeberg.org/
">Project Runenberg
</a
> (
1,
652
1941 books) and
<a href=
"http://www.archive.org/details/texts
">The Internet
1942 Archive
</a
> (
3,
641,
797 books) have heaps of books without DRM, which
1943 can read by anyone and shared with anyone.
</p
>
1945 <p
>Update
2012-
10-
23: This story broke in the morning on Monday. In
1946 the evening after the story had spread all across the Internet, Amazon
1947 restored the account of the user, as reported by
1948 <a href=
"http://www.digi.no/
904675/helomvending-fra-amazon
">digi.no
</a
>
1949 and
<a href=
"http://nrk.no/kultur-og-underholdning/
1.8368487">NRK
</a
>.
1950 Apparently public pressure work. The story from Martin have seen
1951 several twitter messages per minute the last
24 hours, which is quite
1952 a lot, and is still drawing a lot of attention. But even when the
1953 account is restored, the fundamental problem still exist. I recommend
1954 reading two opinions from
1955 <a href=
"http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/
2012/
10/rights-you-have-no-right-to-your-ebooks/index.htm
">Simon
1956 Phipps
</a
> and
1957 <a href=
"http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/
2012/
10/is-amazon-playing-fair/index.htm
">Glen
1958 Moody
</a
> if you want to learn more about the fundamentals and more
1959 details about the original story.
</p
>
1964 <title>The fight for freedom and privacy
</title>
1965 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_fight_for_freedom_and_privacy.html
</link>
1966 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_fight_for_freedom_and_privacy.html
</guid>
1967 <pubDate>Thu,
18 Oct
2012 10:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
1968 <description><p
>Civil liberties and privacy in the western world are going down the
1969 drain, and it is hard to fight against it. I try to do my best, but
1970 time is limited. I hope you do your best too. A few years ago I came
1971 across a marvellous drawing by
1972 <a href=
"http://www.claybennett.com/about.html
">Clay Bennett
</a
>
1973 visualising some of what is going on.
1975 <p
><a href=
"http://www.claybennett.com/pages/security_fence.html
">
1976 <img src=
"http://www.claybennett.com/images/archivetoons/security_fence.jpg
"></a
></p
>
1979 «They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
1980 safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.» - Benjamin Franklin
1983 <p
>Do you feel safe at the airport? I do not. Do you feel safe when
1984 you see a surveillance camera? I do not. Do you feel safe when you
1985 leave electronic traces of your behaviour and opinions? I do not. I
1986 just remember
<a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon
">the
1987 Panopticon
</a
>, and can not help to think that we are slowly
1988 transforming our society to a huge Panopticon on our own.
</p
>
1993 <title>ColonHelp produser sue WordPress to silence critic
</title>
1994 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ColonHelp_produser_sue_WordPress_to_silence_critic.html
</link>
1995 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ColonHelp_produser_sue_WordPress_to_silence_critic.html
</guid>
1996 <pubDate>Fri,
12 Oct
2012 23:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
1997 <description><p
>Thanks to a blog post by
1998 <a href=
"http://ramblingfoo.blogspot.no/
2012/
10/a-shitstorm-is-comming.html
">Eddy
1999 Petrișor
</a
>, I became aware of yet another
"alternative medicine
"
2000 company using legal intimidation tactics to scare off critics.
2001 According to the originating blog post about the detox
"cure
"
2002 <a href=
"http://insulaindoielii.wordpress.com/
2012/
10/
11/colon-help-sues-wordpress/
">ColonHelp
2003 and its producers Zenyth Pharmaceuticals actions
</a
>, the producer
2004 sues Wordpress to get rid of the critical information. To check if
2005 the story was for real, I contacted Automattic, the company behind
2006 wordpress.com, and they reply was
"We can confirm that Zenyth is
2007 seeking a court order against WordPress / Automattic. However, we
2008 don
't believe the Terms of Service have been violated in this
2009 matter
".
</p
>
2011 <p
>The story seem to be simply that a blogger checked the scientific
2012 foundation for a popular health product in Rumania, ColonHelp, and
2013 reported that there was no reason at all to believe it improved the
2014 health of its users. This caused the company behind the product,
2015 Zenyth Pharmaceuticals, to use legal intimidation to try to silence
2016 the critic, instead of presenting its views and scientific foundation
2017 to argue its side.
</p
>
2019 <p
>This is the usual story, and the Zenyth Pharmaceuticals company
2020 deserve everyone to know how it failed to act properly. Lets hope the
2021 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
">Streisand
2022 effect
</a
> can make it rethink its strategy.
</p
>
2024 <p
>What is the harm, you might think. I suggest you take a look at
2025 <a href=
"http://www.whatstheharm.net/detoxification.html
">a list of
2026 victims of detoxification
</a
>.
</p
>
2031 <title>Why is your local library collecting the
"wrong
" computer books?
</title>
2032 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_is_your_local_library_collecting_the__wrong__computer_books_.html
</link>
2033 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_is_your_local_library_collecting_the__wrong__computer_books_.html
</guid>
2034 <pubDate>Wed,
3 Oct
2012 10:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2035 <description><p
>I just read the blog post from Tim Retout
2036 <a href=
"http://retout.co.uk/blog/
2012/
10/
02/the-library-challenge
">about
2037 the computer science book collection available in his local
2038 library
</a
>, and just wanted to share my comment on his theory about
2039 computer books becoming obsolete so soon. That is part of the reason
2040 why the selection is so sad in almost any local library (it is in mine
2041 too), but I believe the major contributing factor is that the people
2042 buying books to the library have no way to know a good and future
2043 computer classic from trash. And they need to know which one will
2044 become a classic in the future, as they would normally buy one of the
2045 recently published books.
</p
>
2047 <p
>During my university years, I worked for a while at the university
2048 library, and even there the person in charge of buying computer
2049 related books (and in fact any natural science related book), did not
2050 know enough about computers to make a good educated guess. Once, just
2051 before Christmas, they had some leftover money on the book budget and
2052 I was asked if I could pick out a lot of computer books in the
2053 university book store, for the library to buy for their collection. I
2054 had a great time picking all the books I dreamt of buying and reading,
2055 and the books I knew were classics (like most of the
2056 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Richard_Stevens
">Stevens
2057 collection
</a
>). I picked several of the generic O
'Reilly books (ie
2058 documenting protocols, formats and systems, not specific versions of
2059 products) and stayed away from the
'teach yourself X in N days
' class.
2060 I had a great time, and probably picked out more than a hundred books
2061 for the library that evening.
</p
>
2063 <p
>The sad fact is that there is no way a overworked librarian is
2064 going to know that for example
2065 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Practice_of_Programming
">The
2066 Practice of Programming
</a
> is a must-have in any computer library,
2067 and they will most of the time end up picking the wrong books to buy.
2068 Perhaps you can help your local library make better choices by giving
2069 the suggestions for books to get? I know they would love to hear from
2070 you, even if their budget might block them from getting your favourite
2071 book right away.
</p
>
2076 <title>Seventy percent done with Norwegian docbook version of Free Culture
</title>
2077 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Seventy_percent_done_with_Norwegian_docbook_version_of_Free_Culture.html
</link>
2078 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Seventy_percent_done_with_Norwegian_docbook_version_of_Free_Culture.html
</guid>
2079 <pubDate>Sun,
23 Sep
2012 09:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2080 <description><p
>Since this summer, I have worked in my spare time on a Norwegian
<a
2081 href=
"http://www.docbook.org/
">docbook
</a
> version of the
2004 book
<a
2082 href=
"http://free-culture.cc/
">Free Culture
</a
> by Lawrence Lessig.
2083 The reason is that this book is a great primer on what problems exist
2084 in the current copyright laws, and I want it to be available also for
2085 those that are reluctant do read an English book.
2088 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html
">called
2089 for volunteers
</a
> to help me, but too few have volunteered so far,
2090 and progress is a bit slow. Anyway, today I broken the
70 percent
2091 mark for the first rough translation. At the moment, less than
700
2092 strings (paragraphs, index terms, titles) are left to translate. With
2093 my current progress of
10-
20 strings per day, it will take a while to
2094 complete the translation. This graph show the updated progress:
</p
>
2096 <img width=
"80%
" align=
"center
" src=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/progress.png
">
2098 <p
>Progress have slowed down lately due to family and work
2099 commitments. If you want to help, please get in touch, and check out
2100 the project files currently available from
2101 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig
">github
</a
>.
</p
>
2103 <p
>If you are curious what the translated book currently look like,
2105 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf?raw=true
">PDF
</a
>
2107 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub?raw=true
">EPUB
</a
>
2108 are published on github. The HTML version is published as well, but
2109 github hand it out with MIME type text/plain, confusing browsers, so I
2110 saw no point in linking to that version.
</p
>
2115 <title>Debian Edu interview: Giorgio Pioda
</title>
2116 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Giorgio_Pioda.html
</link>
2117 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Giorgio_Pioda.html
</guid>
2118 <pubDate>Mon,
17 Sep
2012 14:
10:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2119 <description><p
>After a long break in my row of interviews with people in the
2120 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
>
2121 community, I finally found time to wrap up another. This time it is
2122 Giorgio Pioda, which showed up on the mailing list at the start of
2123 this year, asking questions and inspiring us to improve the first time
2124 administrators experience with Skolelinux. :) The interview was
2125 conduced in May, but I only found time to publish it now.
</p
>
2127 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
2129 <p
>I have a PhD in chemistry but since several years I work as teacher
2130 in secondary (
15-
18 year old students) and tertiary (a kind of
"light
"
2131 university) schools. Five years ago I started to manage a Learning
2132 Management Service server and slowly I got more and more involved with
2133 IT.
3 years ago the graduating schools moved completely to Linux and I
2134 got the head of the IT for this. The experience collected in chemistry
2135 labs computers (for example NMR analysis of protein folding) and in
2136 the IT-courses during university where sufficient to start. Self
2137 training is anyway very important
</p
>
2139 <p
>I live in the Italian speaking part of Switzerland, and the
2140 <a href=
"http://www.spse.ch/
">SPSE school
</a
> (secondary) is a very
2141 special sport school for young people who try to became sport pro (for
2142 all sports, we have dozens of disciplines represented) and we are
2143 recognised by the Olympic Swiss Organisation.
2145 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
2146 project?
</strong
></p
>
2148 <p
>Looking for Linux / Primary Domain Controller (PDC) I found it
2149 already several years ago. But since the system was still not
2150 Kerberized and since our schools relies strongly on laptops I didn
't
2151 use it. I plan to introduce it in the next future, probably for the
2152 next school year, since the squeeze release solved this security
2155 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
2156 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
2158 <p
>Many. First of all there is a strong and living community that is
2159 very generous for help and hints. Chat help is crucial, together with
2160 the mailing list. Second. With Skolelinux you get an already well
2161 engineered platform and you don
't have to start to build up your PDC
2162 and your clients from GNU/scratch; I
've already done this once and I
2163 can tell it, it is hard. Third, since Skolelinux is a standard
2164 platform, it is way easier to educate other IT people and even if the
2165 head IT is sick another one could pick up the task without too much
2168 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
2169 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
2171 <p
>The only real problem I see is that it is a little too less
2172 flexible at client level. Debian stable is rocky and desirable, but
2173 there are many reasons that force for another choice. For example the
2174 need of new drivers for new PC, or the need for a specific OS for some
2175 devices that have specific software packages for another specific
2176 distribution (I have such a case for whiteboards that have only
2177 Ubuntu packages). Thus, I prepared compatibility packages educlient
2178 and eduroaming, hoping not to use them ;-)
</p
>
2180 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
2182 <p
>I have a Debian Stable PDC at school (Kerberos, NIS, NFS) with
2183 mixed Debian and Ubuntu clients. If you think that this triad
2184 combination is exotic... well I discovered right yesterday that
2185 <a href=
"http://moo.nac.uci.edu/~hjm/Perceus-Report.html
">Perceus
</a
>
2186 has the same...
</p
>
2188 <p
>For myself I run Debian wheezy/sid, but this combination is good
2189 only I you have enough competence to fix stuff for yourself, if
2190 something breaks. Daily I use texmacs, gnumeric, a little bit of R
2191 statistics, kmplot, and less frequently OpenOffice.org.
</p
>
2193 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
2194 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
2196 <P
>I think that the only real argument that school managers
"hear
" is
2197 cost reduction. They don
't give too much weight on quality, stability,
2198 just because they are normally not open to change.
</p
>
2200 <p
>Students adapts very quickly to GNU/Linux (and for them being able
2201 to switch between different OS is a plus value); teachers and managers
2202 don
't.
</p
>
2204 <p
>We decided to move to Linux because students at our school have own
2205 laptop and we have the responsibility to keep the laptop ready to use;
2206 we were really unsatisfied with Microsoft since every Monday we had
20
2207 machine to fix for viral infections... With Linux this has been
2208 reduced to zero, since people installs almost only from official
2209 repositories. I think that our special needs brought us to Linux.
2210 Those who don
't have such needs will hardly move to Linux.
</p
>
2215 <title>IETF activity to standardise video codec
</title>
2216 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_activity_to_standardise_video_codec.html
</link>
2217 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_activity_to_standardise_video_codec.html
</guid>
2218 <pubDate>Sat,
15 Sep
2012 20:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2219 <description><p
>After the
2220 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_standardize_its_first_multimedia_codec__Opus.html
">Opus
2221 codec made
</a
> it into
<a href=
"http://www.ietf.org/
">IETF
</a
> as
2222 <a href=
"http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6716
">RFC
6716</a
>, I had a look
2223 to see if there is any activity in IETF to standardise a video codec
2224 too, and I was happy to discover that there is some activity in this
2225 area. A non-
"working group
" mailing list
2226 <a href=
"https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/video-codec
">video-codec
</a
>
2228 <a href=
"http://ietf
.10.n7.nabble.com/New-Non-WG-Mailing-List-video-codec-Video-codec-BoF-discussion-list-td119548.html
">created
2012-
08-
20</a
>. It is intended to discuss the topic and if a
2229 formal working group should be formed.
</p
>
2231 <p
>I look forward to see how this plays out. There is already
2232 <a href=
"http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/video-codec/current/msg00003.html
">an
2233 email from someone
</a
> in the MPEG group at ISO asking people to
2234 participate in the ISO group. Given how ISO failed with OOXML and given
2235 that it so far (as far as I can remember) only have produced
2236 multimedia formats requiring royalty payments, I suspect
2237 joining the ISO group would be a complete waste of time, but I am not
2238 involved in any codec work and my opinion will not matter much.
</p
>
2240 <p
>If one of my readers is involved with codec work, I hope she will
2241 join this work to standardise a royalty free video codec within
2247 <title>IETF standardize its first multimedia codec: Opus
</title>
2248 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_standardize_its_first_multimedia_codec__Opus.html
</link>
2249 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_standardize_its_first_multimedia_codec__Opus.html
</guid>
2250 <pubDate>Wed,
12 Sep
2012 13:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2251 <description><p
>Yesterday,
<a href=
"http://www.ietf.org/
">IETF
</a
> announced the
2253 <a href=
"http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6716
">RFC
6716, the Definition
2254 of the Opus Audio Codec
</a
>, a low latency, variable bandwidth, codec
2255 intended for both VoIP, film and music. This is the first time, as
2256 far as I know, that IETF have standardized a multimedia codec. In
2257 <a href=
"http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3533
">RFC
3533</a
>, IETF
2258 standardized the OGG container format, and it has proven to be a great
2259 royalty free container for audio, video and movies. I hope IETF will
2260 continue to standardize more royalty free codeces, after ISO and MPEG
2261 have proven incapable of securing everyone equal rights to publish
2262 multimedia content on the Internet.
</p
>
2264 <p
>IETF require two interoperating independent implementations to
2265 ratify a standard, and have so far ensured to only standardize royalty
2266 free specifications. Both are key factors to allow everyone (rich and
2267 poor), to compete on equal terms on the Internet.
</p
>
2269 <p
>Visit the
<a href=
"http://opus-codec.org/
">Opus project page
</a
> if
2270 you want to learn more about the solution.
</p
>
2275 <title>Git repository for song book for Computer Scientists
</title>
2276 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Git_repository_for_song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html
</link>
2277 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Git_repository_for_song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html
</guid>
2278 <pubDate>Fri,
7 Sep
2012 13:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2279 <description><p
>As I
2280 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html
">mentioned
2281 this summer
</a
>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
2282 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
2283 <a href=
"https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook
">Gitorious
2284 repository for the project
</a
>.
</p
>
2286 <p
>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
2287 to the HTML version. To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
2288 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
2289 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.
</p
>
2291 <p
>Want to sing? You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
2292 PostScript formats at
2293 <a href=
"http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/
">Petter
's Computer
2294 Science Songbook
</a
>.
</p
>
2299 <title>Free software forced Microsoft to open Office (and don
't forget Officeshots)
</title>
2300 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_software_forced_Microsoft_to_open_Office__and_don_t_forget_Officeshots_.html
</link>
2301 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_software_forced_Microsoft_to_open_Office__and_don_t_forget_Officeshots_.html
</guid>
2302 <pubDate>Thu,
23 Aug
2012 14:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2303 <description><p
>I came across a great comment from Simon Phipps today, about how
2304 <a href=
"http://www.infoworld.com/d/open-source-software/how-microsoft-was-forced-open-office-
200233">Microsoft
2305 have been forced to open Office
</a
>, and it made me remember and
2306 revisit the great site
2307 <a href=
"http://www.officeshots.org/
">officeshots
</a
> which allow you
2308 to check out how different programs present the ODF file format. I
2309 recommend both to those of my readers interested in ODF. :)
</p
>
2314 <title>Half way there with translated docbook version of Free Culture
</title>
2315 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Half_way_there_with_translated_docbook_version_of_Free_Culture.html
</link>
2316 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Half_way_there_with_translated_docbook_version_of_Free_Culture.html
</guid>
2317 <pubDate>Fri,
17 Aug
2012 21:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2318 <description><p
>In my spare time, I currently work on a Norwegian
2319 <a href=
"http://www.docbook.org/
">docbook
</a
> version of the
2004 book
2320 <a href=
"http://free-culture.cc/
">Free Culture
</a
> by Lawrence Lessig,
2321 to get a Norwegian text explaining the problems with the copyright law
2322 I can give to my parents and others that are reluctant to read an
2323 English book. It is a marvellous set of examples on how the ever
2324 expanding copyright regulations hurt culture and society. When the
2325 translation is done, I hope to find funding to print and ship a copy
2326 to all the members of the Norwegian parliament, before they sit down
2327 to debate the latest revisions to the Norwegian copyright law. This
2329 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html
">called
2330 for volunteers
</a
> to help me, and I have been able to secure the
2331 valuable contribution from at least one other Norwegian.
</p
>
2333 <p
>Two days ago, we finally broke the
50% mark. Then more than
50% of
2334 the number of strings to translate (normally paragraphs, but also
2335 titles and index entries are also counted). All parts from the
2336 beginning up to and including chapter four is translated. So is
2337 chapters six, seven and the conclusion. I created a graph to show the
2340 <img width=
"80%
" align=
"center
" src=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/progress.png
">
2342 <p
>The number of strings to translate increase as I insert the index
2343 entries into the docbook. They were missing with the docbook version
2344 I initially started with. There are still quite a few index entries
2345 missing, but everyone starting with A, B, O, Z and Y are done. I
2346 currently focus on completing the index entries, to get a complete
2347 english version of the docbook source.
</p
>
2349 <p
>There is still need for translators and people with docbook
2350 knowledge, to be able to get a good looking book (I still struggle
2351 with dblatex, xmlto and docbook-xsl) as well as to do the draft
2352 translation and proof reading. And I would like the figures to be
2353 redrawn as SVGs to make it easy to translate them. Any SVG master
2354 around? I am sure there are some legal terms that are unfamiliar to
2355 me. If you want to help, please get in touch, and check out the
2356 project files currently available from
<a
2357 href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig
">github
</a
>.
</p
>
2359 <p
>If you are curious what the translated book currently look like,
2361 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf?raw=true
">PDF
</a
>
2363 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub?raw=true
">EPUB
</a
>
2364 are published on github. The HTML version is published as well, but
2365 github hand it out with MIME type text/plain, confusing browsers, so I
2366 saw no point in linking to that version.
</p
>
2371 <title>Notes on language codes for Norwegian docbook processing...
</title>
2372 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Notes_on_language_codes_for_Norwegian_docbook_processing___.html
</link>
2373 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Notes_on_language_codes_for_Norwegian_docbook_processing___.html
</guid>
2374 <pubDate>Fri,
10 Aug
2012 21:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2375 <description><p
>In
<a href=
"http://www.docbook.org/
">docbook
</a
> one can specify
2376 the language used at the top, and the processing pipeline will use
2377 this information to pick the correct translations for
'chapter
',
'see
2378 also
',
'index
' etc. And for most languages used with docbook, I guess
2379 this work just fine. For example a German user can start the document
2380 with
&lt;book lang=
"de
"&gt;, and the document will show up with the
2381 correct content with any of the docbook processors. This is not the
2382 case for the language
2383 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Culture_in_Norwegian___5_chapters_done__74_percent_left_to_do.html
">I
2384 am working with at the moment
</a
>, Norwegian Bokmål.
</p
>
2386 <p
>For a while, I was confused about which language code to use,
2387 because I was unable to find any language code that would work across
2388 all tools. I am currently testing dblatex, xmlto, docbook-xsl, and
2389 dbtoepub, and they do not handle Norwegian Bokmål the same way. Some
2390 of them do not handle it at all.
</p
>
2392 <p
>A bit of background information is probably needed to understand
2393 this mess. Norwegian is not one, but two written variants. The
2394 variants are Norwegian Nynorsk and Norwegian Bokmål. There are three
2395 two letter language codes associated with these languages, Norwegian
2396 is
'no
', Norwegian Nynorsk is
'nn
' and Norwegian Bokmål is
'nb
'.
2397 Historically the
'no
' language code was used for Norwegian Bokmål, but
2398 many years ago this was found to be å bad idea, and the recommendation
2399 is to use the most specific language code instead, to avoid confusion.
2400 In the transition period it is a good idea to make sure
'no
' was an
2401 alias for
'nb
'.
</p
>
2403 <p
>Back to docbook processing tools in Debian. The dblatex tool only
2404 understand
'nn
'. There are translations for
'no
', but not
'nb
' (BTS
2405 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
684391">#
684391</a
>), but due to a bug
2406 (BTS
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
682936">#
682936</a
>) the
'no
'
2407 language code is not recognised. The docbook-xsl tool chain only
2408 recognise
'nn
' and
'nb
', but not
'no
'. The xmlto tool only recognise
2409 'nn
' and
'nb
', but not
'no
'. The end result that there is no language
2410 code I can use to get the docbook file working with all of these tools
2411 at the same time. :(
</p
>
2413 <p
>The correct solution is to use
&lt;book lang=
"nb
"&gt;, but it will
2414 take time before that will work with all the free software docbook
2415 processors. :(
</p
>
2417 <p
>Oh, the joy of well integrated tools. :/
</p
>
2422 <title>Best way to create a docbook book?
</title>
2423 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Best_way_to_create_a_docbook_book_.html
</link>
2424 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Best_way_to_create_a_docbook_book_.html
</guid>
2425 <pubDate>Tue,
31 Jul
2012 22:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2426 <description><p
>I tried to send this text to the
2427 <a href=
"https://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/docbook-apps/
">docbook-apps
2428 mailing list at lists.oasis-open.org
</a
>, but it only accept messages
2429 from subscribers and rejected my post, and I completely lack the
2430 bandwidth required to subscribe to another mailing list, so instead I
2431 try to post my message here and hope my blog readers can help me
2434 <p
>I am quite new to docbook processing, and am climbing a steep
2435 learning curve at the moment.
</p
>
2437 <p
>To give you some background, I am working on a Norwegian
2438 translation of the book Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig, and I use
2439 docbook to handle the process. The files to build the book are
2441 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig
">github
</a
>.
2442 The book got around
400 pages with parts, images, footnotes, tables,
2443 index entries etc, which has proven to be a challenge for the free
2444 software docbook processors. My build platform is Debian GNU/Linux
2447 <p
>I want to build PDF, EPUB and HTML version of the book, and have
2448 tried different tool chains to do the conversion from docbook to these
2449 formats. I am currently focusing on the PDF version, and have a few
2454 <li
>Using dblatex, the
&lt;part
&gt; handling is not the way I want to,
2455 as
&lt;/part
&gt; do not really end the
&lt;part
&gt;. (See
2456 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
683166">BTS report #
683166</a
>), the
2457 xetex backend (needed to process UTF-
8) give incorrect hyphens in
2458 index references spanning several pages (See
2459 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
682901">BTS report #
682901</a
>), and
2460 I am unable to get the norwegian template texts (See
2461 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
682936">BTS report #
682936</a
>).
</li
>
2463 <li
>Using straight xmlto fail with some latex error (See
2464 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
683163">BTS report
2465 #
683163</a
>).
</li
>
2467 <li
>Using xmlto with the fop backend fail to handle images (do not
2468 show up in the PDF), fail to handle a long footnote (overlap
2469 footnote and text body, see
2470 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
683197">BTS report #
683197</a
>), and
2471 fail to create a correct index (some lack page ref, and the page
2472 refs listed are not right).
</li
>
2474 <li
>Using xmlto with the dblatex backend behave like dblatex.
</li
>
2476 <li
>Using docbook-xls with xsltproc + fop have the same footnote and
2477 index problems the xmlto + fop processing.
</li
>
2481 <p
>So I wonder, what would be the best way to create the PDF version
2482 of this book? Are some of the bugs found above solved in new or
2483 experimental versions of some docbook tool chain?
</p
>
2485 <p
>What about HTML and EPUB versions?
</p
>
2490 <title>Free Culture in Norwegian -
5 chapters done,
74 percent left to do
</title>
2491 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Culture_in_Norwegian___5_chapters_done__74_percent_left_to_do.html
</link>
2492 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Culture_in_Norwegian___5_chapters_done__74_percent_left_to_do.html
</guid>
2493 <pubDate>Sat,
21 Jul
2012 20:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2494 <description><p
>I reported earlier that I am working on
2495 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html
">a
2496 norwegian version
</a
> of the book
2497 <a href=
"http://free-culture.cc/
">Free Culture
</a
> by Lawrence Lessig.
2498 Progress is good, and yesterday I got a major contribution from Anders
2499 Hagen Jarmund completing chapter six. The source files as well as a
2500 PDF and EPUB version of this book are available from
2501 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig
">github
</a
>.
</p
>
2503 <p
>I am happy to report that the draft for the first two chapters
2504 (preface, introduction) is complete, and three other chapters are also
2505 completely translated. This completes
26 percent of the number of
2506 strings (equivalent to paragraphs) in the book, and there is thus
74
2507 percent left to translate. A graph of the progress is present at the
2508 bottom of the github project page. There is still room for more
2509 contributors. Get in touch or send github pull requests with fixes if
2510 you got time and are willing to help make this book make it to
2513 <p
>The book translation framework could also be a good basis for other
2514 translations, if you want the book to be available in your
2520 <title>Call for help from docbook expert to tag Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig
</title>
2521 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Call_for_help_from_docbook_expert_to_tag_Free_Culture_by_Lawrence_Lessig.html
</link>
2522 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Call_for_help_from_docbook_expert_to_tag_Free_Culture_by_Lawrence_Lessig.html
</guid>
2523 <pubDate>Mon,
16 Jul
2012 22:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2524 <description><p
>I am currently working on a
2525 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html
">project
2526 to translate
</a
> the book
2527 <a href=
"http://free-culture.cc/
">Free Culture
</a
> by Lawrence Lessig
2528 to Norwegian. And the source we base our translation on is the
2529 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DocBook
">docbook
</a
> version, to
2530 allow us to use po4a and .po files to handle the translation, and for
2531 this to work well the docbook source document need to be properly
2532 tagged. The source files of this project is available from
2533 <a href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig
">github
</a
>.
</p
>
2535 <p
>The problem is that the docbook source have flaws, and we have
2536 no-one involved in the project that is a docbook expert. Is there a
2537 docbook expert somewhere that is interested in helping us create a
2538 well tagged docbook version of the book, and adjust our build process
2539 for the PDF, EPUB and HTML version of the book? This will provide a
2540 well tagged English version (our source document), and make it a lot
2541 easier for us to create a good Norwegian version. If you can and want
2542 to help, please get in touch with me or fork the github project and
2543 send pull requests with fixes. :)
</p
>
2548 <title>Debian Edu interview: George Bredberg
</title>
2549 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__George_Bredberg.html
</link>
2550 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__George_Bredberg.html
</guid>
2551 <pubDate>Mon,
9 Jul
2012 00:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2552 <description><p
>The
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu /
2553 Skolelinux
</a
> project have users all over the globe, but until
2554 recently we have not known about any users in Norway
's neighbour
2555 country Sweden. This changed when George Bredberg showed up in March
2556 this year on the mailing list, asking interesting questions about how
2557 to adjust and scale the just released
2558 <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/News/
2012/
20120311.html
">Debian Edu
2559 Wheezy
</a
> setup to his liking. He granted me an interview, and I am
2560 happy to share his answers with you here.
</p
>
2562 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
2564 <p
>I
'm a
44 year old country guy that have been working
12 years at
2565 the same school as
50% IT-manager and
50% Teacher. My educational
2566 background is fil.kand in history and religious beliefs, an exam as a
2567 "folkhighschool
" teacher, that is, for teaching grownups. In
2568 Norwegian I believe it
's called
"Vuxenupplaring
". I also have a master
2569 in
"Technology and social change
". So I
'm not really a tech guy, I
2570 just like to study how humans and technology interact and that is my
2571 perspective when working with IT.
</p
>
2573 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
2574 project?
</strong
></p
>
2576 I have followed the Skolelinux project for quite some time by
2577 now. Earlier I tested out the K12-LTSP project, which we used for some
2578 time, but I really like the idea of having a distribution aimed to be
2579 a complete solution for schools with necessary tools integrated. When
2580 K12-LTSP abandoned that idea some years ago, I started to look more
2581 seriously into Skolelinux instead.
2583 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
2584 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
2586 The big point of Skolelinux to me is that it is a complete
2587 distribution, ready to install. It has LDAP-support, MS Windows
2588 integration tools and so forth already configured, saving an
2589 administrator a lot of time and headache. We were using another Linux
2590 based thin-client system called Thinlinc, that has served us very
2591 well. But that Skolelinux is based on VNC and LTSP, to me, is better
2592 when it comes to the kind of multimedia used in schools. That is
2593 showing videos from Youtube or educational TV. It is also easier to
2594 mix thin clients with workstations, since the user settings will be the
2595 same. In our VNC-based solution you had to
"beat around the bush
" by
2596 setting up a second, hidden, home-directory for user settings for the
2597 workstations, because they will be different from the ones used on the
2598 thin clients. Skolelinux support for diskless workstations are very
2599 convenient since a school today often need to use a class room
2600 projector showing videos in full screen. That is easily done with a
2601 small integrated media computer running as a diskless workstation. You
2602 have only two installs to update and configure. One for the thin
2603 clients and one for the workstations. Also saving a lot of time. Our
2604 old system was also based on Redhat and CentOS. They are both very
2605 nice distributions, but they are sometimes painfully slow when it
2606 comes to updating multimedia support and multimedia programs (even
2607 such as Gimp), leaving us with a bit
"oldish
" applications. Debian is
2610 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
2611 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
2613 <p
>Debian is a bit too quick when it comes to updating. As an example
2614 we use old HP terminals as thinclients, and two times already this
2615 year (
2012) the updates you get from the repositories has stopped
2616 sound from working with them. It
's a kernel/ALSA issue. So you have
2617 to be more careful properly testing the updates before you run them in
2618 a production environment. This has never happened with CentOS.
</p
>
2620 <p
>I also would like to be able to set my own domain-settings at
2621 install time. In Skolelinux they are kind of hard coded into the
2622 distribution, when it comes to LDAP and at least samba integration.
2623 That is more a cosmetic/translation issue, and not a real problem.
2624 Running MS Windows applications within the Skolelinux environment needs
2625 to be better supported. That is, running them seamlessly via RDP, and
2626 support for single-sign on. That will make the transition to free
2627 software easier, because you can keep the applications you really
2628 need. No support will make it impossible if you work in a school where
2629 some applications can
't be open source. As for us we really need to
2630 run Adobe InDesign in our journalist classes. We run a journalist
2631 education, and is one of the very few non university ones that is ok:d
2632 by Svenska journalistförbundet (Swedish journalist association). Our
2633 education gives the pupils the right of membership there, once they
2634 are done. This is important if you want to get a job.
</p
>
2636 <p
>Adobe InDesign is the program most commonly used in newspapers and
2637 magazines. We used Quark Express before, but they seem to loose there
2638 market to Adobe. The only
"equivalent
" to InDesign in the opensource
2639 world is Scribus, and its not advanced enough. At least not according
2640 to the teacher. I think it would be possible to use it, because they
2641 are not supposed to learn a program, they are supposed to learn how to
2642 edit and compile a newspaper. But politically at our school we are not
2643 there yet. And Scribus lacks a lot of things you find i InDesign.
</p
>
2645 <p
>We used even a windows program for sound editing when it comes to
2646 the radio-journalist part. The year to come we are going to try
2647 Audacity. That software has the same kind of limitations compared to
2648 Adobe Audition, but that teacher is a bit more open minded. We have
2649 tried Ardour also, but that instead is more like a music studio
2650 program, not intended for the kind of editing taking place in a radio
2651 studio. Its way to complex and the GUI is to scattered when you only
2652 want to cut, make pass-overs, add extra channels and normalise. Those
2653 things you can do in Audacity, but its not as easy as in Audition. You
2654 have to do more things manually with envelopes, and that is a bit old
2655 fashion and timewasting. Its also harder to cut and move sound from
2656 one channel to another, which is a thing that you do frequently
2657 because you often find yourself needing to rearrange parts of the
2658 sound file.
</p
>
2660 <p
>So, I am not sure we will succeed in replacing even Audition, but we
2661 will try. The problem is the students have certain expectations when
2662 they start an education towards a profession. So the programs has to
2663 look and feel professional. Good thing with radio, there are many
2664 programs out there, that radio studios use, so its not as standardised
2665 as Newspaper editing. That means, it does not really matter what
2666 program they learn, because once they start working they still have to
2667 learn the program the studio uses, so instead focus has to be to learn
2668 the editing part without to much focus on a specific software.
</p
>
2670 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
2672 <p
>Myself I
'm running Linux Mint, or Ubuntu these days. I use almost
2673 only open source software, and preferably Linux based. When it comes
2674 to most used applications its OpenOffice, and Firefox (of course ;)
2677 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
2678 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
2680 <p
>To get schools to use free software there has to be good open
2681 source software that are windows based, to ease the transition. But
2682 it
's also very important that the multimedia support is working
2683 flawlessly. The problems with Youtube, Twitter, Facebook and whatever
2684 will create problems when it comes to both teachers and
2685 students. Economy are also important for schools, so using thin
2686 clients, as long as they have good multimedia support, is a very good
2687 idea. It
's also important that the open source software works even for
2688 the administration. It
's hard to convince the teachers to stick with
2689 open source, if the principal has to run Windows. It also creates a
2690 problem if some classes has to use Windows for there tasks, since that
2691 will create a difference in
"status
" between classes, so a good
2692 support for running windows applications via the thin client (Linux)
2693 desktop is essential. At least at our school, where we have mixed
2694 level of educations, from high-school to journalist-school.
</p
>
2696 <p
>Update
2012-
07-
09 08:
30: Paul Wise tipped me on IRC about three
2697 useful sources related to Free Software for radio stations: the LWN
2698 article
<a href=
"https://lwn.net/Articles/
481607/
">Radio station
2699 management with Airtime
</a
>,
2700 <a href=
"http://www.sourcefabric.org/en/airtime/
">Airtime
</a
> which
2701 claim to be a Free open source radio automation software and
2702 <a href=
"http://www.rivendellaudio.org/
">Rivendell
</a
> which claim to
2703 be complete radio broadcast automation solution. All of them seem
2704 useful to the aspiring radio producer.
</p
>
2709 <title>Why do schools waste money on IT?
</title>
2710 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_do_schools_waste_money_on_IT_.html
</link>
2711 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_do_schools_waste_money_on_IT_.html
</guid>
2712 <pubDate>Sun,
8 Jul
2012 09:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2713 <description><p
>In the Debian Edu / Skolelinux project, we have realised that one
2714 of the major blockers for the project success is the purchasing skills
2715 in schools and municipalities. We provide what the happy users of
2716 Debian Edu / Skolelinux say they need and to a lower cost than the
2717 alternatives, and yet so few schools decide to use our solution. I
2718 was pleased to discover the same observation done by mySociety and Tom
2719 Steinberg in his blog post
2720 "<a href=
"http://www.mysociety.org/
2012/
06/
19/can-you-recognize-the-million-pound-chair/
">Can
2721 you recognize the million pound chair?
</a
>". Read it and weep for the
2722 spending of your tax money.
</p
>
2724 <p
>Of course there are other factors involved as well, like our
2725 projects bad marketing skills and the Linux community fragmentation
2726 causing worry with the people on the outside, so we as a project need
2727 to keep working hard to gain users, but it is a up-hill battle when
2728 public decision makers are unable to understand computer system
2729 purchases.
</p
>
2734 <title>Free Timetabling Software - nice free software
</title>
2735 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Timetabling_Software___nice_free_software.html
</link>
2736 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Timetabling_Software___nice_free_software.html
</guid>
2737 <pubDate>Sat,
7 Jul
2012 09:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2738 <description><p
>Included in
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu /
2739 Skolelinux
</a
> is a large collection of end user and school specific
2740 software. It is one of the packages not installed by default but
2741 provided in the Debian archive for schools to install if they want to,
2742 is a system to automatically plan the school time table using
2743 information about available teachers, classes and rooms, combined with
2744 the list of required courses and how many hours each topic should
2745 receive. The software is
2747 <a href=
"http://lalescu.ro/liviu/fet/
">named FET
</a
>, and it provide a
2748 graphical user interface to input the required information, save the
2749 result in a fairly simple XML format, and generate time tables for
2750 both teachers and students. It is available both for
2751 <a href=
"http://lalescu.ro/liviu/fet/download.html
">Linux, MacOSX and
2752 Windows
</a
>.
</p
>
2754 <p
>This is
<a href=
"http://lalescu.ro/liviu/fet/features.html
">the
2755 feature list
</a
>, liftet from the project web site:
</p
>
2759 <li
>FET is free software, licensed under the GNU GPL v2 or later.
2760 You can freely use, copy, modify and redistribute it
</li
>
2762 <li
>Localized to en_US (US English, default), ar (Arabic), ca
2763 (Catalan), da (Danish), de (German), el (Greek), es (Spanish), fa
2764 (Persian), fr (French), gl (Galician), he (Hebrew), hu
2765 (Hungarian), id (Indonesian), it (Italian), lt (Lithuanian), mk
2766 (Macedonian), ms (Malay), nl (Dutch), pl (Polish), pt_BR
2767 (Brazilian Portuguese), ro (Romanian), ru (Russian), si (Sinhala),
2768 sk (Slovak), sr (Serbian), tr (Turkish), uk (Ukrainian), uz
2769 (Uzbek) and vi (Vietnamese) (incompletely for some languages)
2772 <li
>Fully automatic generation algorithm, allowing also
2773 semi-automatic or manual allocation
</li
>
2775 <li
>Platform independent implementation, allowing running on
2776 GNU/Linux, Windows, Mac and any system that Qt supports
</li
>
2778 <li
>Flexible modular XML format for the input file, allowing editing
2779 with an XML editor or by hand (besides FET interface)
</li
>
2781 <li
>Import/export from CSV format
</li
>
2783 <li
>The resulted timetables are exported into HTML, XML and CSV
2786 <li
>Flexible students structure, organized into sets: years, groups
2787 and subgroups. FET allows overlapping years and groups and
2788 non-overlapping subgroups. You can even define individual students
2789 (as separate sets)
</li
>
2791 <li
>Each constraint has a weight percentage, from
0.0% to
100.0%
2792 (but some special constraints are allowed to have only
100% weight
2793 percentage)
</li
>
2795 <li
>Limits for the algorithm (all these limits can be increased on
2796 demand, as a custom version, because this would require a bit more
2799 <li
>Maximum total number of hours (periods) per day:
60</li
>
2800 <li
>Maximum number of working days per week:
35</li
>
2801 <li
>Maximum total number of teachers:
6000</li
>
2802 <li
>Maximum total number of sets of students:
30000</li
>
2803 <li
>Maximum total number of subjects:
6000</li
>
2804 <li
>Virtually unlimited number of activity tags
</li
>
2805 <li
>Maximum number of activities:
30000</li
>
2806 <li
>Maximum number of rooms:
6000</li
>
2807 <li
>Maximum number of buildings:
6000</li
>
2808 <li
>Possibility of adding multiple teachers and
2809 students sets for each activity. (it is possible
2810 also to have no teachers or no students sets for an
2811 activity)
</li
>
2812 <li
>Virtually unlimited number of time constraints
</li
>
2813 <li
>Virtually unlimited number of space constraints
</li
>
2814 </ul
></li
>
2816 <li
>A large and flexible palette of time constraints:
2818 <li
>Break periods
</li
>
2819 <li
>For teacher(s):
2821 <li
>Not available periods
</li
>
2822 <li
>Max/min days per week
</li
>
2823 <li
>Max gaps per day/week
</li
>
2824 <li
>Max hours daily/continuously
</li
>
2825 <li
>Min hours daily
</li
>
2826 <li
>Max hours daily/continuously with an activity tag
</li
>
2828 <li
>Respect working in an hourly interval a max number of
2829 days per week
</li
>
2830 </ul
></li
>
2831 <li
>For students (sets):
2833 <li
>Not available periods
</li
>
2834 <li
>Begins early (specify max allowed beginnings at second hour)
</li
>
2835 <li
>Max gaps per day/week
</li
>
2836 <li
>Max hours daily/continuously
</li
>
2837 <li
>Min hours daily
</li
>
2838 <li
>Max hours daily/continuously with an activity tag
</li
>
2840 <li
>Respect working in an hourly interval a max number of
2841 days per week
</li
>
2842 </ul
></li
>
2843 <li
>For an activity or a set of activities/subactivities:
2845 <li
>A single preferred starting time
</li
>
2846 <li
>A set of preferred starting times
</li
>
2847 <li
>A set of preferred time slots
</li
>
2848 <li
>Min/max days between them
</li
>
2849 <li
>End(s) students day
</li
>
2850 <li
>Same starting time/day/hour
</li
>
2851 <li
>Occupy max time slots from selection (a complex and
2852 flexible constraint, useful in many situations)
</li
>
2853 <li
>Consecutive, ordered, grouped (for
2 or
3 (sub)activities)
</li
>
2854 <li
>Not overlapping
</li
>
2855 <li
>Max simultaneous in selected time slots
</li
>
2856 <li
>Min gaps between a set of (sub)activities
</li
>
2857 </ul
></li
>
2858 </ul
></li
>
2860 <li
>A large and flexible palette of space constraints:
2862 <li
>Room not available periods
</li
>
2863 <li
>For teacher(s):
2865 <li
>Home room(s)
</li
>
2866 <li
>Max building changes per day/week
</li
>
2867 <li
>Min gaps between building changes
</li
>
2871 <li
>For students (sets):
2873 <li
>Home room(s)
</li
>
2874 <li
>Max building changes per day/week
</li
>
2875 <li
>Min gaps between building changes
</li
>
2878 <li
>Preferred room(s):
2880 <li
>For a subject
</li
>
2881 <li
>For an activity tag
</li
>
2882 <li
>For a subject and an activity tag
</li
>
2883 <li
>Individually for a (sub)activity
</li
>
2887 <li
>For a set of activities:
2889 <li
>Occupy a maximum number of different rooms
</li
>
2894 </ul
></p
>
2896 <p
>I have not used it myself, as I am not involved in time table
2897 planning at a school, but it seem to work fine when I test it. If you
2898 need to set up your schools time table, and is tired of doing it
2899 manually, check it out.
2901 A quick summary on how to use it can be found in
2902 <a href=
"http://marvelsoft.co.in/wp/
2012/
03/generate-timetable-for-state-cbse-icse-igcse-schools-free/
">a
2903 blog post from MarvelSoft
</a
>. If you find FET useful, please provide
2904 a recipe for the Debian Edu project in the
2905 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu#Howtos
">Debian Edu HowTo
2906 section
</a
>.
</p
>
2911 <title>Can Zimbra be told to send autoreplies to the From: address?
</title>
2912 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Can_Zimbra_be_told_to_send_autoreplies_to_the_From__address_.html
</link>
2913 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Can_Zimbra_be_told_to_send_autoreplies_to_the_From__address_.html
</guid>
2914 <pubDate>Tue,
3 Jul
2012 23:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2915 <description><p
>In the NUUG
<a href=
"http://www.fiksgatami.no/
">FiksGataMi
</a
>
2916 project (Norwegian version of
2917 <a href=
"http://www.fixmystreet.com/
">FixMyStreet
</a
> from
2918 <a href=
"http://www.mysociety.org/
">mySociety
</a
>), we have discovered
2919 a problem with the municipalities using
2920 <a href=
"http://www.zimbra.com/
">Zimbra
</a
>. When FiksGataMi send a
2921 problem report to the government, the email From: address is set to
2922 the address of the person reporting the problem, while envelope sender
2923 is set to the FiksGataMi contact address. The intention is to make
2924 sure the municipality send any replies to the person reporting the
2925 problem, while any email delivery problems are sent to us in NUUG.
2926 This work well in most cases, but not for Karmøy municipality using
2927 Zimbra. Karmøy is using the vacation message function in Zimbra to
2928 send an automatic reply to report that the message has been received,
2929 and this message is sent to the envelope sender and not the address in
2930 the From: header.
</p
>
2932 <p
>This causes the automatic message from Karmøy to go to NUUGs
2933 request-tracker instance instead of to the person reporting the
2934 problem. We can not really change the envelope sender address, as
2935 this would make it impossible for us to discover when there are
2936 problems with the MTAs receiving problem reports. We have been in
2937 contact with the people at Karmøy municipality, and they are willing
2938 to adjust Zimbra if something can be changed there to get a better
2939 behaviour.
</p
>
2941 <p
>The default behaviour of Zimbra is as far as I can tell according
2942 to the specification in RFC
3834, which recommend that vacation
2943 messages are sent to the envelope sender and not to the From: address.
2944 But I wonder if it is possible to adjust or configure Zimbra to behave
2945 differently. Anyone know? Please let us know at
2946 <a href=
"http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/fiksgatami
">fiksgatami
2947 (at) nuug.no
</a
>.
</p
>
2952 <title>Debian Edu interview: José Luis Redrejo Rodríguez
</title>
2953 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Jos__Luis_Redrejo_Rodr_guez.html
</link>
2954 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Jos__Luis_Redrejo_Rodr_guez.html
</guid>
2955 <pubDate>Tue,
26 Jun
2012 08:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
2956 <description><p
>I
've been too busy at home, but finally I found time to wrap up
2957 another interview with the people behind
2958 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
>.
2959 This time we get to know José Luis Redrejo Rodríguez, one of our great
2960 helpers from Spain. His effort was the reason we added support for
2961 several desktop types (KDE, Gnome and most recently LXDE) in Debian
2962 Edu, and have all of these available in the recently published
2963 <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/News/
2012/
20120311.html
">Debian Edu
2964 Squeeze
</a
> version.
</p
>
2966 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
2968 <p
>I
'm a father, teacher and engineer who is working for the Education
2969 ministry of the Region of Extremadura (Spain) in the implementation of
2970 ICT in schools
</p
>
2972 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
2973 project?
</strong
></p
>
2975 <p
>At
2006, I verified that both, we in Extremadura and Skolelinux
2976 project, had been working in parallel for some years, doing very
2977 similar things, using very similar tools and with similar targets, so
2978 I decided it was time to join forces as much as possible.
</p
>
2980 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
2981 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
2983 <p
>A community of highly skilled experts working together, with a
2984 really open schema of collaboration and work. I really love the
2985 concepts of Do-ocracy and Merit-ocracy and the way these concepts are
2986 been used everyday inside Debian Edu.
</p
>
2988 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
2989 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
2991 <p
>Sometimes the differences in the implementations, laws or
2992 economical and technical resources in the different countries don
't
2993 allow us to agree in the same solution for all of us, and several
2994 approaches are needed, what is a waste of effort. Also, there is a
2995 lack of more man power to be able to follow the fast evolution of the
2996 technologies in school.
</p
>
2998 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
3000 <p
>Debian, of course, and due to my kind of job I am most of my time
3001 between Iceweasel,
<a href=
"http://www.geany.org/
">Geany
</a
> and
3002 <a href=
"http://www.ohloh.net/p/gnome-terminator
">Terminator
</a
>.
</p
>
3004 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
3005 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
3007 <p
>I think there is not a single strategy because there are very
3008 different scenarios: schools with mixed proprietary and free
3009 environments, schools using only workstations, other schools using
3010 laptops, netbooks, tablets, interactive white-boards, etc.
</p
>
3012 <p
>Also the range of ages of the students is very broad and you can
3013 not use the same solutions for primary schools and secondary or even
3014 universities. So different strategies are needed.
</p
>
3016 <p
>But, looking at these differences, and looking back to the things
3017 we
've done and implemented, and the places were we have spent most of
3018 our forces, I think we should focus as much as possible in free
3019 multi-platform environments, using only standards tools, and moving
3020 more and more to Internet or network solutions that could be deployed
3021 using wireless. I think we
'll see more and more personal devices in
3022 the schools, devices the students and teachers will take home with
3023 them, so the solutions must be able to be taken at home and continue
3024 working there.
</p
>
3029 <title>Song book for Computer Scientists
</title>
3030 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html
</link>
3031 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html
</guid>
3032 <pubDate>Sun,
24 Jun
2012 13:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3033 <description><p
>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
3034 <a href=
"http://www.uit.no/
">University of Tromsø
</a
>, I started
3035 collecting computer related songs for use at parties. The original
3036 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
3037 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
3038 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format. I have
3039 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
3040 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
3041 help me extend and update the book. If anyone is volunteering to help
3042 me with this, send me an email. Also let me know if there are songs
3043 missing in my book.
</p
>
3045 <p
>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
3046 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
3047 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
3048 Especially now that
<a href=
"http://debconf12.debconf.org/
">Debconf
3049 12</a
> is about to start (and I am not going). Want to sing? Check
3050 out
<a href=
"http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/
">Petter
's
3051 Computer Science Songbook
</a
>.
3056 <title>Debian Edu - some ideas for the future versions
</title>
3057 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu___some_ideas_for_the_future_versions.html
</link>
3058 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu___some_ideas_for_the_future_versions.html
</guid>
3059 <pubDate>Mon,
11 Jun
2012 14:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3060 <description><p
>During my work on
3061 <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/News/
2012/
20120311.nb.html
">Debian Edu
3062 based on Squeeze
</a
>, I came across some issues that should be
3063 addressed in the Wheezy release. I finally found time to wrap up my
3064 notes and provide quick summary of what I found, with a bit
3065 explanation.
</p
>
3069 <li
>We need to rewrite our package installation framework, as tasksel
3070 changed from using tasksel tasks to using meta packages (aka packages
3071 with dependencies like our education-* packages), and our installation
3072 system depend on tasksel tasks in
3073 /usr/share/tasksel/debian-edu-tasks.desc for package
3074 installation.
</li
>
3076 <li
>Enable Kerberos login for more services. Now with the Kerberos
3077 foundation in place, we should use it to get single sign on with more
3078 services, and avoiding unneeded password / login questions. We should
3079 at least try to enable it for these services:
3082 <li
>CUPS for admins to add/configure printers and users when using
3084 <li
>Nagios for admins checking the system status.
</li
>
3085 <li
>GOsa for admins updating LDAP and users changing their passwords.
</li
>
3086 <li
>LDAP for admins updating LDAP.
</li
>
3087 <li
>Squid for users when exam mode / filtering is active.
</li
>
3088 <li
>ssh for admins and users to save a password prompt.
</li
>
3090 </ul
></li
>
3092 <li
>When we move GOsa to use Kerberos instead of LDAP bind to
3093 authenticate users, we should try to block or at least limit access to
3094 use LDAP bind for authentication, to ensure Kerberos is used when it
3095 is intended, and nothing fall back to using the less safe LDAP bind
</li
>
3097 <li
>Merge debian-edu-config and debian-edu-install. The split made
3098 sense when d-e-install did a lot more, but these days it is just an
3099 inconvenience when we update the debconf preseeding values.
</li
>
3101 <li
>Fix partman-auto to allow us to abort the installation before
3102 touching the disk if the disk is too small. This is
3103 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
653305">BTS report #
653305</a
> and the
3104 d-i developers are fine with the patch and someone just need to apply
3105 it and upload. After this is done we need to adjust
3106 debian-edu-install to use this new hook.
</li
>
3108 <li
>Adjust to new LTSP framework (boot time config instead of install
3109 time config). LTSP changed its design, and our hooks to install
3110 packages and update the configuration is most likely not going to work
3113 <li
>Consider switching to NBD instead of NFS for LTSP root, to allow
3114 the Kernel to cache files in its normal file cache, possibly speeding
3115 up KDE login on slow networks.
</li
>
3117 <li
>Make it possible to create expired user passwords that need to
3118 change on first login. This is useful when handing out password on
3119 paper, to make sure only the user know the password. This require
3120 fixes to the PAM handling of kdm and gdm.
</li
>
3122 <li
>Make GUI for adding new machines automatically from sitesummary.
3123 The current command line script is not very friendly to people most
3124 familiar with GUIs. This should probably be integrated into GOsa to
3125 have it available where the admin will be looking for it..
</li
>
3127 <li
>We should find way for Nagios to check that the DHCP service
3128 actually is working (as in handling out IP addresses). None of the
3129 Nagios checks I have found so far have been working for me.
</li
>
3131 <li
>We should switch from libpam-nss-ldapd to sssd for all profiles
3132 using LDAP, and not only on for roaming workstations, to have less
3133 packages to configure and consistent setup across all profiles.
</li
>
3135 <li
>We should configure Kerberos to update LDAP and Samba password
3136 when changing password using the Kerberos protocol. The hook was
3137 requested in
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
588968">BTS report
3138 #
588968</a
> and is now available in Wheezy. We might need to write a
3139 MIT Kerberos plugin in C to get this.
</li
>
3141 <li
>We should clean up the set of applications installed by default.
3144 <li
>reduce the number of chemistry visualisers
</li
>
3145 <li
>consider dropping xpaint
</li
>
3146 <li
>and probably more?
</li
>
3147 </ul
></li
>
3149 <li
>Some hardware need external firmware to work properly. This is
3150 mostly the case for WiFi network cards, but there are some other
3151 examples too. For popular laptops to work out of the box, such
3152 firmware need to be installed from non-free, and we should provide
3153 some GUI to do this. Ubuntu already have this implemented, and we
3154 could consider using their packages. At the moment we have some
3155 command line script to do this (one for the running system, another
3156 for the LTSP chroot).
</li
>
3159 <li
>In Squeeze, we provide KDE, Gnome and LXDE as desktop options. We
3160 should extend the list to Xfce and Sugar, and preferably find a way to
3161 install several and allow the admin or the user to select which one to
3164 <li
>The golearn tool from the goplay package make it easy to check out
3165 interesting educational packages. We should work on the package
3166 tagging in Debian to ensure it represent all the useful educational
3167 packages, and extend the tool to allow it to use packagekit to install
3168 new applications with a simple mouse click.
</li
>
3170 <li
>The Squeeze version got half a exam solution already in place,
3171 with the introduction of iptable based network blocking, but for it to
3172 be a complete exam solution the Squid proxy need to enable
3173 filtering/blocking as well when the exam mode is enabled. We should
3174 implement a way to easily enable this for the schools that want it,
3175 instead of the
"it is documented
" method of today.
</li
>
3177 <li
>A feature used in several schools is the ability for a teacher to
3178 "take over
" the desktop of individual or all computers in the room.
3179 There are at least three implementations,
3180 <a href=
"italc.sourceforge.net/
">italc
</a
>,
3181 <a href=
"http://www.itais.net/help/en/
">controlaula
</a
> og
3182 <a href=
"http://www.epoptes.org/
">epoptes
</a
> and we should pick one of
3183 them and make it trivial to set it up in a school. The challenges is
3184 how to distribute crypto keys and how to group computers in one room
3185 and how to set up which machine/user can control the machines in a
3186 given room.
</li
>
3188 <li
>Tablets and surf boards are getting more and more popular, and we
3189 should look into providing a good solution for integrating these into
3190 the Debian Edu network. Not quite sure how. Perhaps we should
3191 provide a installation profile with better touch screen support for
3192 them, or add some sync services to allow them to exchange
3193 configuration and data with the central server. This should be
3194 investigated.
</li
>
3196 </ul
></p
>
3198 <p
>I guess we will discover more as we continue to work on the Wheezy
3204 <title>TV with face recognition, for improved viewer experience
</title>
3205 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/TV_with_face_recognition__for_improved_viewer_experience.html
</link>
3206 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/TV_with_face_recognition__for_improved_viewer_experience.html
</guid>
3207 <pubDate>Sat,
9 Jun
2012 22:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3208 <description><p
>Slashdot got a story about Intel planning a
3209 <a href=
"http://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/
12/
06/
09/
0012247/intel-to-launch-tv-service-with-facial-recognition-by-end-of-the-year
">TV
3210 with face recognition
</a
> to recognise the viewer, and it occurred to
3211 me that it would be more interesting to turn it around, and do face
3212 recognition on the TV image itself. It could let the viewer know who
3213 is present on the screen, and perhaps look up their credibility,
3214 company affiliation, previous appearances etc for the viewer to better
3215 evaluate what is being said and done. That would be a feature I would
3216 be willing to pay for.
</p
>
3218 <p
>I would not be willing to pay for a TV that point a camera on my
3219 household, like the big brother feature apparently proposed by Intel.
3220 It is the telescreen idea fetched straight out of the book
3221 <a href=
"http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks01/
0100021.txt
">1984 by George
3222 Orwell
</a
>.
</p
>
3227 <title>Web service to look up HP and Dell computer hardware support status
</title>
3228 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Web_service_to_look_up_HP_and_Dell_computer_hardware_support_status.html
</link>
3229 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Web_service_to_look_up_HP_and_Dell_computer_hardware_support_status.html
</guid>
3230 <pubDate>Wed,
6 Jun
2012 23:
15:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3231 <description><p
>A few days ago
3232 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/SOAP_based_webservice_from_Dell_to_check_server_support_status.html
">I
3233 reported how to get
</a
> the support status out of Dell using an
3234 unofficial and undocumented SOAP API, which I since have found out was
3235 <a href=
"http://lists.us.dell.com/pipermail/linux-poweredge/
2012-February/
045959.html
">discovered
3236 by Daniel De Marco in february
</a
>. Combined with my web scraping
3237 code for HP, Dell and IBM
3238 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Checking_server_hardware_support_status_for_Dell__HP_and_IBM_servers.html
">from
3239 2009</a
>, I got inspired and wrote
3240 <a href=
"https://views.scraperwiki.com/run/computer-hardware-support-status/
">a
3241 web service
</a
> based on Scraperwiki to make it easy to look up the
3242 support status and get a machine readable result back.
</p
>
3244 <p
>This is what it look like at the moment when asking for the JSON
3247 <blockquote
><pre
>
3248 % GET
<a href=
"https://views.scraperwiki.com/run/computer-hardware-support-status/?format=json
&vendor=Dell
&servicetag=
2v1xwn1
">https://views.scraperwiki.com/run/computer-hardware-support-status/?format=json
&vendor=Dell
&servicetag=
2v1xwn1
</a
>
3249 supportstatus({
"servicetag
":
"2v1xwn1
",
"warrantyend
":
"2013-
11-
24",
"shipped
":
"2010-
11-
24",
"scrapestamputc
":
"2012-
06-
06T20:
26:
56.965847",
"scrapedurl
":
"http://
143.166.84.118/services/assetservice.asmx?WSDL
",
"vendor
":
"Dell
",
"productid
":
""})
3251 </pre
></blockquote
>
3253 <p
>It currently support Dell and HP, and I am hoping for help to add
3254 support for other vendors. The python source is available on
3255 Scraperwiki and I welcome help with adding more features.
</p
>
3260 <title>Debian Edu interview: Mike Gabriel
</title>
3261 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Mike_Gabriel.html
</link>
3262 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Mike_Gabriel.html
</guid>
3263 <pubDate>Sat,
2 Jun
2012 15:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3264 <description><p
>Back in
2010, Mike Gabriel showed up on the
3265 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
>
3266 mailing list. He quickly proved to be a valuable developer, and
3267 thanks to his tireless effort we now have Kerberos integrated into the
3268 <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/News/
2012/
20120311.html
">Debian Edu
3269 Squeeze
</a
> version.
</p
>
3271 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
3273 <p
>My name is Mike Gabriel, I am
38 years old and live near Kiel,
3274 Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. I live together with a wonderful partner
3275 (Angela Fuß) and two own children and two bonus children (contributed
3276 by Angela).
</p
>
3278 <p
>During the day I am part-time employed as a system administrator
3279 and part-time working as an IT consultant. The consultancy work
3280 touches free software topics wherever and whenever possible. During
3281 the nights I am a free software developer. In the gaps I also train in
3282 becoming an osteopath.
</p
>
3284 <p
>Starting in
2010 we (Andreas Buchholz, Angela Fuß, Mike Gabriel)
3285 have set up a free software project in the area of Kiel that aims at
3286 introducing free software into schools. The project
's name is
3287 "IT-Zukunft Schule
" (IT future for schools). The project links IT
3288 skills with communication skills.
</p
>
3290 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
3291 project?
</strong
></p
>
3293 <p
>While preparing our own customised Linux distribution for
3294 "IT-Zukunft Schule
" we were repeatedly asked if we really wanted to
3295 reinvent the wheel. What schools really need is already available,
3296 people said. From this impulse we started evaluating other Linux
3297 distributions that target being used for school networks.
</p
>
3299 <p
>At the end we short-listed two approaches and compared them: a
3300 commercial Linux distribution developed by a company in Bremen,
3301 Germany, and Skolelinux / Debian Edu. Between
12/
2010 and
03/
2011 we
3302 went to several events and met people being responsible for marketing
3303 and development of either of the distributions. Skolelinux / Debian
3304 Edu was by far much more convincing compared to the other product that
3305 got short-listed beforehand--across the full spectrum. What was most
3306 attractive for me personally: the perspective of collaboration within
3307 the developmental branch of the Debian Edu project itself.
</p
>
3309 <p
>In parallel with this, we talked to many local and not-so-local
3310 people. People teaching at schools, headmasters, politicians, data
3311 protection experts, other IT professionals.
</p
>
3313 <p
>We came to two conclusions:
</p
>
3315 <p
>First, a technical conclusion: What schools need is available in
3316 bits and pieces here and there, and none of the solutions really fit
3317 by
100%. Any school we have seen has a very individual IT setup
3318 whereas most of each school
's requirements could mapped by a standard
3319 IT solution. The requirement to this IT solution is flexibility and
3320 customisability, so that individual adaptations here and there are
3321 possible. In terms of re-distributing and rolling out such a
3322 standardised IT system for schools (a system that is still to some
3323 degree customisable) there is still a lot of work to do here
3324 locally. Debian Edu / Skolelinux has been our choice as the starting
3327 <p
>Second, a holistic conclusion: What schools need does not exist at
3328 all (or we missed it so far). There are several technical solutions
3329 for handling IT at schools that tend to make a good impression. What
3330 has been missing completely here in Germany, though, is the enrolment
3331 of people into using IT and teaching with IT.
"IT-Zukunft Schule
"
3332 tries to provide an approach for this.
</p
>
3334 <p
>Only some schools have some sort of a media concept which explains,
3335 defines and gives guidance on how to use IT in class. Most schools in
3336 Northern Germany do not have an IT service provider, the school
's IT
3337 equipment is managed by one or (if the school is lucky) two (admin)
3338 teachers, most of the workload these admin teachers get done in there
3339 spare time.
</p
>
3341 <p
>We were surprised that only a very few admin teachers were
3342 networked with colleagues from other schools. Basically, every school
3343 here around has its individual approach of providing IT equipment to
3344 teachers and students and the exchange of ideas has been quasi
3345 non-existent until
2010/
2011.
</p
>
3347 <p
>Quite some (non-admin) teachers try to avoid using IT technology in
3348 class as a learning medium completely. Several reasons for this
3349 avoidance do exist.
</p
>
3351 <p
>We discovered that no-one has ever taken a closer look at this
3352 social part of IT management in schools, so far. On our quest journey
3353 for a technical IT solution for schools, we discussed this issue with
3354 several teachers, headmasters, politicians, other IT professionals and
3355 they all confirmed: a holistic approach of considering IT management
3356 at schools, an approach that includes the people in place, will be new
3357 and probably a gain for all.
</p
>
3359 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
3360 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
3362 <p
>There is a list of advantages: international context, openness to
3363 any kind of contributions, do-ocracy policy, the closeness to Debian,
3364 the different installation scenarios possible (from stand-alone
3365 workstation to complex multi-server sites), the transparency within
3366 project communication, honest communication within the group of
3367 developers, etc.
</p
>
3369 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
3370 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
3372 <p
>Every coin has two sides:
</p
>
3374 <p
>Technically:
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
311188">BTS issue
3375 #
311188</a
>, tricky upgradability of a Debian Edu main server, network
3376 client installations on top of a plain vanilla Debian installation
3377 should become possible sometime in the near future, one could think
3378 about splitting the very complex package debian-edu-config into
3379 several portions (to make it easier for new developers to
3380 contribute).
</p
>
3382 <p
>Another issue I see is that we (as Debian Edu developers) should
3383 find out more about the network of people who do the marketing for
3384 Debian Edu / Skolelinux. There is a very active group in Germany
3385 promoting Skolelinux on the bigger Linux Days within Germany. Are
3386 there other groups like that in other countries? How can we bring
3387 these marketing people together (marketing group A with group B and
3388 all of them with the group of Debian Edu developers)? During the last
3389 meeting of the German Skolelinux group, I got the impression of people
3390 there being rather disconnected from the development department of
3391 Debian Edu / Skolelinux.
</p
>
3393 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
3395 <p
>For my daily business, I do not use commercial software at all.
</p
>
3397 <p
>For normal stuff I use Iceweasel/Firefox, Libreoffice.org. For
3398 serious text writing I prefer LaTeX. I use gimp, inkscape, scribus for
3399 more artistic tasks. I run virtual machines in KVM and Virtualbox.
</p
>
3401 <p
>I am one of the upstream developers of X2Go. In
2010 I started the
3402 development of a Python based X2Go Client, called PyHoca-GUI.
3403 PyHoca-GUI has brought forth a Python X2Go Client API that currently
3404 is being integrated in Ubuntu
's software center.
</p
>
3406 <p
>For communications I have my own Kolab server running using Horde
3407 as web-based groupware client. For IRC I love to use irssi, for Jabber
3408 I have several clients that I use, mostly pidgin, though. I am also
3409 the Debian maintainer of Coccinella, a Jabber-based interactive
3410 whiteboard.
</p
>
3412 <p
>My favourite terminal emulator is KDE
's Yakuake.
</p
>
3414 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
3415 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
3417 <p
>Communicate, communicate, communicate. Enrol people, enrol people,
3418 enrol people.
</p
>
3423 <title>SOAP based webservice from Dell to check server support status
</title>
3424 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/SOAP_based_webservice_from_Dell_to_check_server_support_status.html
</link>
3425 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/SOAP_based_webservice_from_Dell_to_check_server_support_status.html
</guid>
3426 <pubDate>Fri,
1 Jun
2012 15:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3427 <description><p
>A few years ago I wrote
3428 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Checking_server_hardware_support_status_for_Dell__HP_and_IBM_servers.html
">how
3429 to extract support status
</a
> for your Dell and HP servers. Recently
3430 I have learned from colleges here at the
3431 <a href=
"http://www.uio.no/
">University of Oslo
</a
> that Dell have
3432 made this even easier, by providing a SOAP based web service. Given
3433 the service tag, one can now query the Dell servers and get machine
3434 readable information about the support status. This perl code
3435 demonstrate how to do it:
</p
>
3437 <p
><pre
>
3442 my $GUID =
'11111111-
1111-
1111-
1111-
111111111111';
3443 my $App =
'test
';
3444 my $servicetag = $ARGV[
0] or die
"Please supply a servicetag. $!\n
";
3445 my ($deal, $latest, @dates);
3447 -
> uri(
'http://support.dell.com/WebServices/
')
3448 -
> on_action( sub { join
'', @_ } )
3449 -
> proxy(
'http://xserv.dell.com/services/assetservice.asmx
')
3451 my $a = $s-
>GetAssetInformation(
3452 SOAP::Data-
>name(
'guid
')-
>value($GUID)-
>type(
''),
3453 SOAP::Data-
>name(
'applicationName
')-
>value($App)-
>type(
''),
3454 SOAP::Data-
>name(
'serviceTags
')-
>value($servicetag)-
>type(
''),
3456 print Dumper($a -
> result) ;
3457 </pre
></p
>
3459 <p
>The output can look like this:
</p
>
3461 <p
><pre
>
3463 'Asset
' =
> {
3464 'Entitlements
' =
> {
3465 'EntitlementData
' =
> [
3467 'EntitlementType
' =
> 'Expired
',
3468 'EndDate
' =
> '2009-
07-
29T00:
00:
00',
3469 'Provider
' =
> '',
3470 'StartDate
' =
> '2006-
07-
29T00:
00:
00',
3471 'DaysLeft
' =
> '0'
3474 'EntitlementType
' =
> 'Expired
',
3475 'EndDate
' =
> '2009-
07-
29T00:
00:
00',
3476 'Provider
' =
> '',
3477 'StartDate
' =
> '2006-
07-
29T00:
00:
00',
3478 'DaysLeft
' =
> '0'
3481 'EntitlementType
' =
> 'Expired
',
3482 'EndDate
' =
> '2007-
07-
29T00:
00:
00',
3483 'Provider
' =
> '',
3484 'StartDate
' =
> '2006-
07-
29T00:
00:
00',
3485 'DaysLeft
' =
> '0'
3489 'AssetHeaderData
' =
> {
3490 'SystemModel
' =
> 'GX620
',
3491 'ServiceTag
' =
> '8DSGD2J
',
3492 'SystemShipDate
' =
> '2006-
07-
29T19:
00:
00-
05:
00',
3493 'Buid
' =
> '2323',
3494 'Region
' =
> 'Europe
',
3495 'SystemID
' =
> 'PLX_GX620
',
3496 'SystemType
' =
> 'OptiPlex
'
3500 </pre
></p
>
3502 <p
>I have not been able to find any documentation from Dell about this
3504 <a href=
"http://xserv.dell.com/services/assetservice.asmx?op=GetAssetInformation
">inline
3505 documentation
</a
>, and according to
3506 <a href=
"http://iboyd.net/index.php/
2012/
02/
14/updated-dell-warranty-information-script/
">one
3507 comment
</a
> it can have stability issues, but it is a lot better than
3508 scraping HTML pages. :)
</p
>
3510 <p
>Wonder if HP and other server vendors have a similar service. If
3511 you know of one, drop me an email. :)
</p
>
3516 <title>First monitor calibration using ColorHug
</title>
3517 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_monitor_calibration_using_ColorHug.html
</link>
3518 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_monitor_calibration_using_ColorHug.html
</guid>
3519 <pubDate>Thu,
31 May
2012 22:
10:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3520 <description><p
>A few days ago my color calibration gadget
3521 <a href=
"http://www.hughski.com/index.html
">ColorHug
</a
> arrived in the
3522 mail, and I
've had a few days to test it. As all my machines are
3523 running Debian Squeeze, where
3524 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/c/colorhug-client.html
">the
3525 calibration software
</a
> is missing (it is present in Wheezy and Sid),
3526 I ran the calibration using the Fedora based live CD. This worked
3527 just fine. So far I have only done the quick calibration. It was
3528 slow enough for me, so I will leave the more extensive calibration for
3529 another day.
</p
>
3531 <p
>After calibration, I get a
3532 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICC_profile
">ICC color
3533 profile
</a
> file that can be passed to programs understanding such
3534 tools. KDE do not seem to understand it out of the box, so I searched
3535 for command line tools to use to load the color profile into X.
3536 xcalib was the first one I found, and it seem to work fine for single
3537 monitor setups. But for my video player, a laptop with a flat screen
3538 attached, it was unable to load the color profile for the correct
3539 monitor. After searching a bit, I
3540 <a href=
"http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=
1347896">discovered
</a
>
3541 that the dispwin tool from the argyll package would do what I wanted,
3542 and a simple
</p
>
3544 <p
><pre
>
3545 dispwin -d
1 profile.icc
3546 </pre
></p
>
3548 <p
>later I had the color profile loaded for the correct monitor. The
3549 result was a bit more pink than I expected. I guess I picked the
3550 wrong monitor type for the
"led
" monitor I got, but the result is good
3551 enough for now.
</p
>
3556 <title>Debian Edu interview: Ralf Gesellensetter
</title>
3557 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Ralf_Gesellensetter.html
</link>
3558 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Ralf_Gesellensetter.html
</guid>
3559 <pubDate>Sun,
27 May
2012 17:
15:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3560 <description><p
>In
2003, a German teacher showed up on the
3561 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
>
3562 mailing list with interesting problems and reports proving he setting
3563 up Linux for a (for us at the time) lot of pupils. His name was Ralf
3564 Gesellensetter, and he has been an important tester and contributor
3565 since then, helping to make sure the
3566 <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/News/
2012/
20120311.html
">Debian Edu
3567 Squeeze
</a
> release became as good as it is..
</p
>
3569 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
3571 <p
>I am a teacher from Germany, and my subjects are Geography,
3572 Mathematics, and Computer Science (
"Informatik
"). During the past
12
3573 years (since
2000), I have been working for a comprehensive (and soon,
3574 also inclusive) school leading to all kind of general levels, such as
3575 O- or A-level (
"Abitur
"). For quite as long, I
've been taking care of
3576 our computer network.
</p
>
3578 <p
>Now, in my early
40s, I enjoy the privilege of spending a lot of my
3579 spare time together with my wife, our son (
3 years) and our daughter
3580 (
4 months).
</p
>
3582 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
3583 project?
</strong
></p
>
3585 <p
>We had tried different Linux based school servers, when members of
3586 my local Linux User Group (LUG OWL) detected Skolelinux. I remember
3587 very well, being part of a party celebrating the Linux New Media Award
3588 (
"Best Newcomer Distribution
", also nominated: Ubuntu) that was given
3589 to Skolelinux at Linux World Exposition in Frankfurt,
2005 (IIRC). Few
3590 months later, I had the chance to join a developer meeting in Ulsrud
3591 (Oslo) and to hand out the award to Knut Yrvin and others. For more
3592 than
7 years, Skolelinux is part of our schools infrastructure, namely
3593 our main server (tjener), one LTSP (today without thin clients), and
3594 approximately
50 work stations. Most of these have the option to boot a
3595 locally installed Skolelinux image. As a consequence, I joined quite
3596 a few events dealing with free software or Linux, and met many Debian
3597 (Edu) developers. All of them seemed quite nice and competent to me,
3598 one more reason to stick to Skolelinux.
</p
>
3600 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
3601 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
3603 <p
>Debian driven, you are given all the advantages of a community
3604 project including well maintained updates. Once, you are familiar with
3605 the network layout, you can easily roll out an entire educational
3606 computer infrastructure, from just one installation media. As only
3607 free software (FOSS) is used, that supports even elderly hardware,
3608 up-sizing your IT equipment is only limited by space (i.e. available
3609 labs). Especially if you run a LTSP thin client server, your
3610 administration costs tend towards zero.
</p
>
3612 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
3613 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
3615 <p
>While Debian
's stability has loads of advantages for servers, this
3616 might be different in some cases for clients: Schools with unlimited
3617 budget might buy new hardware with components that are not yet
3618 supported by Debian stable, or wish to use more recent versions of
3619 office packages or desktop environments. These schools have the
3620 option to run Debian testing or other distributions - if they have the
3621 capacity to do so. Another issue is that Debian release cycles
3622 include a wide range of changes; therefor a high percentage of human
3623 power seems to be absorbed by just keeping the features of Skolelinux
3624 within the new setting of the version to come. During this process,
3625 the cogs of Debian Edu are getting more and more professional,
3626 i.e. harder to understand for novices.
</p
>
3628 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
3630 <p
>LibreOffice, Wikipedia, Openstreetmap, Iceweasel (Mozilla Firefox),
3631 KMail, Gimp, Inkscape - and of course the Linux Kernel (not only on
3632 PC, Laptop, Mobile, but also our SAT receiver)
</p
>
3634 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
3635 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
3639 <li
>Support computer science as regular subject in schools to make
3640 people really
"own
" their hardware, to make them understand the
3641 difference between proprietary software products, and free software
3642 developing.
</li
>
3644 <li
>Make budget baskets corresponding: In Germany
's public schools
3645 there are more or less fixed budgets for IT equipment (including
3646 licenses), so schools won
't benefit from any savings here. This
3647 privilege is left to private schools which have consequently a large
3648 share among German Skolelinux schools.
</li
>
3650 <li
>Get free software in the seminars where would-be teachers are
3651 trained. In many cases, teachers
' software customs are respected by
3652 decision makers rather than the expertise of any IT experts.
</li
>
3654 <li
>Don
't limit ourself to free software run natively. Everybody uses
3655 free software or free licenses (for instance Wikipedia), and this
3656 general concept should get expanded to free educational content to be
3657 shared world wide (school books e.g.).
</li
>
3659 <li
>Make clear where ever you can that the market share of free (libre)
3660 office suites is much above
20 p.c. today, and that you pupils don
't
3661 need to know the
"ribbon menu
" in order to get employed.
</li
>
3663 <li
>Talk about the difference between freeware and free software.
</li
>
3665 <li
>Spread free software, or even collections of portable free apps
3666 for USB pen drives. Endorse students to get a legal copy of
3667 Libreoffice rather than accepting them to use illegal serials. And
3668 keep sending documents in ODF formats.
</li
>
3670 </ol
></p
>
3675 <title>The cost of ODF and OOXML
</title>
3676 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_cost_of_ODF_and_OOXML.html
</link>
3677 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_cost_of_ODF_and_OOXML.html
</guid>
3678 <pubDate>Sat,
26 May
2012 18:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3679 <description><p
>I just come across a blog post from Glyn Moody reporting the
3680 claimed cost from Microsoft on requiring ODF to be used by the UK
3681 government. I just sent him an email to let him know that his
3682 assumption are most likely wrong. Sharing it here in case some of my
3683 blog readers have seem the same numbers float around in the UK.
</p
>
3685 <p
><blockquote
> <p
>Hi. I just noted your
3686 <a href=
"http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/
2012/
04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-
500-million/index.htm
">http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/
2012/
04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-
500-million/index.htm
</a
>
3689 <p
><blockquote
>"They
're all in Danish, not unreasonably, but even
3690 with the help of Google Translate I can
't find any figures about the
3691 savings of
"moving to a flexible two standard
" as claimed by the
3692 Microsoft email. But I assume it is backed up somewhere, so let
's take
3693 it, and the £
500 million figure for the UK, on trust.
"
3694 </blockquote
></p
>
3696 <p
>I can tell you that the Danish reports are inflated. I believe it is
3697 the same reports that were used in the Norwegian debate around
2007,
3698 and Gisle Hannemyr (a well known IT commentator in Norway) had a look
3699 at the content. In short, the reason it is claimed that using ODF
3700 will be so costly, is based on the assumption that this mean every
3701 existing document need to be converted from one of the MS Office
3702 formats to ODF, transferred to the receiver, and converted back from
3703 ODF to one of the MS Office formats, and that the conversion will cost
3704 10 minutes of work time for both the sender and the receiver. In
3705 reality the sender would have a tool capable of saving to ODF, and the
3706 receiver would have a tool capable of reading it, and the time spent
3707 would at most be a few seconds for saving and loading, not
20 minutes
3708 of wasted effort.
</p
>
3710 <p
>Microsoft claimed all these costs were saved by allowing people to
3711 transfer the original files from MS Office instead of spending
10
3712 minutes converting to ODF. :)
</p
>
3715 <a href=
"http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php
">http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php
</a
>
3717 <a href=
"http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php
">http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php
</a
>
3718 for background information. Norwegian only, sorry. :)
</p
>
3719 </blockquote
></p
>
3724 <title>ColorHug - USB and free software based screen color calibration
</title>
3725 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ColorHug___USB_and_free_software_based_screen_color_calibration.html
</link>
3726 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ColorHug___USB_and_free_software_based_screen_color_calibration.html
</guid>
3727 <pubDate>Fri,
18 May
2012 10:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3728 <description><p
>In january, I
3729 <a href=
"http://blog.cihar.com/archives/
2012/
01/
17/colorhug-has-arrived/
">discovered
3730 the ColorHug
</a
>, a USB dongle from
3731 <a href=
"http://www.hughski.com/index.html
">Hughski
</a
> to calibrate
3732 the color on a computer screen. The software required is
3733 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/c/colorhug-client.html
">included
3734 in Debian
</a
>, and I decided back then to preorder from the next
3735 batch. Yesterday I finally heard back from them, and got the
3736 opportunity to order. Today I ordered mine, and eagerly await the
3737 delivery. I hope it arrive next week, as I got a confirmation that it
3738 should go in the mail on monday. :)
</p
>
3740 <p
>If you want to ensure the colors on the screen match the intended
3741 colors, I suggest you check out this cheap tool with free software
3742 drivers. :)
</p
>
3747 <title>Debian Edu interview: Jürgen Leibner
</title>
3748 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__J_rgen_Leibner.html
</link>
3749 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__J_rgen_Leibner.html
</guid>
3750 <pubDate>Sun,
13 May
2012 20:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3751 <description><p
>It has been a few busy weeks for me, but I am finally back to
3752 publish another interview with the people behind
3753 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
>.
3754 This time it is one of our German developers, who have helped out over the
3755 years to make sure both a lot of major but also a lot of the minor
3756 details get right before release.
3758 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
3760 <p
>My name is Jürgen Leibner, I
'm
49 years old and living in
3761 Bielefeld, a town in northern Germany. I worked nearly
20 years as
3762 certified engineer in the department for plant design and layout of an
3763 international company for machinery and equipment. Since
2011 I
'm a
3764 certified technical writer (tekom e.V.) and doing technical
3765 documentations for a steam turbine manufacturer. From April this year
3766 I will manage the department of technical documentation at a
3767 manufacturer of automation and assembly line engineering.
</p
>
3769 <p
>My first contact with linux was around
1993. Since that time I used
3770 it at work and at home repeatedly but not exclusively as I do now at
3771 home since
2006.
</p
>
3773 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
3774 project?
</strong
></p
>
3776 <p
>Once a day in the early year of
2001 when I wanted to fetch my
3777 daughter from primary school, there was a teacher sitting in the
3778 middle of
20 old computers trying to boot them and he failed. I helped
3779 him to get them booting. That was seen by the school director and she
3780 asked me if I would like to manage that the school gets all that old
3781 computers in use. I answered:
"Yes
".
</p
>
3783 <p
>Some weeks later every of the
10 classrooms had one computer
3784 running Windows98. I began to collect old computers and equipment as
3785 gifts and installed the first computer room with a peer-to-peer
3786 network. I did my work at school without being payed in my spare time
3787 and with a lot of fun. About one year later the school was connected
3788 to Internet and a local area network was installed in the school
3789 building. That was the time to have a server and I knew it must be a
3790 Linux server to be able to fulfil all the wishes of the teachers and
3791 being able to do this in a transparent and economic way, without extra
3792 costs for things like licence and software. So I searched for a
3793 school server system running under Linux and I found a couple of
3794 people nearby who founded
'skolelinux.de
'. It was the Skolelinux
3795 prerelease
32 I first tried out for being used at the school. I
3796 managed the IT of that school until the municipal authority took over
3797 the IT management and centralised the services for all schools in
3798 Bielefeld in December of
2006.
</p
>
3800 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
3801 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
3803 <p
>When I
'm looking back to the beginning, there were other advantages
3804 for me as today.
</p
>
3806 <p
>In the past there were advantages like:
</p
>
3810 <li
>I don
't need to buy it so it generates no costs to the school as
3811 they had little money to spent for computers and software.
</li
>
3813 <li
>It has a licence which grands all rights to use it without
3816 <li
>It was more able to fit all requirements of a server system for
3817 schools than a Microsoft server system, even if there are only Windows
3818 clients because of it
's preconfigured overall concept of being a
3819 infrastructure solution and community for schools, not only a
3822 <li
>I was able to configure the server to the needs of the
3825 </ul
></p
>
3827 <p
>Today some of the advantages has been lost, changed or new ones
3828 came up in this way:
</p
>
3832 <li
>Most schools here do have money to buy hardware and software
3835 <li
>They are today mostly managed from central IT departments which
3836 have own concepts which often do not fit to Debian Edu concepts
3837 because they are to close to Microsoft ideology.
</li
>
3839 <li
>With the Squeeze version of Debian Edu which now uses GOsa² for
3840 management I feel more able to manage the daily tasks than with the
3841 interfaces used in the past.
</li
>
3843 <li
>It is more modular than in the past and fits even better to the
3844 different needs.
</li
>
3846 <li
>The documentation is usable and gets better every day.
</li
>
3848 <li
>More people than ever before are using Debian Edu all over the
3849 world and so the community, which is an very important part I think,
3850 is sharing knowledge and minds.
</li
>
3852 <li
>Most, maybe all, of the technical requirements for schools are
3853 solved today by Debian Edu.
</li
>
3855 </ul
></p
>
3857 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
3858 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
3862 <li
>There are too few IT companies able to integrate Debian Edu into
3863 their product portfolio for serving schools with concepts or even
3864 whole municipality areas.
</li
>
3866 <li
>Debian Edu has beside other free and open software projects not
3867 enough lobbyists which promote free and open software to
3868 politicians.
</li
>
3870 <li
>Technically there are no disadvantages I
'm aware of.
</li
>
3872 </ul
></p
>
3874 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
3876 <p
>I use Debian stable on my home server and on my little desktop
3877 computer. On my laptop I use Debian testing/sid. The applications I
3878 use on my laptop and my desktop are Open/Libre-office, Iceweasel,
3879 KMail, DigiKam, Amarok, Dolphin, okular and all the other programs I
3880 need from the KDE environment. On console I use newsbeuter, mutt,
3881 screen, irssi and all the other famous and useful tools.
</p
>
3883 <p
>My home server provides mail services with exim, dovecot, roundcube
3884 and mutt over ssh on the console, file services with samba, NFS,
3885 rsync, web services with apache, moinmoin-wiki, multimedia services
3886 with gallery2 and mediatomb and database services with MySQL for me
3887 and the whole family. I probably forgot something.
</p
>
3889 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
3890 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
3892 <p
>I believe, we should provide concepts for IT companies to integrate
3893 Debian Edu into their product portfolio with use cases for different
3894 countries and areas all over the world.
</p
>
3899 <title>Cutting it short - and picking the right tool for the job
</title>
3900 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Cutting_it_short___and_picking_the_right_tool_for_the_job.html
</link>
3901 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Cutting_it_short___and_picking_the_right_tool_for_the_job.html
</guid>
3902 <pubDate>Mon,
30 Apr
2012 23:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3903 <description><p
><!-- IMG_5869.JPG --
>
3904 <img src=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/panasonic-er-
1611.jpeg
"></p
>
3906 <p
>I normally cut my hair short, and my tool of choice has been a
3907 common hair/beard cutter, bought in a electrical shop here in Norway.
3908 But the last ones have not really been up to the task. My last
3909 cutter, some model from Braun, could only cut a few of my hairs at the
3910 time, and cutting my head took forever. And the one before that did
3911 not work very well either. We have looked for something better for a
3912 while, but it was not until I ended up visiting a hairdresser that we
3913 discovered that there are indeed better tools available. But these
3914 are not marketed and sold to
"regular consumers
". The hair saloons
3915 can get them through their suppliers, but their suppliers only sell
3916 companies. The models they sell, are very different from the ones
3917 available from Elkjøp and Lefdal. The main difference is their
3918 efficiency. It would cut my hair in
5 minutes, instead of the
30-
40
3919 minutes required by my impotent Braun. The hairdresser I visited had
3920 a Panasonic ER160, which unfortunately is no longer available from the
3921 producer. But I found it had a successor, the Panasonic ER1611.
</p
>
3923 <p
>The next step was to find somewhere to buy it. This was not
3924 straight forward. The list of suppliers I got from the hairdresser
3925 did not want to sell anything to me. But searching for the model on
3926 the web we found a supplier in Norway willing to sell it to us for
3927 around NOK
4000,-. This was a bit much. We kept searching and
3928 finally found a Danish supplier
3929 <a href=
"http://nicehair.dk/panasonic-er-
1611-professionel-hartrimmer.html
">selling
3930 it for around NOK
1800,-
</a
>. We ordered one, and it arrived a few
3933 <p
>The instructions said it had to charge for
8 hours when we started
3934 to use it, so we left it charging over night. Normally it will only
3935 need one hour to charge. The following evening we successfully tested
3936 it, and I can warmly recommend it to anyone looking for a real hair
3937 cutter. The ones we have used until now have been hair cutter
3943 <title>HTC One X - Your video? What do you mean?
</title>
3944 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/HTC_One_X___Your_video___What_do_you_mean_.html
</link>
3945 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/HTC_One_X___Your_video___What_do_you_mean_.html
</guid>
3946 <pubDate>Thu,
26 Apr
2012 13:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3947 <description><p
>In
<a href=
"http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article243690.ece
">an
3948 article today
</a
> published by Computerworld Norway, the photographer
3949 <a href=
"http://www.urke.com/eirik/
">Eirik Helland Urke
</a
> reports
3950 that the video editor application included with
3951 <a href=
"http://www.htc.com/www/smartphones/htc-one-x/#specs
">HTC One
3952 X
</a
> have some quite surprising terms of use. The article is mostly
3953 based on the twitter message from mister Urke, stating:
3955 <p
><blockquote
>
3956 "<a href=
"http://twitter.com/urke/status/
194062269724897280">Drøy
3957 brukeravtale: HTC kan bruke MINE redigerte videoer kommersielt. Selv
3958 kan jeg KUN bruke dem privat.
</a
>"
3959 </blockquote
></p
>
3961 <p
>I quickly translated it to this English message:
</p
>
3963 <p
><blockquote
>
3964 "Arrogant user agreement: HTC can use MY edited videos
3965 commercially. Although I can ONLY use them privately.
"
3966 </blockquote
></p
>
3968 <p
>I
've been unable to find the text of the license term myself, but
3969 suspect it is a variation of the MPEG-LA terms I
3970 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html
">discovered
3971 with my Canon IXUS
130</a
>. The HTC One X specification specifies that
3972 the recording format of the phone is .amr for audio and .mp3 for
3974 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_Multi-Rate_audio_codec#Licensing_and_patent_issues
">Adaptive
3975 Multi-Rate audio codec
</a
> with patents which according to the
3976 Wikipedia article require an license agreement with
3977 <a href=
"http://www.voiceage.com/
">VoiceAge
</a
>. MP4 is
3978 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H
.264/MPEG-
4_AVC#Patent_licensing
">MPEG4 with
3979 H
.264</a
>, which according to Wikipedia require a licence agreement
3980 with
<a href=
"http://www.mpegla.com/
">MPEG-LA
</a
>.
</p
>
3982 <p
>I know why I prefer
3983 <a href=
"http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition
">free and open
3984 standards
</a
> also for video.
</p
>
3989 <title>RAND terms - non-reasonable and discriminatory
</title>
3990 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RAND_terms___non_reasonable_and_discriminatory.html
</link>
3991 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RAND_terms___non_reasonable_and_discriminatory.html
</guid>
3992 <pubDate>Thu,
19 Apr
2012 22:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
3993 <description><p
>Here in Norway, the
3994 <a href=
"http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad.html?id=
339"> Ministry of
3995 Government Administration, Reform and Church Affairs
</a
> is behind
3996 a
<a href=
"http://standard.difi.no/forvaltningsstandarder
">directory of
3997 standards
</a
> that are recommended or mandatory for use by the
3998 government. When the directory was created, the people behind it made
3999 an effort to ensure that everyone would be able to implement the
4000 standards and compete on equal terms to supply software and solutions
4001 to the government. Free software and non-free software could compete
4002 on the same level.
</p
>
4004 <p
>But recently, some standards with RAND
4005 (
<a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_non-discriminatory_licensing
">Reasonable
4006 And Non-Discriminatory
</a
>) terms have made their way into the
4007 directory. And while this might not sound too bad, the fact is that
4008 standard specifications with RAND terms often block free software from
4009 implementing them. The reasonable part of RAND mean that the cost per
4010 user/unit is low,and the non-discriminatory part mean that everyone
4011 willing to pay will get a license. Both sound great in theory. In
4012 practice, to get such license one need to be able to count users, and
4013 be able to pay a small amount of money per unit or user. By
4014 definition, users of free software do not need to register their use.
4015 So counting users or units is not possible for free software projects.
4016 And given that people will use the software without handing any money
4017 to the author, it is not really economically possible for a free
4018 software author to pay a small amount of money to license the rights
4019 to implement a standard when the income available is zero. The result
4020 in these situations is that free software are locked out from
4021 implementing standards with RAND terms.
</p
>
4023 <p
>Because of this, when I see someone claiming the terms of a
4024 standard is reasonable and non-discriminatory, all I can think of is
4025 how this really is non-reasonable and discriminatory. Because free
4026 software developers are working in a global market, it does not really
4027 help to know that software patents are not supposed to be enforceable
4028 in Norway. The patent regimes in other countries affect us even here.
4029 I really hope the people behind the standard directory will pay more
4030 attention to these issues in the future.
</p
>
4032 <p
>You can find more on the issues with RAND, FRAND and RAND-Z terms
4034 (
<a href=
"http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/
2010/
11/rand-not-so-reasonable/
">RAND:
4035 Not So Reasonable?
</a
>).
</p
>
4037 <p
>Update
2012-
04-
21: Just came across a
4038 <a href=
"http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/
2012/
04/of-microsoft-netscape-patents-and-open-standards/index.htm
">blog
4039 post from Glyn Moody
</a
> over at Computer World UK warning about the
4040 same issue, and urging people to speak out to the UK government. I
4041 can only urge Norwegian users to do the same for
4042 <a href=
"http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/hoyring-om-nye-anbefalte-it-standarder
">the
4043 hearing taking place at the moment
</a
> (respond before
2012-
04-
27).
4044 It proposes to require video conferencing standards including
4045 specifications with RAND terms.
</p
>
4050 <title>Debian Edu interview: Andreas Mundt
</title>
4051 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Andreas_Mundt.html
</link>
4052 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Andreas_Mundt.html
</guid>
4053 <pubDate>Sun,
15 Apr
2012 12:
10:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
4054 <description><p
>Behind
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and
4055 Skolelinux
</a
> there are a lot of people doing the hard work of
4056 setting together all the pieces. This time I present to you Andreas
4057 Mundt, who have been part of the technical development team several
4058 years. He was also a key contributor in getting GOsa and Kerberos set
4059 up in the recently released
4060 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze
">Debian
4061 Edu Squeeze
</a
> version.
</p
>
4063 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
4065 <p
>My name is Andreas Mundt, I grew up in south Germany. After
4066 studying Physics I spent several years at university doing research in
4067 Quantum Optics. After that I worked some years in an optics company.
4068 Finally I decided to turn over a new leaf in my life and started
4069 teaching
10 to
19 years old kids at school. I teach math, physics,
4070 information technology and science/technology.
</p
>
4072 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
4073 project?
</strong
></p
>
4075 <p
>Already before I switched to teaching, I followed the Debian Edu
4076 project because of my interest in education and Debian. Within the
4077 qualification/training period for the teaching, I started
4078 contributing.
</p
>
4080 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4081 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4083 <p
>The advantages of Debian Edu are the well known name, the
4084 out-of-the-box philosophy and of course the great free software of the
4085 Debian Project!
</p
>
4087 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4088 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4090 <p
>As every coin has two sides, the out-of-the-box philosophy has its
4091 downside, too. In my opinion, it is hard to modify and tweak the
4092 setup, if you need or want that. Further more, it is not easily
4093 possible to upgrade the system to a new release. It takes much too
4094 long after a Debian release to prepare the -Edu release, perhaps
4095 because the number of developers working on the core of the code is
4096 rather small and often busy elsewhere.
</p
>
4098 <p
>The
<a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianLAN
">Debian LAN
</a
>
4099 project might fill the use case of a more flexible system.
</p
>
4101 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
4103 <p
>I am only using non-free software if I am forced to and run Debian
4104 on all my machines. For documents I prefer LaTeX and PGF/TikZ, then
4105 mutt and iceweasel for email respectively web browsing. At school I
4106 have Arduino and Fritzing in use for a micro controller project.
</p
>
4108 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
4109 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
4111 <p
>One of the major problems is the vendor lock-in from top to bottom:
4112 Especially in combination with ignorant government employees and
4113 politicians, this works out great for the
"market-leader
". The school
4114 administration here in Baden-Wuerttemberg is occupied by that vendor.
4115 Documents have to be prepared in non-free, proprietary formats. Even
4116 free browsers do not work for the school administration. Publishers
4117 of school books provide software only for proprietary platforms.
</p
>
4119 <p
>To change this, political work is very important. Parts of the
4120 political spectrum have become aware of the problem in the last years.
4121 However it takes quite some time and courageous politicians to
'free
'
4122 the system. There is currently some discussion about
"Open Data
" and
4123 "Free/Open Standards
". I am not sure if all the involved parties have
4124 a clue about the potential of these ideas, and probably only a
4125 fraction takes them seriously. However it might slowly make free
4126 software and the philosophy behind it more known and popular.
</p
>
4131 <title>Debian Edu interview: Justin B. Rye
</title>
4132 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Justin_B__Rye.html
</link>
4133 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Justin_B__Rye.html
</guid>
4134 <pubDate>Sun,
8 Apr
2012 10:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
4135 <description><p
>It take all kind of contributions to create a Linux distribution
4136 like
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
>,
4137 and this time I lend the ear to Justin B. Rye, who is listed as a big
4139 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze
">Debian
4140 Edu Squeeze release manual
</a
>.
4142 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
4144 <p
>I
'm a
44-year-old linguistics graduate living in Edinburgh who has
4145 occasionally been employed as a sysadmin.
</p
>
4147 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
4148 project?
</strong
></p
>
4150 <p
>I
'm neither a developer nor a Skolelinux/Debian Edu user! The only
4151 reason my name
's in the credits for the documentation is that I hang
4152 around on debian-l10n-english waiting for people to mention things
4153 they
'd like a native English speaker to proofread... So I did a sweep
4154 through the wiki for typos and Norglish and inconsistent spellings of
4155 "localisation
".
</p
>
4157 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4158 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4160 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4161 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4163 <p
>These questions are too hard for me - I don
't use it! In fact I
4164 had hardly any contact with I.T. until long after I
'd got out of the
4165 education system.
</p
>
4167 <p
>I can tell you the advantages of Debian for me though: it soaks up
4168 as much of my free time as I want and no more, and lets me do
4169 everything I want a computer for without ever forcing me to spend
4170 money on the latest hardware.
</p
>
4172 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
4174 <p
>I
've been using Debian since Rex; popularity-contest says the
4175 software that I use most is xinit, xterm, and xulrunner (in other
4176 words, I use a distinctly retro sort of desktop).
</p
>
4178 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
4179 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
4181 <p
>Well, I don
't know. I suppose I
'd be inclined to try reasoning
4182 with the people who make the decisions, but obviously if that worked
4183 you would hardly need a strategy.
</p
>
4188 <title>Why the KDE menu is slow when /usr/ is NFS mounted - and a workaround
</title>
4189 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_the_KDE_menu_is_slow_when__usr__is_NFS_mounted___and_a_workaround.html
</link>
4190 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_the_KDE_menu_is_slow_when__usr__is_NFS_mounted___and_a_workaround.html
</guid>
4191 <pubDate>Fri,
6 Apr
2012 22:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
4192 <description><p
>Recently I have spent time with
4193 <a href=
"http://www.slxdrift.no/
">Skolelinux Drift AS
</a
> on speeding
4194 up a
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
>
4195 Lenny installation using LTSP diskless workstations, and in the
4196 process I discovered something very surprising. The reason the KDE
4197 menu was responding slow when using it for the first time, was mostly
4198 due to the way KDE find application icons. I discovered that showing
4199 the Multimedia menu would cause more than
20 000 IP packages to be
4200 passed between the LTSP client and the NFS server. Most of these were
4202 NFS LOOKUP calls, resulting in a NFS3ERR_NOENT response. Because the
4203 ping times between the client and the server were in the range
2-
20
4204 ms, the menus would be very slow. Looking at the strace of kicker in
4205 Lenny (or plasma-desktop i Squeeze - same problem there), I see that
4206 the source of these NFS calls are access(
2) system calls for
4207 non-existing files. KDE can do hundreds of access(
2) calls to find
4208 one icon file. In my example, just finding the mplayer icon required
4209 around
230 access(
2) calls.
</p
>
4211 <p
>The KDE code seem to search for icons using a list of icon
4212 directories, and the list of possible directories is large. In
4213 (almost) each directory, it look for files ending in .png, .svgz, .svg
4214 and .xpm. The result is a very slow KDE menu when /usr/ is NFS
4215 mounted. Showing a single sub menu may result in thousands of NFS
4216 requests. I am not the first one to discover this. I found a
4217 <a href=
"https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=
211416">KDE bug report
4218 from
2009</a
> about this problem, and it is still unsolved.
</p
>
4220 <p
>My solution to speed up the KDE menu was to create a package
4221 kde-icon-cache that upon installation will look at all .desktop files
4222 used to generate the KDE menu, find their icons, search the icon paths
4223 for the file that KDE will end up finding at run time, and copying the
4224 icon file to /var/lib/kde-icon-cache/. Finally, I add symlinks to
4225 these icon files in one of the first directories where KDE will look
4226 for them. This cut down the number of file accesses required to find
4227 one icon from several hundred to less than
5, and make the KDE menu
4228 almost instantaneous. I
'm not quite sure where to make the package
4229 publicly available, so for now it is only available on request.
</p
>
4231 <p
>The bug report mention that this do not only affect the KDE menu
4232 and icon handling, but also the login process. Not quite sure how to
4233 speed up that part without replacing NFS with for example NBD, and
4234 that is not really an option at the moment.
</p
>
4236 <p
>If you got feedback on this issue, please let us know on debian-edu
4237 (at) lists.debian.org.
</p
>
4242 <title>Debian Edu in the Linux Weekly News
</title>
4243 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_in_the_Linux_Weekly_News.html
</link>
4244 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_in_the_Linux_Weekly_News.html
</guid>
4245 <pubDate>Thu,
5 Apr
2012 08:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
4246 <description><p
>About two weeks ago, I was interviewed via email about
4247 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
> by
4248 Bruce Byfield in Linux Weekly News. The result was made public for
4249 non-subscribers today. I am pleased to see liked our Linux solution
4250 for schools. Check out his article
4251 <a href=
"https://lwn.net/Articles/
488805/
">Debian Edu/Skolelinux: A
4252 distribution for education
</a
> if you want to learn more.
</p
>
4257 <title>Debian Edu interview: Wolfgang Schweer
</title>
4258 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Wolfgang_Schweer.html
</link>
4259 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Wolfgang_Schweer.html
</guid>
4260 <pubDate>Sun,
1 Apr
2012 23:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
4261 <description><p
>Germany is a core area for the
4262 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and Skolelinux
</a
>
4263 user community, and this time I managed to get hold of Wolfgang
4264 Schweer, a valuable contributor to the project from Germany.
4266 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
4268 <p
>I
've studied Mathematics at the university
'Ruhr-Universität
' in
4269 Bochum, Germany. Since
1981 I
'm working as a teacher at the school
4270 "<a href=
"http://www.westfalenkolleg-dortmund.de/
">Westfalen-Kolleg
4271 Dortmund
</a
>", a second chance school. Here, young adults is given
4272 the opportunity to get further education in order to do the school
4273 examination
'Abitur
', which will allow to study at a university. This
4274 second chance is of value for those who want a better job perspective
4275 or failed to get a higher school examination being teens.
</p
>
4277 <p
>Besides teaching I was involved in developing online courses for a
4278 blended learning project called
'abitur-online.nrw
' and in some other
4279 information technology related projects. For about ten years I
've been
4280 teacher and coordinator for the
'abitur-online
' project at my
4281 school. Being now in my early sixties, I
've decided to leave school at
4282 the end of April this year.
</p
>
4284 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
4285 project?
</strong
></p
>
4287 <p
>The first information about Skolelinux must have come to my
4288 attention years ago and somehow related to LTSP (Linux Terminal Server
4289 Project). At school, we had set up a network at the beginning of
1997
4290 using Suse Linux on the desktop, replacing a Novell network. Since
4291 2002, we used old machines from the city council of Dortmund as thin
4292 clients (LTSP, later Ubuntu/Lessdisks) cause new hardware was out of
4293 reach. At home I
'm using Debian since years and - subscribed to the
4294 Debian news letter - heard from time to time about Skolelinux. About
4295 two years ago I proposed to replace the (somehow undocumented and only
4296 known to me) system at school by a well known Debian based system:
4297 Skolelinux.
</p
>
4299 <p
>Students and teachers appreciated the new system because of a
4300 better look and feel and an enhanced access to local media on thin
4301 clients. The possibility to alter and/or reset passwords using a GUI
4302 was welcomed, too. Being able to do administrative tasks using a GUI
4303 and to easily set up workstations using PXE was of very high value for
4304 the admin teachers.
</p
>
4306 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4307 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4309 <p
>It
's open source, easy to set up, stable and flexible due to it
's
4310 Debian base. It integrates LTSP out-of-the-box. And it is documented!
4311 So it was a perfect choice.
</p
>
4313 <p
>Being open source, there are no license problems and so it
's
4314 possible to point teachers and students to programs like
4315 OpenOffice.org, ViewYourMind (mind mapping) and The Gimp. It
's of
4316 high value to be able to adapt parts of the system to special needs of
4317 a school and to choose where to get support for this.
</p
>
4319 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4320 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4322 <p
>Nothing yet.
</p
>
4324 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
4326 <p
>At home (Debian Sid with Gnome Desktop): Iceweasel, LibreOffice,
4327 Mutt, Gedit, Document Viewer, Midnight Commander, flpsed (PDF
4328 Annotator). At school (Skolelinux Lenny): Iceweasel, Gedit,
4329 LibreOffice.
</p
>
4331 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
4332 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
4334 <p
>Some time ago I thought it was enough to tell people about it. But
4335 that doesn
't seem to work quite well. Now I concentrate on those more
4336 interested and hope to get multiplicators that way.
</p
>
4341 <title>Debian Edu screencast: Checking email with kmail using Kerberos authentication
</title>
4342 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_screencast__Checking_email_with_kmail_using_Kerberos_authentication.html
</link>
4343 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_screencast__Checking_email_with_kmail_using_Kerberos_authentication.html
</guid>
4344 <pubDate>Sun,
25 Mar
2012 10:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
4345 <description><!-- Video HTML based on http://www.diveintohtml5.net/video.html --
>
4347 <p
>The same Debian Edu developer that did the last screen cast I
4348 published, Wolfgang Schweer, has created a new screen cast showing how
4349 to set up Kmail in Debian Edu Squeze to authenticate using Kerberos,
4350 allowing users to check their local email account without providing
4351 any password. The video is embedded here in quarter size,
4352 and also available from
<a href=
"https://vimeo.com/
38601767">vimeo
</a
>
4354 <a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/
2012-
03-
14-Debian-Edu_Configure_Kmail_for_internal_usage.ogv
">Ogg
4355 Theora
</a
> file. Check it out below.
</p
>
4357 <p
><video id=
"kmail-kerberos-movie
" width=
"256" height=
"184" preload controls
>
4358 <source src=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/
2012-
03-
14-Debian-Edu_Configure_Kmail_for_internal_usage.ogv
" type=
'video/ogg; codecs=
"theora, vorbis
"' /
>
4359 <p
>Download video as
4360 <a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/
2012-
03-
14-Debian-Edu_Configure_Kmail_for_internal_usage.ogv
">Ogg
</a
>.
</p
>
4361 </video
></p
>
4366 <title>Debian Edu interview: John Ingleby
</title>
4367 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__John_Ingleby.html
</link>
4368 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__John_Ingleby.html
</guid>
4369 <pubDate>Mon,
19 Mar
2012 21:
15:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4370 <description><p
><a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
>
4371 users are spread all across the globe. The second inteview after
4372 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
03/msg00001.html
">the
4373 Squeeze release
</a
> was publised is with John Ingleby, a teacher and
4374 long time Linux user in United Kingdom.
</p
>
4376 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
4378 <p
>I teach ICT part time at the Rudolf Steiner School in Kings
4379 Langley, near London, UK. Previously I worked as a technical
4380 author/trainer while my children attended the school, and I also
4381 contributed to the Schoolforge UK community with the aim of
4382 encouraging UK schools to adopt free/open source software. Five or six
4383 years ago we had about
50 schools interested in some way, but we
4384 weren
't able to convert many of them into sustainable
4385 installations.
</p
>
4387 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
4388 project?
</strong
></p
>
4390 <p
>Skolelinux had two representatives at an early Edubuntu meeting in
4391 London which I attended. However at that time our school network had
4392 just been installed using CentOS, LTSP
4 and GNOME. When LTSP
5 came
4393 along we switched to Edubuntu thin client servers so now we have a
4394 mixed environment which includes Windows PCs and student laptops, as
4395 well as their MacBooks and iPads. However, the proprietary systems
4396 have always been rather problematic, and we never built a GUI for the
4397 LDAP server, so when I discovered Skolelinux is configured for all
4398 these things we decided to try it.
</p
>
4400 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4401 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4403 <p
>By far the biggest advantage is the Debian Edu community. Apart
4404 from that I have always believed in the same
"sustainable computing
"
4405 goals that Skolelinux is built on: installing Linux on computers which
4406 would otherwise be thrown away, to provide a reliable, secure and
4407 low-cost IT environment for schools. From my own experience I know
4408 that a part-time person can teach and manage a network of about
25
4409 Linux computers, but it would take much more of my time if we had
4410 proprietary software everywhere.
</p
>
4412 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4413 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4415 <p
>As a newcomer I
'm just finding out who
's who in the community and
4416 how you
're organised, and what your procedures are for dealing with
4417 various things such as editing manual pages and so-on. The only
4418 English language mailing list seems to be for developers as well as
4419 users, so my inbox needs heavy pruning each day!
</p
>
4421 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
4423 <p
>Besides the software already mentioned at school we use Samba,
4424 OpenLDAP, CUPS, Nagios and Dansguardian for the network, and on the
4425 desktops we have LibreOffice, Firefox, GIMP and Inkscape. At home I
4426 use Ubuntu and an Android
4 eePad Transformer (but I
'm not sure if
4427 that counts...)
</p
>
4429 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
4430 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
4432 <p
>That
's a tough question! For very many years UK schools installed
4433 and taught only proprietary software, so that at the highest levels
4434 the notion of
"computer
" means simply
"proprietary office
4435 applications
". However, schools today are experiencing budget
4436 constraints, and many are having to think hard about upgrading Windows
4437 XP. At the same time, we have students showing teachers how to use
4438 iPads, MacBooks and Android, so the choice of operating system is no
4439 longer quite so automatic. What is more, our government at last
4440 realised that we need people with programming skills, so they
're
4441 putting coding back in the curriculum! And it
's encouraging that the
4442 first
10,
000 Raspberry Pi units sold out in
2 hours.
</p
>
4444 <p
>I don
't really know what strategy is going to get UK schools to use
4445 free software, but building an active community of Skolelinux/Debian
4446 Edu users in this country has to be part of it.
</p
>
4451 <title>Writing and translating documentation in Debian Edu
</title>
4452 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Writing_and_translating_documentation_in_Debian_Edu.html
</link>
4453 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Writing_and_translating_documentation_in_Debian_Edu.html
</guid>
4454 <pubDate>Fri,
16 Mar
2012 09:
55:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4455 <description><p
>Documentation in Debian Edu is provided in several languages, and
4456 it is important to make it both easy to contribute and to keep the
4457 translated versions in sync. To do this we have come up with what we
4458 believe is a very efficient work flow.
</p
>
4462 <li
>The documentation is written in a
4463 <a href=
"http://moinmo.in
">moinmoin wiki
</a
> (see for example
4464 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze
">the
4465 Squeeze release manual
</a
>) with support for exporting the content as
4466 docbook XML.
</li
>
4468 <li
>This docbook document is given to po4a to extract a gettext style
4469 .pot file with the content, which in turn is used to create .po files
4470 with the translated text.
</li
>
4472 <li
>The .po files are given to translators, and they can always tell
4473 which part of the original wiki document is new or changed. They can
4474 use their normal translation tools like lokalize or poedit to write
4475 the translation. There is even a system in place to handle translated
4478 <li
>The translated .po files are combined with the original docbook
4479 XML document using po4a to create a translated docbook document.
</li
>
4481 <li
>The final step is to use all the generated docbook files and
4482 create PDF and HTML version of the original and translated documents.
</li
>
4486 <p
>This setup work very well, but have a few issues. The biggest
4487 issue is that
<a href=
"http://moinmo.in/DocBook
">the docbook support
4488 we use in moinmoin
</a
> is not actively maintained. The docbook
4489 support is also buggy, and our build system contain workarounds to
4490 make sure the generated docbook is usable despite these bugs.
</p
>
4492 <p
>If you want to have a look at our setup, it is all there in the
4493 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-doc
">debian-edu-doc
4494 package
</a
>.
</p
>
4499 <title>Skolelinux / Debian Edu Squeeze is out!
</title>
4500 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Skolelinux___Debian_Edu_Squeeze_is_out_.html
</link>
4501 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Skolelinux___Debian_Edu_Squeeze_is_out_.html
</guid>
4502 <pubDate>Sun,
11 Mar
2012 23:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4503 <description><p
>This weekend we finally published the first stable release of
4504 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Skolelinux / Debian Edu
</a
> based
4505 on Debian/Squeeze. The full announcement is
4506 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
03/msg00001.html
">available
</a
>
4507 from the project announcement list. Now is a good time to test if it
4508 you have not done so already.
</p
>
4510 <p
>I plan to present the new version at
4511 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/
20120313-skolelinux/
">a NUUG
4512 meeting
</a
> on tuesday. I look forward to seeing you there if you are
4513 in Oslo, Norway.
</p
>
4518 <title>Debian Edu interview: Nigel Barker
</title>
4519 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Nigel_Barker.html
</link>
4520 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Nigel_Barker.html
</guid>
4521 <pubDate>Fri,
9 Mar
2012 11:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4522 <description><p
>Inspired by
<a href=
"http://raphaelhertzog.com/tag/interview/
">the
4523 interview series
</a
> conducted by Raphael, I started a Norwegian
4524 interview series with people involved in the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4525 community. This was so popular that I believe it is time to move to a
4526 more international audience.
</p
>
4528 <p
>While
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu and
4529 Skolelinux
</a
> originated in France and Norway, and have most users in
4530 Europe, there are users all around the globe. One of those far away
4531 from me is Nigel Barker, a long time Debian Edu system administrator
4532 and contributor. It is thanks to him that Debian Edu is adjusted to
4533 work out of the box in Japan. I got him to answer a few questions,
4534 and am happy to share the response with you. :)
4537 <p
><strong
>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?
</strong
></p
>
4539 <p
>My name is Nigel Barker, and I am British. I am married to Yumiko,
4540 and we have three lovely children, aged
15,
14 and
4(!) I am the IT
4541 Coordinator at Hiroshima International School, Japan. I am also a
4542 teacher, and in fact I spend most of my day teaching Mathematics,
4543 Science, IT, and Chemistry. I was originally a Chemistry teacher, but
4544 I have always had an interest in computers. Another teacher teaches
4545 primary school IT, but apart from that I am the only computer person,
4546 so that means I am the network manager, technician and webmaster,
4547 also, and I help people with their computer problems. I teach python
4548 to beginners in an after-school club. I am way too busy, so I really
4549 appreciate the simplicity of Skolelinux.
</p
>
4551 <p
><strong
>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
4552 project?
</strong
></p
>
4554 <p
>In around
2004 or
5 I discovered the ltsp project, and set up a
4555 server in the IT lab. I wanted some way to connect it to our central
4556 samba server, which I was also quite poor at configuring. I discovered
4557 Edubuntu when it came out, but it didn
't really improve my setup. I
4558 did various desperate searches for things like
"school Linux server
"
4559 and ended up in a document called
"Drift
" something or other. Reading
4560 there it became clear that Skolelinux was going to solve all my
4561 problems in one go. I was very excited, but apprehensive, because my
4562 previous attempts to install Debian had ended in failure (I used
4563 Mandrake for everything - ltsp, samba, apache, mail, ns...). I
4564 downloaded a beta version, had some problems, so subscribed to the
4565 Debian Edu list for help. I have remained subscribed ever since, and
4566 my school has run a Skolelinux network since Sarge.
</p
>
4568 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4569 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4571 <p
>For me the integrated setup. This is not just the server, or the
4572 workstation, or the ltsp. Its all of them, and its all configured
4573 ready to go. I read somewhere in the early documentation that it is
4574 designed to be setup and managed by the Maths or Science teacher, who
4575 doesn
't necessarily know much about computers, in a small Norwegian
4576 school. That describes me perfectly if you replace Norway with
4579 <p
><strong
>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
4580 Edu?
</strong
></p
>
4582 <p
>The desktop is fairly plain. If you compare it with Edubuntu, who
4583 have fun themes for children, or with distributions such as Mint, who
4584 make the desktop beautiful. They create a good impression on people
4585 who don
't need to understand how to use any of it, but who might be
4586 important to the school. School administrators or directors, for
4587 instance, or parents. Even kids. Debian itself usually has ugly
4588 default theme settings. It was my dream a few years back that some
4589 kind of integration would allow Edubuntu to do the desktop stuff and
4590 Debian Edu the servers, but now I realise how impossible that is. A
4591 second disadvantage is that if something goes wrong, or you need to
4592 customise something, then suddenly the level of expertise required
4593 multiplies. For example, backup wasn
't working properly in Lenny. It
4594 took me ages to learn how to set up my own server to do rsync backups.
4595 I am afraid of anything to do with ldap, but perhaps Gosa will
4598 <p
><strong
>Which free software do you use daily?
</strong
></p
>
4600 <p
>Nowadays I only use Debian on my personal computers. I have one for
4601 studio work (I play guitar and write songs), running AV Linux
4602 (customised Debian) a netbook running Squeeze, and a bigger laptop
4603 still running Skolelinux Lenny workstation. I have a Tjener in my
4604 house, that
's very useful for the family photos and music. At school
4605 the students only use Skolelinux. (Some teachers and the office still
4606 have windows). So that means we only use free software all day every
4607 day. Open office, The GIMP, Firefox/Iceweasel, VLC and Audacity are
4608 installed on every computer in school, irrespective of OS. We also
4609 have Koha on Debian for the library, and Apache, Moodle, b2evolution
4610 and Etomite on Debian for the www. The firewall is Untangle.
</p
>
4612 <p
><strong
>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
4613 get schools to use free software?
</strong
></p
>
4615 <p
>Current trends are in our favour. Open source is big in industry,
4616 and ordinary people have heard of it. The spread of Android and the
4617 popularity of Apple have helped to weaken the impression that you have
4618 to have Microsoft on everything. People complain to me much less about
4619 file formats and Word than they did
5 years ago. The Edu aspect is
4620 also a selling point. This is all customised for schools. Where is the
4621 Windows-edu, or the Mac-edu? But of course the main attraction is
4622 budget.The trick is to convince people that the quality is not
4623 compromised when you stop paying and use free software instead. That
4624 is one reason why I say the desktop experience is a weakness. People
4625 are not impressed when their USB drive doesn
't work, or their browser
4626 doesn
't play flash, for example.
</p
>
4631 <title>Debian Edu screencast: Mass creation of user accounts in Squeeze
</title>
4632 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_screencast__Mass_creation_of_user_accounts_in_Squeeze.html
</link>
4633 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_screencast__Mass_creation_of_user_accounts_in_Squeeze.html
</guid>
4634 <pubDate>Wed,
7 Mar
2012 13:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4635 <description><!-- Video HTML based on http://www.diveintohtml5.net/video.html --
>
4637 <p
>One of the Debian Edu developers, Wolfgang Schweer, just created a
4638 screen cast documenting how to create a lot of new users in LDAP on
4639 Debian Edu Squeeze. The video is embedded here in quarter size, and
4640 also available from
<a href=
"http://vimeo.com/
37675399">vimeo
</a
> and
4642 <a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/
2012-
02-
29-debian_edu_mass_create_user_accounts.ogv
">Ogg
4643 Theora
</a
> file. Check it out below.
</p
>
4645 <p
><video id=
"gosa-mass-user-create-movie
" width=
"256" height=
"184" preload controls
>
4646 <source src=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/
2012-
02-
29-debian_edu_mass_create_user_accounts.ogv
" type=
'video/ogg; codecs=
"theora, vorbis
"' /
>
4647 <p
>Download video as
4648 <a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/
2012-
02-
29-debian_edu_mass_create_user_accounts.ogv
">Ogg
</a
>.
</p
>
4649 </video
></p
>
4654 <title>Third release candidate of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze
</title>
4655 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</link>
4656 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</guid>
4657 <pubDate>Sun,
4 Mar
2012 18:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4658 <description><p
>This weekend we wrapped up and published the third release
4659 candidate for
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu /
4660 Skolelinux
</a
> based on Squeeze. The full announcement is
4661 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
03/msg00000.html
">available
</a
>
4662 from the project announcement list. Check it out if you
4663 need a software solution for your school.
</p
>
4668 <title>Stopmotion for making stop motion animations on Linux - reloaded
</title>
4669 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Stopmotion_for_making_stop_motion_animations_on_Linux___reloaded.html
</link>
4670 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Stopmotion_for_making_stop_motion_animations_on_Linux___reloaded.html
</guid>
4671 <pubDate>Sat,
3 Mar
2012 12:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4672 <description><p
>Many years ago, the
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Skolelinux
4673 / Debian Edu project
</a
> initiated a student project to create a tool
4674 for making stop motion movies. The proposal came from a teacher
4675 needing such tool on Skolelinux. The project, called
"stopmotion
",
4676 was manned by two extraordinary students and won a school award and a
4677 national aware with this great project. The project was initiated and
4678 mentored by Herman Robak, and manned by the students Bjørn Erik Nilsen
4679 and Fredrik Berg Kjølstad. They got in touch with people at Aardman
4680 Animation studio and received feedback on how professionals would like
4681 such stopmotion tool to work, and the end result was and is used by
4682 animators around the globe. But as is usual after studying, both got
4683 jobs and went elsewhere, and did not have time to properly tend to the
4684 project, and it has been lingering for a few years now. Until last
4687 <p
>Last year some of the users got together with Herman, and moved the
4688 project to Sourceforge and in effect restarted the project under a new
4690 <a href=
"http://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxstopmotion/
">linuxstopmotion
</a
>.
4691 The name change was done to make it possible to find the project using
4692 Internet search engines (try to search for
'stopmotion
' to see what I
4693 mean). I
've been following
4694 <a href=
"https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/linuxstopmotion-community
">the
4695 mailing list
</a
> and the improvement already in place and planned for
4696 the future is encouraging. If you want to make stop motion movies.
4697 Check it out. :)
</p
>
4702 <title>Second release candidate of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze
</title>
4703 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</link>
4704 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</guid>
4705 <pubDate>Mon,
27 Feb
2012 14:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4706 <description><p
>This weekend we wrapped up and published the second release
4707 candidate for
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu /
4708 Skolelinux
</a
> based on Squeeze. The full announcement did for some
4709 reason not make it the project announcement list, but is
4710 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/
2012/
02/msg00015.html
">available
</a
>
4711 from the Debian development announcement list. Check it out if you
4712 need a software solution for your school.
</p
>
4717 <title>First release candidate of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze
</title>
4718 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</link>
4719 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</guid>
4720 <pubDate>Sun,
19 Feb
2012 23:
10:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4721 <description><p
>One week delayed due to DVD build problems, we managed today to
4722 wrap up and publish the first release candidate for
4723 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
> based
4724 on Squeeze. The full announcement is
4725 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
02/msg00001.html
">available
</a
>
4726 on the project announcement list. Check it out if you need a software
4727 solution for your school.
</p
>
4732 <title>How to figure out which RAID disk to replace when it fail
</title>
4733 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_figure_out_which_RAID_disk_to_replace_when_it_fail.html
</link>
4734 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_figure_out_which_RAID_disk_to_replace_when_it_fail.html
</guid>
4735 <pubDate>Tue,
14 Feb
2012 21:
25:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4736 <description><p
>Once in a while my home server have disk problems. Thanks to Linux
4737 Software RAID, I have not lost data yet (but
4738 <a href=
"http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.linux.raid/
34532">I was
4739 close
</a
> this summer :). But once a disk is starting to behave
4740 funny, a practical problem present itself. How to get from the Linux
4741 device name (like /dev/sdd) to something that can be used to identify
4742 the disk when the computer is turned off? In my case I have SATA
4743 disks with a unique ID printed on the label. All I need is a way to
4744 figure out how to query the disk to get the ID out.
</p
>
4746 <p
>After fumbling a bit, I
4747 <a href=
"http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/linux-getting-scsi-ide-harddisk-information/
">found
4748 that hdparm -I
</a
> will report the disk serial number, which is
4749 printed on the disk label. The following (almost) one-liner can be
4750 used to look up the ID of all the failed disks:
</p
>
4752 <blockquote
><pre
>
4753 for d in $(cat /proc/mdstat |grep
'(F)
'|tr
' ' "\n
"|grep
'(F)
'|cut -d\[ -f1|sort -u);
4755 printf
"Failed disk $d:
"
4756 hdparm -I /dev/$d |grep
'Serial Num
'
4758 </blockquote
></pre
>
4760 <p
>Putting it here to make sure I do not have to search for it the
4761 next time, and in case other find it useful.
</p
>
4763 <p
>At the moment I have two failing disk. :(
</p
>
4765 <blockquote
><pre
>
4766 Failed disk sdd1: Serial Number: WD-WCASJ1860823
4767 Failed disk sdd2: Serial Number: WD-WCASJ1860823
4768 Failed disk sde2: Serial Number: WD-WCASJ1840589
4769 </blockquote
></pre
>
4771 <p
>The last time I had failing disks, I added the serial number on
4772 labels I printed and stuck on the short sides of each disk, to be able
4773 to figure out which disk to take out of the box without having to
4774 remove each disk to look at the physical vendor label. The vendor
4775 label is at the top of the disk, which is hidden when the disks are
4776 mounted inside my box.
</p
>
4778 <p
>I really wish the check_linux_raid Nagios plugin for checking Linux
4779 Software RAID in the
4780 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/nagios-plugins.html
">nagios-plugins-standard
</a
>
4781 debian package would look up this value automatically, as it would
4782 make the plugin a lot more useful when my disks fail. At the moment
4783 it only report a failure when there are no more spares left (it really
4784 should warn as soon as a disk is failing), and it do not tell me which
4785 disk(s) is failing when the RAID is running short on disks.
</p
>
4790 <title>Automatic proxy configuration with Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</title>
4791 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_proxy_configuration_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux.html
</link>
4792 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_proxy_configuration_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux.html
</guid>
4793 <pubDate>Mon,
13 Feb
2012 23:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4794 <description><p
>New in the Squeeze version of
4795 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
> is the
4796 ability for clients to automatically configure their proxy settings
4797 based on their environment. We want all systems on the client to use
4798 the WPAD based proxy definition fetched from
<tt
>http://wpad/wpad.dat
</tt
>, to
4799 allow sites to control the proxy setting from a central place and make
4800 sure clients do not have hard coded proxy settings. The schools can
4801 change the global proxy setting by editing
4802 <tt
>tjener:/etc/debian-edu/www/wpad.dat
</tt
> and the change propagate
4803 to all Debian Edu clients in the network.
</p
>
4805 <p
>The problem is that some systems do not understand the WPAD system.
4806 In other words, how do one get from a WPAD file like this (this is a
4807 simple one, they can run arbitrary code):
</p
>
4809 <blockquote
><pre
>
4810 function FindProxyForURL(url, host)
4812 if (!isResolvable(host) ||
4813 isPlainHostName(host) ||
4814 dnsDomainIs(host,
".intern
"))
4815 return
"DIRECT
";
4817 return
"PROXY webcache:
3128; DIRECT
";
4819 </pre
></blockquote
>
4821 <p
>to a proxy setting in the process environment looking like this:
</p
>
4823 <blockquote
><pre
>
4824 http_proxy=http://webcache:
3128/
4825 ftp_proxy=http://webcache:
3128/
4826 </pre
></blockquote
>
4828 <p
>To do this conversion I developed a perl script that will execute
4829 the javascript fragment in the WPAD file and return the proxy that
4831 <tt
><a href=
"http://www.debian.org/
">http://www.debian.org/
</a
></tt
>,
4832 and insert this extracted proxy URL in
<tt
>/etc/environment
</tt
> and
4833 <tt
>/etc/apt/apt.conf
</tt
>. The perl script wpad-extract work just
4834 fine in Squeeze, but in Wheezy the library it need to run the
4835 javascript code is
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
631045">no longer
4836 able to build
</a
> because the C library it depended on is now a C++
4837 library. I hope someone find a solution to that problem before Wheezy
4838 is frozen. An alternative would be for us to rewrite wpad-extract to
4839 use some other javascript library currently working in Wheezy, but no
4840 known alternative is known at the moment.
</p
>
4842 <p
>This automatic proxy system allow the roaming workstation (aka
4843 laptop) setup in Debian Edu/Squeeze to use the proxy when the laptop
4844 is connected to the backbone network in a Debian Edu setup, and to
4845 automatically use any proxy present and announced using the WPAD
4846 feature when it is connected to other networks. And if no proxy is
4847 announced, direct connections will be used instead.
</p
>
4849 <p
>Silently using a proxy announced on the network might be a privacy
4850 or security problem. But those controlling DHCP and DNS on a network
4851 could just as easily set up a transparent proxy, and force all HTTP
4852 and FTP connections to use a proxy anyway, so I consider that
4853 distinction to be academic. If you are afraid of using the wrong
4854 proxy, you should avoid connecting to the network in question in the
4855 first place. In Debian Edu, the proxy setup is updated using dhcp and
4856 ifupdown hooks, to make sure the configuration is updated every time
4857 the network setup changes.
</p
>
4859 <p
>The WPAD system is documented in a
4860 <a href=
"http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-wrec-wpad-
01">IETF
4861 draft
</a
> and a
4862 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Proxy_Autodiscovery_Protocol
">Wikipedia
4863 page
</a
> for those that want to learn more.
</p
>
4868 <title>Saving power with Debian Edu / Skolelinux using shutdown-at-night
</title>
4869 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Saving_power_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_using_shutdown_at_night.html
</link>
4870 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Saving_power_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_using_shutdown_at_night.html
</guid>
4871 <pubDate>Sun,
5 Feb
2012 09:
45:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4872 <description><p
>Since the Lenny version of
4873 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
>, a
4874 feature to save power have been included. It is as simple as it is
4875 practical: Shut down unused clients at night, and turn them on again
4876 in the morning. This is done using the
4877 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/s/shutdown-at-night.html
">shutdown-at-night
</a
> Debian package.
</p
>
4879 <p
>To enable this feature on a client, the machine need to be added to
4880 the netgroup shutdown-at-night-hosts. For Debian Edu, this is done in
4881 LDAP, and once this is in place, the machine in question will check
4882 every hour from
16:
00 until
06:
00 to see if the machine is unused, and
4883 shut it down if it is. If the hardware in question is supported by
4885 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/nvram-wakeup.html
">nvram-wakeup
</a
>
4886 package, the BIOS is told to turn the machine back on around
07:
00 +-
4887 10 minutes. If this isn
't working, one can configure wake-on-lan to
4888 try to turn on the client. The wake-on-lan option is only documented
4889 and not enabled by default in Debian Edu.
</p
>
4891 <p
>It is important to not turn all machines on at once, as this can
4892 blow a fuse if several computers are connected to the same fuse like
4893 the common setup for a classroom. The nvram-wakeup method only work
4894 for machines with a functioning hardware/BIOS clock. I
've seen old
4895 machines where the BIOS battery were dead and the hardware clock were
4896 starting from
0 (or was it
1990?) every boot. If you have one of
4897 those, you have to turn on the computer manually.
</p
>
4899 <p
>The shutdown-at-night package is completely self contained, and can
4900 also be used outside the Debian Edu environment. For those without a
4901 central LDAP server with netgroups, one can instead touch the file
4902 <tt
>/etc/shutdown-at-night/shutdown-at-night
</tt
> to enable it.
4903 Perhaps you too can use it to save some power?
</p
>
4908 <title>Third beta version of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze
</title>
4909 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_beta_version_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</link>
4910 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_beta_version_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</guid>
4911 <pubDate>Sat,
4 Feb
2012 13:
25:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4912 <description><p
>I am happy to announce that finally we managed today to wrap up and
4913 publish the third beta version of
4914 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
> based
4915 on Squeeze. If you want to test a LDAP backed Kerberos server with
4916 out of the box PXE configuration for running diskless machines and
4917 installing new machines, check it out. If you need a software
4918 solution for your school, check it out too. The full announcement is
4919 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
02/msg00000.html
">available
</a
>
4920 on the project announcement list.
</p
>
4922 <p
>I am very happy to report these changes and improvements since
4923 beta2 (there are more, see announcement for full list):
</p
>
4927 <li
>It is now possible to change the pre-configured IP subnet from
4928 10.0.0.0/
8 to something else by using the subnet-change tool after
4929 the installation.
</li
>
4931 <li
>Too full partitions are now automatically extended on the Main
4932 Server, based on the rules specified in /etc/fsautoresizetab.
</li
>
4934 <li
>The CUPS queues are now automatically flushed every night, and all
4935 disabled queues are restarted every hour. This should cut down on
4936 the amount of manual administration needed for printers.
</li
>
4938 <li
>The set of initial users have been changed. Now a personal user
4939 for the local system administrator is created during installation
4940 instead of the previously created localadmin and super-admin users,
4941 and this user is granted administrative privileges using group
4942 membership. This reduces the number of passwords one need to keep
4943 up to date on the system.
</li
>
4947 <p
>The new main server seem to work so well that I am testing it as my
4948 private DNS/LDAP/Kerberos/PXE/LTSP server at home. I will use it look
4949 for issues we could fix to polish Debian Edu even further before the
4950 final Squeeze release is published.
</p
>
4952 <p
>Next weekend the project organise a
4953 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
01/msg00001.html
">developer
4954 gathering
</a
> in Oslo. We will continue the work on the Squeeze
4955 version, and start initial planning for the Wheezy version. Perhaps I
4956 will see you there?
</p
>
4961 <title>Handling non-free firmware in Debian Edu/Squeeze
</title>
4962 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Handling_non_free_firmware_in_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html
</link>
4963 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Handling_non_free_firmware_in_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html
</guid>
4964 <pubDate>Fri,
27 Jan
2012 23:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
4965 <description><p
>With some computer hardware, one need non-free firmware blobs.
4966 This is the sad fact of todays computers. In the next version of
4967 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
> based
4968 on Squeeze, we provide several scripts and modifications to make
4969 firmware blobs easier to handle. The common use case I run into is a
4970 laptop with a wireless network card requiring non-free firmware to
4971 work, but there are other use cases as well.
</p
>
4973 <p
>First and foremost, Debian Edu provide ISO images for DVD and CD
4974 with all firmware packages in the Debian sections main and non-free
4975 included, to ensure debian-installer find and can install all of them
4976 during installation. This take care firmware for network devices used
4977 by the installer when installing from from local media. But for
4978 example multimedia devices are not activated in the installer and are
4979 not taken care of by this.
</p
>
4981 <p
>For non-network devices, we provide the script
4982 <tt
>/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/auto-addfirmware
</tt
> which
4983 search through the
<tt
>dmesg
</tt
> output for drivers requesting extra
4984 firmware. The firmware file name is looked up in the Contents-ARCH.gz
4985 file available in the package repository, and the packages providing
4986 the requested firmware file(s) is installed. I have proposed to do
4987 something similar in debian-installer (BTS report
4988 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
655507">#
655507</a
>), to allow PXE
4989 installs of Debian to handle firmware installation better. Run the
4990 script as root from the command line to fetch and install the needed
4991 firmware packages.
</p
>
4993 <p
>Debian Edu provide PXE installation of Debian out of the box, and
4994 because some machines need firmware to get their network cards
4995 working, the installation initrd some times need extra firmware
4996 included to be able to install at all. To fill the PXE installation
4997 initrd with extra firmware, the
4998 <tt
>/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/pxe-addfirmware
</tt
> script is
4999 provided. Again, just run it as root on the command line to fill the
5000 PXE initrd with firmware packages.
</p
>
5002 <p
>Last, some LTSP clients might also need firmware to get their
5003 network cards working. For this,
5004 <tt
>/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/ltsp-addfirmware
</tt
> is
5005 provided to update the LTSP initrd with firmware blobs. It is used
5006 the same way as the other firmware related tools.
</p
>
5008 <p
>At the moment, we do not run any of these during installation. We
5009 do not know if this is acceptable for the local administrator to use
5010 non-free software, and it is their choice.
</p
>
5012 <p
>We plan to release beta3 this weekend. You might want to give it a
5018 <title>Setting up a new school with Debian Edu/Squeeze
</title>
5019 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Setting_up_a_new_school_with_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html
</link>
5020 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Setting_up_a_new_school_with_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html
</guid>
5021 <pubDate>Wed,
25 Jan
2012 21:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
5022 <description><p
>The next version of
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu
5023 / Skolelinux
</a
> will include a new tool
5024 <tt
>sitesummary2ldapdhcp
</tt
>, which can be used to quickly set up all
5025 the computers in a school without much manual labour. Here is a short
5026 summary on how to use it to set up a new school.
</p
>
5028 <p
>First, install a combined Main Server and Thin Client Server as the
5029 central server in the network. Next, PXE boot all the client machines
5030 as thin clients and wait
5 minutes after the last client booted to
5031 allow the clients to report their existence to the central server. When
5032 this is done, log on to the central server and run
5033 <tt
>sitesummary2ldapdhcp -a
</tt
> in the
<tt
>konsole
</tt
> to use the
5034 collected information to generate system objects in LDAP. The output
5035 will look similar to this:
</p
>
5037 <p
><blockquote
><pre
>
5038 % sitesummary2ldapdhcp -a
5039 info: Updating machine tjener.intern [
10.0.2.2] id ether-
00:
01:
02:
03:
04:
05.
5040 info: Create GOsa machine for auto-mac-
00-
01-
02-
03-
04-
06 [
10.0.16.20] id ether-
00:
01:
02:
03:
04:
06.
5042 Enter password if you want to activate these changes, and ^c to abort.
5044 Connecting to LDAP as cn=admin,ou=ldap-access,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
5045 enter password: *******
5047 </pre
></blockquote
></p
>
5049 <p
>After providing the LDAP administrative password (the same as the
5050 root password set during installation), the LDAP database will be
5051 populated with system objects for each PXE booted machine with
5052 automatically generated names. The final step to set up the school is
5053 then to log into
<a href=
"https://oss.gonicus.de/labs/gosa/
">GOsa
</a
>,
5054 the web based user, group and system administration system to change
5055 system names, add systems to the correct host groups and finally
5056 enable DHCP and DNS for the systems. All clients that should be used
5057 as diskless workstations should be added to the workstation-hosts
5058 group. After this is done, all computers can be booted again via PXE
5059 and get their assigned names and group based configuration
5060 automatically.
</p
>
5062 <p
>We plan to release beta3 with the updated version of this feature
5063 enabled this weekend. You might want to give it a try.
</p
>
5065 <p
>Update
2012-
01-
28: When calling sitesummary2ldapdhcp to add new
5066 hosts, one need to add the option -a. I forgot to mention this in my
5067 original text, and have added it to the text now.
</p
>
5072 <title>Changing the default Iceweasel start page in Debian Edu/Squeeze
</title>
5073 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Changing_the_default_Iceweasel_start_page_in_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html
</link>
5074 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Changing_the_default_Iceweasel_start_page_in_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html
</guid>
5075 <pubDate>Tue,
10 Jan
2012 15:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
5076 <description><p
>In the Squeeze version of
5077 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
> soon
5078 to be released, users of the system will get their default browser
5079 start page set from LDAP, allowing the system administrator to point
5080 all users to the school web page by updating one setting in LDAP. In
5081 addition to setting the default start page when a machine boots, users
5082 are shown the same page as a welcome page when they log in for the
5083 first time.
</p
>
5085 <p
>The LDAP object dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no have an attribute
5086 labeledURI with
"http://www/ LDAP for Debian Edu/Skolelinux
" as the
5087 default content. By changing this value to another URL, all users get
5088 to see the page behind this new URL.
</p
>
5090 <p
>An easy way to update it is by using the ldapvi tool. It can be
5091 called as
"<tt
>ldapvi -ZD
'(cn=admin)
'</tt
>' to update LDAP with the
5092 new setting.
</p
>
5094 <p
>We have written the code to adjust the default start page and show
5095 the welcome page, and I wonder if there is an easier way to do this
5096 from within Iceweasel instead.
</p
>
5101 <title>Second beta version of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze
</title>
5102 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_beta_version_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</link>
5103 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_beta_version_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html
</guid>
5104 <pubDate>Sat,
7 Jan
2012 22:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
5105 <description><p
>I am happy to announce that today we managed to wrap up and publish
5106 the second beta version of
5107 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
>. If
5108 you want to test a LDAP backed Kerberos server with out of the box PXE
5109 configuration for running diskless machines and installing new
5110 machines, check it out. If you need a software solution for your
5111 school, check it out too. The full announcement is
5112 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2012/
01/msg00000.html
">available
</a
>
5113 on the project announcement list.
</p
>
5118 <title>Fixing an hanging debian installer for Debian Edu
</title>
5119 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fixing_an_hanging_debian_installer_for_Debian_Edu.html
</link>
5120 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fixing_an_hanging_debian_installer_for_Debian_Edu.html
</guid>
5121 <pubDate>Tue,
3 Jan
2012 11:
25:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
5122 <description><p
>During christmas, I have been working getting the next version of
5123 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
</a
> ready
5124 for release. The initial problem I looked at was particularly
5125 interesting.
</p
>
5127 <P
>The installer would hang at the end when it was doing it
5128 post-installation configuration, and whatevery I did to try to find
5129 the cause and fix it always worked while I tested it, but never when I
5130 integrated it into the installer and ran the installation from
5131 scratch. I would try to restart processes, close file descriptors,
5132 remove or create files, and the installer would always unblock and
5133 wrap up its tasks.
</p
>
5135 <p
>Eventually the cause was found. The kernel was simply running out
5136 of entropy, causing the Kerberos setup to hang waiting for more.
5137 Pressing keys was adding entropy to the kernel, and thus all my tries
5138 to fix the problem worked not because what I was typing to fix it, but
5139 because I was typing.
</P
>
5141 <p
>The fix I implemented was to add a background process looking at
5142 the level of entropy in the kernel (by checking
5143 /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail), and if it was too small, the
5144 installer will flush the kernel file buffers and do
'find /
' to
5145 generate some disk IO. Disk IO generate entropy in the kernel, and is
5146 one of the few things that can be initated from within the system to
5147 generate entropy.
</p
>
5149 <p
>The fix is in
5150 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze/Installation
">beta1
5151 of the Debian Edu/Squeeze
</a
> version, and we
5152 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu
">welcome more testers and
5153 developers
</a
>. We plan to release beta2 this weekend.
</p
>
5158 <title>Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge
</title>
5159 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html
</link>
5160 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html
</guid>
5161 <pubDate>Mon,
21 Nov
2011 12:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
5162 <description><p
>At work we have heaps of servers. I believe the total count is
5163 around
1000 at the moment. To be able to get help from the vendors
5164 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
5165 up to date. If the firmware isn
't the latest and greatest, the
5166 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
5167 firmware is upgraded. So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
5168 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
5169 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
5170 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
5171 the tools to do so.
</p
>
5173 <p
>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
5174 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got. Most of
5175 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
5176 so far. This blog post is about the Dell part.
</P
>
5178 <p
>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
5179 <a href=
"ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz
">an XML file
</a
>
5180 with firmware information for all
11th generation servers, listing
5181 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
5182 site I can find it. Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
5183 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
5184 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
5185 be activated on the first reboot.
</p
>
5187 <p
>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
5188 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
5189 servers at a site? Please get in touch and lets share resources.
</p
>
5191 <p
><pre
>
5195 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
5197 # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
5199 'XML::Simple
' =
> 'perl-XML-Simple
',
5201 for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
5202 eval
"use $module;
";
5204 my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
5205 system(
"yum install -y $pkg
");
5206 eval
"use $module;
";
5210 my $errorsto =
'pere@hungry.com
';
5216 sub run_firmware_script {
5217 my ($opts, $script) = @_;
5219 print STDERR
"fail: missing script name\n
";
5222 print STDERR
"Running $script\n\n
";
5224 if (
0 == system(
"sh $script $opts
")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
5225 print STDERR
"success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n
";
5227 print STDERR
"fail: firmware script returned error\n
";
5231 sub run_firmware_scripts {
5232 my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
5233 # Run firmware packages
5234 for my $dir (@dirs) {
5235 print STDERR
"info: Running scripts in $dir\n
";
5236 opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die
"Unable to open directory $dir: $!
";
5237 while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
5238 next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
5239 run_firmware_script($opts,
"$dir/$s
");
5247 print STDERR
"info: Downloading $url\n
";
5248 system(
"wget --quiet \
"$url\
"");
5253 my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
5256 if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
5258 # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
5259 system(
'yum install -y compat-libstdc++-
33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail
');
5261 my $tmpdir = tempdir(
5265 fetch_dell_fw(
'catalog/Catalog.xml.gz
');
5266 system(
'gunzip Catalog.xml.gz
');
5267 my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list(
'Catalog.xml
');
5268 # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
5269 my $fwopts =
"-q
";
5271 for my $url (@paths) {
5272 fetch_dell_fw($url);
5274 run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
5276 print STDERR
"error: Unsupported Dell model
'$product
'.\n
";
5277 print STDERR
"error: Please report to $errorsto.\n
";
5281 print STDERR
"error: Unsupported Dell model
'$product
'.\n
";
5282 print STDERR
"error: Please report to $errorsto.\n
";
5288 my $url =
"ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path
";
5292 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
5293 # firmware packages to download from Dell. Only work for Linux
5294 # machines and
11th generation Dell servers.
5295 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
5296 my $filename = shift;
5298 my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
5300 my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
5302 print STDERR
"Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n
";
5304 my $xml = XMLin($filename);
5306 for my $bundle (@{$xml-
>{SoftwareBundle}}) {
5307 my $brand = $bundle-
>{TargetSystems}-
>{Brand}-
>{Display}-
>{content};
5308 my $model = $bundle-
>{TargetSystems}-
>{Brand}-
>{Model}-
>{Display}-
>{content};
5310 if (
"ARRAY
" eq ref $bundle-
>{TargetOSes}-
>{OperatingSystem}) {
5311 $oscode = $bundle-
>{TargetOSes}-
>{OperatingSystem}[
0]-
>{osCode};
5313 $oscode = $bundle-
>{TargetOSes}-
>{OperatingSystem}-
>{osCode};
5315 if ($mybrand eq $brand
&& $mymodel eq $model
&& "LIN
" eq $oscode)
5317 @paths = map { $_-
>{path} } @{$bundle-
>{Contents}-
>{Package}};
5320 for my $component (@{$xml-
>{SoftwareComponent}}) {
5321 my $componenttype = $component-
>{ComponentType}-
>{value};
5323 # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
5324 next if
'APAC
' eq $componenttype;
5326 my $cpath = $component-
>{path};
5327 for my $path (@paths) {
5328 if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
5329 push(@paths, $cpath);
5337 <p
>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
5338 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking. Anyone know a
5339 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers? At the
5340 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
5346 <title>Free e-book kiosk for the public libraries?
</title>
5347 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_e_book_kiosk_for_the_public_libraries_.html
</link>
5348 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_e_book_kiosk_for_the_public_libraries_.html
</guid>
5349 <pubDate>Fri,
7 Oct
2011 19:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5350 <description><p
>Here in Norway the public libraries are debating with the
5351 publishing houses how to handle electronic books. Surprisingly, the
5352 libraries seem to be willing to accept digital restriction mechanisms
5353 (DRM) on books and renting e-books with artificial scarcity from the
5354 publishing houses. Time limited renting (
2-
3 years) is one proposed
5355 model, and only allowing X borrowers for each book is another.
5356 Personally I find it amazing that libraries are even considering such
5359 <p
>Anyway, while reading
<a href=
"http://boklaben.no/?p=
220">part of
5360 this debate
</a
>, it occurred to me that someone should present a more
5361 sensible approach to the libraries, to allow its borrowers to get used
5362 to a better model. The idea is simple:
</p
>
5364 <p
>Create a computer system for the libraries, either in the form of a
5365 Live DVD or a installable distribution, that provide a simple kiosk
5366 solution to hand out free e-books. As a start, the books distributed
5367 by
<a href=
"http://www.gutenberg.org/
">Project Gutenberg
</a
> (about
5368 36,
000 books),
<a href=
"http://runeberg.org/
">Project Runenberg
</a
>
5369 (
1149 books) and
<a href=
"http://www.archive.org/details/texts
">The
5370 Internet Archive
</a
> (
3,
033,
748 books) could be included, but any book
5371 where the copyright has expired or with a free licence could be
5372 distributed.
</p
>
5374 <p
>The computer system would make it easy to:
</p
>
5378 <li
>Copy e-books into a USB stick, reading tablets, cell phones and
5379 other relevant equipment.
</li
>
5381 <li
>Show the books for reading on the the screen in the library.
</li
>
5385 <p
>In addition to such kiosk solution, there should probably be a web
5386 site as well to allow people easy access to these books without
5387 visiting the library. The site would be the distribution point for
5388 the kiosk systems, which would connect regularly to fetch any new
5389 books available.
</p
>
5391 <p
>Are there anyone working on a system like this? I guess it would
5392 fit any library in the world, and not just the Norwegian public
5393 libraries. :)
</p
>
5398 <title>Ripping problematic DVDs using dvdbackup and genisoimage
</title>
5399 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ripping_problematic_DVDs_using_dvdbackup_and_genisoimage.html
</link>
5400 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ripping_problematic_DVDs_using_dvdbackup_and_genisoimage.html
</guid>
5401 <pubDate>Sat,
17 Sep
2011 20:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5402 <description><p
>For convenience, I want to store copies of all my DVDs on my file
5403 server. It allow me to save shelf space flat while still having my
5404 movie collection easily available. It also make it possible to let
5405 the kids see their favourite DVDs without wearing the physical copies
5406 down. I prefer to store the DVDs as ISOs to keep the DVD menu and
5407 subtitle options intact. It also ensure that the entire film is one
5408 file on the disk. As this is for personal use, the ripping is
5409 perfectly legal here in Norway.
</p
>
5411 <p
>Normally I rip the DVDs using dd like this:
</p
>
5413 <blockquote
><pre
>
5415 # apt-get install lsdvd
5416 title=$(lsdvd
2>/dev/null|awk
'/Disc Title: / {print $
3}
')
5417 dd if=/dev/dvd of=/storage/dvds/$title.iso bs=
1M
5418 </pre
></blockquote
>
5420 <p
>But some DVDs give a input/output error when I read it, and I have
5421 been looking for a better alternative. I have no idea why this I/O
5422 error occur, but suspect my DVD drive, the Linux kernel driver or
5423 something fishy with the DVDs in question. Or perhaps all three.
</p
>
5425 <p
>Anyway, I believe I found a solution today using dvdbackup and
5426 genisoimage. This script gave me a working ISO for a problematic
5427 movie by first extracting the DVD file system and then re-packing it
5430 <blockquote
><pre
>
5432 # apt-get install lsdvd dvdbackup genisoimage
5434 tmpdir=/storage/dvds/
5435 title=$(lsdvd
2>/dev/null|awk
'/Disc Title: / {print $
3}
')
5436 dvdbackup -i /dev/dvd -M -o $tmpdir -n$title
5437 genisoimage -dvd-video -o $tmpdir/$title.iso $tmpdir/$title
5438 rm -rf $tmpdir/$title
5439 </pre
></blockquote
>
5441 <p
>Anyone know of a better way available in Debian/Squeeze?
</p
>
5443 <p
>Update
2011-
09-
18: I got a tip from Konstantin Khomoutov about the
5444 readom program from the wodim package. It is specially written to
5445 read optical media, and is called like this:
<tt
>readom dev=/dev/dvd
5446 f=image.iso
</tt
>. It got
6 GB along with the problematic Cars DVD
5447 before it failed, and failed right away with a Timmy Time DVD.
</p
>
5449 <p
>Next, I got a tip from Bastian Blank about
5450 <a href=
"http://bblank.thinkmo.de/blog/new-software-python-dvdvideo
">his
5451 program python-dvdvideo
</a
>, which seem to be just what I am looking
5452 for. Tested it with my problematic Timmy Time DVD, and it succeeded
5453 creating a ISO image. The git source built and installed just fine in
5454 Squeeze, so I guess this will be my tool of choice in the future.
</p
>
5459 <title>How is booting into runlevel
1 different from single user boots?
</title>
5460 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_is_booting_into_runlevel_1_different_from_single_user_boots_.html
</link>
5461 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_is_booting_into_runlevel_1_different_from_single_user_boots_.html
</guid>
5462 <pubDate>Thu,
4 Aug
2011 12:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5463 <description><p
>Wouter Verhelst have some
5464 <a href=
"http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot
">interesting
5465 comments and opinions
</a
> on my blog post on
5466 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html
">the
5467 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian
</a
> and my blog post about
5468 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html
">the
5469 default KDE desktop in Debian
</a
>. I only have time to address one
5470 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
5471 misunderstanding he bring forward:
</p
>
5473 <p
><blockquote
>
5474 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
5475 single-user system (by adding
'single
' to the kernel command line;
5476 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
5477 </blockquote
></p
>
5479 <p
>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
5480 and booting into runlevel
1 is the same. I am not surprised he
5481 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
5482 thing to believe. But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
5483 runlevel
1 do not work properly and it isn
't the same as single user
5484 mode. I
'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
5485 hard to explain.
</p
>
5487 <p
>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
5488 "<tt
>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin
</tt
>". This means the only thing that is
5489 executed in single user mode is sulogin. Single user mode is a boot
5490 state
"between
" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
5491 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
5492 enters the single user state. When switching to runlevel
1, the state
5493 is in fact not ending in runlevel
1, but it passes through runlevel
1
5494 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
5495 runs
"init -t1 S
" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
5496 1. It is confusing that the
'S
' (single user) init mode is not the
5497 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
5500 <p
>This summary might make it clearer. When booting for the first
5501 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
5502 "<tt
>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin
</tt
>". When booting into
5503 runlevel
1, the following commands are executed:
"<tt
>/etc/init.d/rc
5504 S; /etc/init.d/rc
1; /sbin/sulogin
</tt
>". A problem show up when
5505 trying to continue after visiting single user mode. Not all services
5506 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
5507 unpredicatble state. This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
5508 after visiting single user mode.
</p
>
5510 <p
>A similar problem with runlevel
1 is caused by the amount of
5511 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/. When switching from say runlevel
2
5512 to runlevel
1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
5513 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
5514 started again when switching away from runlevel
1 to the runlevels
5515 2-
5. I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
5516 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not
<strong
>required
</strong
> to get a
5517 functioning single user mode during boot.
</p
>
5519 <p
>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
5520 and discovered this problem a few years ago. I suspect it originates
5521 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.
</p
>
5526 <title>What should start from /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian? - almost nothing
</title>
5527 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html
</link>
5528 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html
</guid>
5529 <pubDate>Sat,
30 Jul
2011 14:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5530 <description><p
>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
5531 are started from /etc/rcS.d/. In fact, there is a bite more of them
5532 than make sense, and this causes a few problems. What kind of
5533 problems, you might ask. There are at least two problems. The first
5534 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
5535 runlevel
1. One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
5536 the expected state. The other is that single user boot will sometimes
5537 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
5538 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
5539 machine from a problem in that subsystem. A minor additional point is
5540 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
5541 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
5542 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.
</p
>
5544 <p
>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/. In short, only the
5545 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
5546 presented during a single user boot should go there. Everything else
5547 should go into the numeric runlevels. This means things like
5548 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
5549 the numeric runlevels. Today in Debian, there are around
115 init.d
5550 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
5551 out. Do your package have one of them? Please help us make single
5552 user and runlevel
1 better by moving it.
</p
>
5554 <p
>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
5555 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
5556 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
5557 is presented.
</p
>
5559 <p
>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound. To keep
5560 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
5561 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
5562 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
5563 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
5564 moved first. This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
5565 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
5566 the system state correct. This will require some coordination when it
5567 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
5568 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
5569 on them. Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
5570 package, while others are still left to do. I wish I had time to work
5571 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
5572 find time to push this forward.
</p
>
5577 <title>What is missing in the Debian desktop, or why my parents use Kubuntu
</title>
5578 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html
</link>
5579 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html
</guid>
5580 <pubDate>Fri,
29 Jul
2011 08:
10:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5581 <description><p
>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
5582 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
5583 desktop to be useful for more people. The use case for this is my
5584 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
5587 <p
>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
5588 implement. After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
5589 do this in Debian we would have a source.
</p
>
5593 <li
><strong
>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.
</strong
> When there
5594 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
5595 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
5596 tool to handle it. I have no problem guiding both of my parents
5597 through the process over the phone. If a kernel reboot is required,
5598 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool. Last
5599 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
5602 <li
><strong
>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
5603 plugins.
</strong
> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
5604 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
5605 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
5606 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
5607 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
5608 Packages file in the APT archive). If one or more packages are found,
5609 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
5610 type. If the package require the user to accept some non-free
5611 license, this is explained to the user. The entire process make it
5612 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
5613 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
5614 not the browser for any missing features.
</li
>
5616 <li
><strong
>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
5617 handlers.
</strong
> When the media players encounter a format or codec
5618 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
5619 should search for a package that would add support for it. This
5620 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H
.264. The selection
5621 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
5622 plugin handling. This is as far as I know implemented using a
5623 gstreamer hook. The end result is that the user easily get access to
5624 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
5625 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.
</li
>
5627 <li
><strong
>Better browser handling of some MIME types.
</strong
> When
5628 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
5629 start emacs to show it. If I remember correctly, when doing the same
5630 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser. At least I
5631 know Opera will show text files within the browser. I much prefer the
5632 latter behaviour.
</li
>
5636 <p
>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
5637 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
5638 it do not matter much.
</p
>
5640 <p
>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
5641 Debian release. It would require the coordinated effort of several
5642 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.
</p
>
5647 <title>Perl modules used by FixMyStreet which are missing in Debian/Squeeze
</title>
5648 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Perl_modules_used_by_FixMyStreet_which_are_missing_in_Debian_Squeeze.html
</link>
5649 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Perl_modules_used_by_FixMyStreet_which_are_missing_in_Debian_Squeeze.html
</guid>
5650 <pubDate>Tue,
26 Jul
2011 12:
25:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5651 <description><p
>The Norwegian
<a href=
"http://www.fiksgatami.no/
">FiksGataMi
</A
>
5652 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
5653 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around
10
5654 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
5655 security support for a few years.
</p
>
5657 <p
>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
5658 that are missing in Debian at the moment. It would be great if these
5659 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
5660 their own
<a href=
"http://www.fixmystreet.com
">FixMyStreet
</a
> clone
5661 in their own country using only Debian packages. The list of modules
5662 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn
't very long, and I hope the perl group
5663 will find time to package the
12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
5664 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
5665 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
5666 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
5667 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
5668 easier in the future.
</p
>
5670 <p
>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
5671 installed on my server was a simple call to
'cpan2deb Module::Name
'
5672 and
'dpkg -i
' to install the resulting package. But this leave me
5673 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
5674 do not have time for.
</p
>
5679 <title>Free Software vs. proprietary softare...
</title>
5680 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Software_vs__proprietary_softare___.html
</link>
5681 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Software_vs__proprietary_softare___.html
</guid>
5682 <pubDate>Mon,
20 Jun
2011 12:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5683 <description><p
>Reading
5684 <a href=
"http://blog.thingiverse.com/
2011/
06/
20/open-source-vs-closed-source-eulas/
">the
5685 thingiverse blog
</a
>, I came across two highlights of interesting
5687 <a href=
"http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Autodesk_EULA
">Autodesk
</a
>
5689 <a href=
"http://blog.makezine.com/archive/
2011/
06/things-you-cant-do-with-the-microsoft-kinect-sdk.html
">Microsoft
5690 Kinect
</a
> End User License Agreements (EULAs), which illustrates
5691 quite well why I stay away from software with EULAs. Whenever I take
5692 the time to read their content, the terms are simply unacceptable.
</p
>
5697 <title>Experimental Open311 API for the mySociety fixmystreet system
</title>
5698 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experimental_Open311_API_for_the_mySociety_fixmystreet_system.html
</link>
5699 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experimental_Open311_API_for_the_mySociety_fixmystreet_system.html
</guid>
5700 <pubDate>Sat,
30 Apr
2011 17:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5701 <description><p
>Today, the first draft implementation of an
5702 <a href=
"http://www.open311.org/
">Open311 API
</a
> for the Norwegian
5703 service
<a href=
"http://www.fiksgatami.no/
">FiksGataMi
</a
> started to
5704 work. It is only available on the developer server for now, and I
5705 have not tested it using any existing Open311 client (I lack the
5706 platforms needed to run the clients I have found so far), but it is
5707 able to query the database and extract a list of open and closed
5708 requests within a given category and reported to a given municipality.
5709 I believe that is a good start to create a useful service for those
5710 that want to do data mining on the requests submitted so far.
</p
>
5712 <p
>Where is it? Visit
5713 <a href=
"http://fiksgatami-dev.nuug.no/open311.cgi/v2/
">http://fiksgatami-dev.nuug.no/open311.cgi/v2/
</a
>
5714 to have a look. Please send feedback to the
5715 <a href=
"http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/fiksgatami
">fiksgatami
5716 (at) nuug.no
</a
> mailing list.
</p
>
5721 <title>Initial notes on adding Open311 server API on FixMyStreet
</title>
5722 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Initial_notes_on_adding_Open311_server_API_on_FixMyStreet.html
</link>
5723 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Initial_notes_on_adding_Open311_server_API_on_FixMyStreet.html
</guid>
5724 <pubDate>Fri,
29 Apr
2011 10:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5725 <description><p
>The last few days I have spent some time trying to add support for
5726 the
<a href=
"http://www.open311.org/
">Open311 API
</a
> in the
5727 <a href=
"http://www.fiksgatami.no/
">Norwegian FixMyStreet service
</a
>.
5728 Earlier I believed Open311 would be a useful API to use to submit
5729 reports to the municipalities, but when I noticed that the
5730 <a href=
"http://fixmystreet.org.nz/
">New Zealand version
</a
> of
5731 FixMyStreet had implemented Open311 on the server side, it occurred to
5732 me that this was a nice way to allow the public, press and
5733 municipalities to do data mining directly in the FixMyStreet service.
5734 Thus I went to work implementing the Open311 specification for
5735 FixMyStreet. The implementation is not yet ready, but I am starting
5736 to get a draft limping along. In the process, I have discovered a few
5737 issues with the Open311 specification.
</p
>
5739 <p
>One obvious missing feature is the lack of natural language
5740 handling in the specification. The specification seem to assume all
5741 reports will be written in English, and do not provide a way for the
5742 receiving end to specify which languages are understood there. To be
5743 able to use the same client and submit to several Open311 receivers,
5744 it would be useful to know which language to use when writing reports.
5745 I believe the specification should be extended to allow the receivers
5746 of problem reports to specify which language they accept, and the
5747 submitter to specify which language the report is written in.
5748 Language of a text can also be automatically guessed using statistical
5749 methods, but for multi-lingual persons like myself, it is useful to
5750 know which language to use when writing a problem report. I suspect
5751 some lang=nb,nn kind of attribute would solve it.
</p
>
5753 <p
>A key part of the Open311 API is the list of services provided,
5754 which is similar to the categories used by FixMyStreet. One issue I
5755 run into is the need to specify both name and unique identifier for
5756 each category. The specification do not state that the identifier
5757 should be numeric, but all example implementations have used numbers
5758 here. In FixMyStreet, there is no number associated with each
5759 category. As the specification do not forbid it, I will use the name
5760 as the unique identifier for now and see how open311 clients handle
5763 <p
>The report format in open311 and the report format in FixMyStreet
5764 differ in a key part. FixMyStreet have a title and a description,
5765 while Open311 only have a description and lack the title. I
'm not
5766 quite sure how to best handle this yet. When asking for a FixMyStreet
5767 report in Open311 format, I just merge title an description into the
5768 open311 description, but this is not going to work if the open311 API
5769 should be used for submitting new reports to FixMyStreet.
</p
>
5771 <p
>The search feature in Open311 is missing a way to ask for problems
5772 near a geographic location. I believe this is important if one is to
5773 use Open311 as the query language for mobile units. The specification
5774 should be extended to handle this, probably using some new lat=, lon=
5775 and range= options.
</p
>
5777 <p
>The final challenge I see is that the FixMyStreet code handle
5778 several administrations in one interface, while the Open311 API seem
5779 to assume only one administration. For FixMyStreet, this mean a
5780 report can be sent to several administrations, and the categories
5781 available depend on the location of the problem. Not quite sure how
5782 to best handle this. I
've noticed
5783 <a href=
"http://seeclickfix.com/open311/
">SeeClickFix
</a
> added
5784 latitude and longitude options to the services request, but it do not
5785 solve the problem of what to return when no location is specified.
5786 Will have to investigate this a bit more.
</p
>
5788 <p
>My distaste for web forums have kept me from bringing these issues
5789 up with the open311 developer group. I really wish they had a email
5790 list available via
<a href=
"http://www.gmane.org/
">Gmane
</a
> to use for
5791 discussions instead of only
5792 <a href=
"http://lists.open311.org/groups/discuss
">a forum
<a/
>. Oh,
5793 well. That will probably resolve itself, one way or another. I
've
5794 also tried visiting the IRC channel #open311 on FreeNode, but no-one
5795 seem to reply to my questions there. This make me wonder if I just
5796 fail to understand how the open311 community work. It sure do not
5797 work like the free software project communities I am used to.
</p
>
5802 <title>Gnash enteres Google Summer of Code
2011</title>
5803 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_enteres_Google_Summer_of_Code_2011.html
</link>
5804 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_enteres_Google_Summer_of_Code_2011.html
</guid>
5805 <pubDate>Wed,
6 Apr
2011 09:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5806 <description><p
><a href=
"http://www.getgnash.org/
">The Gnash project
</a
> is still
5807 the most promising solution for a Free Software Flash implementation.
5808 A few days ago the project
5809 <a href=
"http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/gnash-dev/
2011-
04/msg00011.html
">announced
</a
>
5810 that it will participate in Google Summer of Code. I hope many
5811 students apply, and that some of them succeed in getting AVM2 support
5812 into Gnash.
</p
>
5817 <title>A Norwegian FixMyStreet have kept me busy the last few weeks
</title>
5818 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Norwegian_FixMyStreet_have_kept_me_busy_the_last_few_weeks.html
</link>
5819 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Norwegian_FixMyStreet_have_kept_me_busy_the_last_few_weeks.html
</guid>
5820 <pubDate>Sun,
3 Apr
2011 22:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
5821 <description><p
>Here is a small update for my English readers. Most of my blog
5822 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
5823 update in English.
</p
>
5825 <p
>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
5826 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
5827 of the British service
5828 <a href=
"http://www.fixmystreet.com/
">FixMyStreet
</a
> up and running,
5829 and it has been running for a month now. The entire project has been
5830 organised by me and two others. Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
5831 to fund the development work. In January I drafted a contract with
5832 <a href=
"http://www.mysociety.org/
">mySociety
</a
> on what to develop,
5833 and in February the development took place. Most of it involved
5834 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
5835 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
5836 running in any country by now. The Norwegian
5837 <a href=
"http://www.fiksgatami.no/
">FiksGataMi
</a
> is using
5838 <a href=
"http://www.openstreetmap.org/
">OpenStreetmap
</a
> as the map
5839 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
5840 support for this had to be added/fixed.
</p
>
5842 <p
>The Norwegian version went live March
3th, and we spent the weekend
5843 polishing the system before we announced it March
7th. The system is
5844 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost
3000
5845 problem reports in a few weeks. Soon we hope to announce the Android
5846 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
5847 public infrastructure.
</p
>
5849 <p
>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
5850 such service?
</p
>
5855 <title>Using NVD and CPE to track CVEs in locally maintained software
</title>
5856 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_NVD_and_CPE_to_track_CVEs_in_locally_maintained_software.html
</link>
5857 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_NVD_and_CPE_to_track_CVEs_in_locally_maintained_software.html
</guid>
5858 <pubDate>Fri,
28 Jan
2011 15:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
5859 <description><p
>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
5860 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo. My idea is that
5861 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
5862 available on the Internet, and check our locally
5863 maintained/distributed software against this information. It should
5864 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten. The
5865 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
5866 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
5867 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
5868 out which security holes were present in our free software
5869 collection.
</p
>
5871 <p
>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
5872 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
5873 consistent way across data sources. I considered several ways to do
5874 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
5875 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
5876 existing naming scheme. And it seem like I am not the first one to
5877 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
5878 solution. Enter the
<a href=
"http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html
">Common
5879 Platform Enumeration
</a
> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
5880 software, hardware and other platform components. The CPE ids are
5881 mapped to CVEs in the
<a href=
"http://web.nvd.nist.gov/
">National
5882 Vulnerability Database
</a
>, allowing me to look up know security
5883 issues for any CPE name. With this in place, all I need to do is to
5884 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
5885 This is fairly trivial (I google for
'cve cpe $package
' and check the
5886 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).
</p
>
5888 <p
>To give you an example. The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
5889 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip. If the old version
1.3.3 was the package to
5890 check out, one could look up
5891 <a href=
"http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/search?cpe=cpe%
3A%
2Fa%
3Agnu%
3Agzip:
1.3.3">cpe:/a:gnu:gzip:
1.3.3
5892 in NVD
</a
> and get a list of
6 security holes with public CVE entries.
5893 The most recent one is
5894 <a href=
"http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-
2010-
0001">CVE-
2010-
0001</a
>,
5895 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
5896 list of affected versions is provided.
</p
>
5898 <p
>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
5899 for offline processing of issues. Using this dump, I
've written a
5900 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
5901 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs. One give it CPEs
5902 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
5903 security issues out.
</p
>
5905 <p
>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
5906 information need to be high. For that to happen, I believe as many as
5907 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database. I notice
5909 <a href=
"https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt
">a
5910 map from CVE to CPE
</a
>, indicating that they are using the CPE
5911 information. I
'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.
</p
>
5913 <p
>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
5914 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
5915 the CVE database in NVD. The result look fairly good, but there are
5916 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
5917 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
5918 Debian believe are affected by a CVE). Hope to find time to improve
5919 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
5920 someone maintaining it. So far my three emails with questions and
5921 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
5922 established soon.
</p
>
5924 <p
>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
5925 mapping. It would be useful to know which packages in for example
5926 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
5927 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
5928 for their packages.
</p
>
5933 <title>Which module is loaded for a given PCI and USB device?
</title>
5934 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Which_module_is_loaded_for_a_given_PCI_and_USB_device_.html
</link>
5935 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Which_module_is_loaded_for_a_given_PCI_and_USB_device_.html
</guid>
5936 <pubDate>Sun,
23 Jan
2011 00:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
5937 <description><p
>In the
5938 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data
">discover-data
</a
>
5939 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
5940 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
5941 information. One part of this script that I find very useful when
5942 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
5943 to the PCI device it claims. It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
5944 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with. To see
5945 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
5946 <tt
>/usr/share/bug/discover-data
3>&1</tt
>. The relevant output on
5947 one of my machines like this:
</p
>
5951 10de:
03eb i2c_nforce2
5954 10de:
03f0 snd_hda_intel
5963 <p
>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
5964 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor
3:
</p
>
5967 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
5968 echo loaded pci modules:
5970 cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
5971 for address in * ; do
5972 if [ -d
"$address/driver/module
" ] ; then
5973 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
5974 if grep -q
"^$module
" /proc/modules ; then
5975 address=$(echo $address |sed s/
0000://)
5976 id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n
1 | awk
'{print $
3}
'`
5977 echo
"$id $module
"
5986 <p
>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
5990 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
5991 echo loaded usb modules:
5993 cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
5994 for address in * ; do
5995 if [ -d
"$address/driver/module
" ] ; then
5996 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
5997 if grep -q
"^$module
" /proc/modules ; then
5998 address=$(echo $address |sed s/
0000://)
5999 id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n
1 | awk
'{print $
6}
')
6000 if [
"$id
" ] ; then
6001 echo
"$id $module
"
6011 <p
>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
6017 <title>The video format most supported in web browsers?
</title>
6018 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_video_format_most_supported_in_web_browsers_.html
</link>
6019 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_video_format_most_supported_in_web_browsers_.html
</guid>
6020 <pubDate>Sun,
16 Jan
2011 00:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6021 <description><p
>The video format struggle on the web continues, and the three
6022 contenders seem to be Ogg Theora, H
.264 and WebM. Most video sites
6023 seem to use H
.264, while others use Ogg Theora. Interestingly enough,
6024 the comments I see give me the feeling that a lot of people believe
6025 H
.264 is the most supported video format in browsers, but according to
6026 the Wikipedia article on
6027 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video
">HTML5 video
</a
>,
6028 this is not true. Check out the nice table of supprted formats in
6029 different browsers there. The format supported by most browsers is
6030 Ogg Theora, supported by released versions of Mozilla Firefox, Google
6031 Chrome, Chromium, Opera, Konqueror, Epiphany, Origyn Web Browser and
6032 BOLT browser, while not supported by Internet Explorer nor Safari.
6033 The runner up is WebM supported by released versions of Google Chrome
6034 Chromium Opera and Origyn Web Browser, and test versions of Mozilla
6035 Firefox. H
.264 is supported by released versions of Safari, Origyn
6036 Web Browser and BOLT browser, and the test version of Internet
6037 Explorer. Those wanting Ogg Theora support in Internet Explorer and
6038 Safari can install plugins to get it.
</p
>
6040 <p
>To me, the simple conclusion from this is that to reach most users
6041 without any extra software installed, one uses Ogg Theora with the
6042 HTML5 video tag. Of course to reach all those without a browser
6043 handling HTML5, one need fallback mechanisms. In
6044 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/
">NUUG
</a
>, we provide first fallback to a
6045 plugin capable of playing MPEG1 video, and those without such support
6046 we have a second fallback to the Cortado java applet playing Ogg
6047 Theora. This seem to work quite well, as can be seen in an
<a
6048 href=
"http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/
20110111-semantic-web/
">example
6049 from last week
</a
>.
</p
>
6051 <p
>The reason Ogg Theora is the most supported format, and H
.264 is
6052 the least supported is simple. Implementing and using H
.264
6053 require royalty payment to MPEG-LA, and the terms of use from MPEG-LA
6054 are incompatible with free software licensing. If you believed H
.264
6055 was without royalties and license terms, check out
6056 "<a href=
"http://webmink.com/essays/h-
264/
">H
.264 – Not The Kind Of
6057 Free That Matters
</a
>" by Simon Phipps.
</p
>
6059 <p
>A incomplete list of sites providing video in Ogg Theora is
6061 <a href=
"http://wiki.xiph.org/index.php/List_of_Theora_videos
">the
6062 Xiph.org wiki
</a
>, if you want to have a look. I
'm not aware of a
6063 similar list for WebM nor H
.264.
</p
>
6065 <p
>Update
2011-
01-
16 09:
40: A question from Tollef on IRC made me
6066 realise that I failed to make it clear enough this text is about the
6067 &lt;video
&gt; tag support in browsers and not the video support
6068 provided by external plugins like the Flash plugins.
</p
>
6073 <title>Chrome plan to drop H
.264 support for HTML5
&lt;video
&gt;
</title>
6074 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Chrome_plan_to_drop_H_264_support_for_HTML5__lt_video_gt_.html
</link>
6075 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Chrome_plan_to_drop_H_264_support_for_HTML5__lt_video_gt_.html
</guid>
6076 <pubDate>Wed,
12 Jan
2011 22:
10:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6077 <description><p
>Today I discovered
6078 <a href=
"http://www.digi.no/
860070/google-dropper-h264-stotten-i-chrome
">via
6079 digi.no
</a
> that the Chrome developers, in a surprising announcement,
6080 <a href=
"http://blog.chromium.org/
2011/
01/html-video-codec-support-in-chrome.html
">yesterday
6081 announced
</a
> plans to drop H
.264 support for HTML5
&lt;video
&gt; in
6082 the browser. The argument used is that H
.264 is not a
"completely
6083 open
" codec technology. If you believe H
.264 was free for everyone
6084 to use, I recommend having a look at the essay
6085 "<a href=
"http://webmink.com/essays/h-
264/
">H
.264 – Not The Kind Of
6086 Free That Matters
</a
>". It is not free of cost for creators of video
6087 tools, nor those of us that want to publish on the Internet, and the
6088 terms provided by MPEG-LA excludes free software projects from
6089 licensing the patents needed for H
.264. Some background information
6090 on the Google announcement is available from
6091 <a href=
"http://www.osnews.com/story/
24243/Google_To_Drop_H264_Support_from_Chrome
">OSnews
</a
>.
6092 A good read. :)
</p
>
6094 <p
>Personally, I believe it is great that Google is taking a stand to
6095 promote equal terms for everyone when it comes to video publishing on
6096 the Internet. This can only be done by publishing using free and open
6097 standards, which is only possible if the web browsers provide support
6098 for these free and open standards. At the moment there seem to be two
6099 camps in the web browser world when it come to video support. Some
6100 browsers support H
.264, and others support
6101 <a href=
"http://www.theora.org/
">Ogg Theora
</a
> and
6102 <a href=
"http://www.webmproject.org/
">WebM
</a
>
6103 (
<a href=
"http://www.diracvideo.org/
">Dirac
</a
> is not really an option
6104 yet), forcing those of us that want to publish video on the Internet
6105 and which can not accept the terms of use presented by MPEG-LA for
6106 H
.264 to not reach all potential viewers.
6107 Wikipedia keep
<a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video
">an
6108 updated summary
</a
> of the current browser support.
</p
>
6110 <p
>Not surprising, several people would prefer Google to keep
6111 promoting H
.264, and John Gruber
6112 <a href=
"http://daringfireball.net/
2011/
01/simple_questions
">presents
6113 the mind set
</a
> of these people quite well. His rhetorical questions
6114 provoked a reply from Thom Holwerda with another set of questions
6115 <a href=
"http://www.osnews.com/story/
24245/
10_Questions_for_John_Gruber_Regarding_H_264_WebM
">presenting
6116 the issues with H
.264</a
>. Both are worth a read.
</p
>
6118 <p
>Some argue that if Google is dropping H
.264 because it isn
't free,
6119 they should also drop support for the Adobe Flash plugin. This
6120 argument was covered by Simon Phipps in
6121 <a href=
"http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/
2011/
01/google-and-h264---far-from-hypocritical/index.htm
">todays
6122 blog post
</a
>, which I find to put the issue in context. To me it
6123 make perfect sense to drop native H
.264 support for HTML5 in the
6124 browser while still allowing plugins.
</p
>
6126 <p
>I suspect the reason this announcement make so many people protest,
6127 is that all the users and promoters of H
.264 suddenly get an uneasy
6128 feeling that they might be backing the wrong horse. A lot of TV
6129 broadcasters have been moving to H
.264 the last few years, and a lot
6130 of money has been invested in hardware based on the belief that they
6131 could use the same video format for both broadcasting and web
6132 publishing. Suddenly this belief is shaken.
</p
>
6134 <p
>An interesting question is why Google is doing this. While the
6135 presented argument might be true enough, I believe Google would only
6136 present the argument if the change make sense from a business
6137 perspective. One reason might be that they are currently negotiating
6138 with MPEG-LA over royalties or usage terms, and giving MPEG-LA the
6139 feeling that dropping H
.264 completely from Chroome, Youtube and
6140 Google Video would improve the negotiation position of Google.
6141 Another reason might be that Google want to save money by not having
6142 to pay the video tax to MPEG-LA at all, and thus want to move to a
6143 video format not requiring royalties at all. A third reason might be
6144 that the Chrome development team simply want to avoid the
6145 Chrome/Chromium split to get more help with the development of Chrome.
6146 I guess time will tell.
</p
>
6148 <p
>Update
2011-
01-
15: The Google Chrome team provided
6149 <a href=
"http://blog.chromium.org/
2011/
01/more-about-chrome-html-video-codec.html
">more
6150 background and information on the move
</a
> it a blog post yesterday.
</p
>
6155 <title>What standards are Free and Open as defined by Digistan?
</title>
6156 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_standards_are_Free_and_Open_as_defined_by_Digistan_.html
</link>
6157 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_standards_are_Free_and_Open_as_defined_by_Digistan_.html
</guid>
6158 <pubDate>Thu,
30 Dec
2010 23:
15:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6159 <description><p
>After trying to
6160 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html
">compare
6161 Ogg Theora
</a
> to
6162 <a href=
"http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition
">the Digistan
6163 definition
</a
> of a free and open standard, I concluded that this need
6164 to be done for more standards and started on a framework for doing
6165 this. As a start, I want to get the status for all the standards in
6166 the Norwegian reference directory, which include UTF-
8, HTML, PDF, ODF,
6167 JPEG, PNG, SVG and others. But to be able to complete this in a
6168 reasonable time frame, I will need help.
</p
>
6170 <p
>If you want to help out with this work, please visit
6171 <a href=
"http://wiki.nuug.no/grupper/standard/digistan-analyse
">the
6172 wiki pages I have set up for this
</a
>, and let me know that you want
6173 to help out. The IRC channel #nuug on irc.freenode.net is a good
6174 place to coordinate this for now, as it is the IRC channel for the
6175 NUUG association where I have created the framework (I am the leader
6176 of the Norwegian Unix User Group).
</p
>
6178 <p
>The framework is still forming, and a lot is left to do. Do not be
6179 scared by the sketchy form of the current pages. :)
</p
>
6184 <title>The many definitions of a open standard
</title>
6185 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_many_definitions_of_a_open_standard.html
</link>
6186 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_many_definitions_of_a_open_standard.html
</guid>
6187 <pubDate>Mon,
27 Dec
2010 14:
45:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6188 <description><p
>One of the reasons I like the Digistan definition of
6189 "<a href=
"http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition
">Free and
6190 Open Standard
</a
>" is that this is a new term, and thus the meaning of
6191 the term has been decided by Digistan. The term
"Open Standard
" has
6192 become so misunderstood that it is no longer very useful when talking
6193 about standards. One end up discussing which definition is the best
6194 one and with such frame the only one gaining are the proponents of
6195 de-facto standards and proprietary solutions.
</p
>
6197 <p
>But to give us an idea about the diversity of definitions of open
6198 standards, here are a few that I know about. This list is not
6199 complete, but can be a starting point for those that want to do a
6200 complete survey. More definitions are available on the
6201 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_standard
">wikipedia
6202 page
</a
>.
</p
>
6204 <p
>First off is my favourite, the definition from the European
6205 Interoperability Framework version
1.0. Really sad to notice that BSA
6206 and others has succeeded in getting it removed from version
2.0 of the
6207 framework by stacking the committee drafting the new version with
6208 their own people. Anyway, the definition is still available and it
6209 include the key properties needed to make sure everyone can use a
6210 specification on equal terms.
</p
>
6214 <p
>The following are the minimal characteristics that a specification
6215 and its attendant documents must have in order to be considered an
6216 open standard:
</p
>
6220 <li
>The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
6221 organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
6222 open decision-making procedure available to all interested parties
6223 (consensus or majority decision etc.).
</li
>
6225 <li
>The standard has been published and the standard specification
6226 document is available either freely or at a nominal charge. It must be
6227 permissible to all to copy, distribute and use it for no fee or at a
6228 nominal fee.
</li
>
6230 <li
>The intellectual property - i.e. patents possibly present - of
6231 (parts of) the standard is made irrevocably available on a royalty-
6232 free basis.
</li
>
6234 <li
>There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.
</li
>
6239 <p
>Another one originates from my friends over at
6240 <a href=
"http://www.dkuug.dk/
">DKUUG
</a
>, who coined and gathered
6241 support for
<a href=
"http://www.aaben-standard.dk/
">this
6242 definition
</a
> in
2004. It even made it into the Danish parlament as
6243 <a href=
"http://www.ft.dk/dokumenter/tingdok.aspx?/samling/
20051/beslutningsforslag/B103/som_fremsat.htm
">their
6244 definition of a open standard
</a
>. Another from a different part of
6245 the Danish government is available from the wikipedia page.
</p
>
6249 <p
>En åben standard opfylder følgende krav:
</p
>
6253 <li
>Veldokumenteret med den fuldstændige specifikation offentligt
6254 tilgængelig.
</li
>
6256 <li
>Frit implementerbar uden økonomiske, politiske eller juridiske
6257 begrænsninger på implementation og anvendelse.
</li
>
6259 <li
>Standardiseret og vedligeholdt i et åbent forum (en såkaldt
6260 "standardiseringsorganisation
") via en åben proces.
</li
>
6266 <p
>Then there is
<a href=
"http://www.fsfe.org/projects/os/def.html
">the
6267 definition
</a
> from Free Software Foundation Europe.
</p
>
6271 <p
>An Open Standard refers to a format or protocol that is
</p
>
6275 <li
>subject to full public assessment and use without constraints in a
6276 manner equally available to all parties;
</li
>
6278 <li
>without any components or extensions that have dependencies on
6279 formats or protocols that do not meet the definition of an Open
6280 Standard themselves;
</li
>
6282 <li
>free from legal or technical clauses that limit its utilisation by
6283 any party or in any business model;
</li
>
6285 <li
>managed and further developed independently of any single vendor
6286 in a process open to the equal participation of competitors and third
6289 <li
>available in multiple complete implementations by competing
6290 vendors, or as a complete implementation equally available to all
6297 <p
>A long time ago, SUN Microsystems, now bought by Oracle, created
6299 <a href=
"http://blogs.sun.com/dennisding/resource/Open%
20Standard%
20Definition.pdf
">Open
6300 Standards Checklist
</a
> with a fairly detailed description.
</p
>
6303 <p
>Creation and Management of an Open Standard
6307 <li
>Its development and management process must be collaborative and
6312 <li
>Participation must be accessible to all those who wish to
6313 participate and can meet fair and reasonable criteria
6314 imposed by the organization under which it is developed
6315 and managed.
</li
>
6317 <li
>The processes must be documented and, through a known
6318 method, can be changed through input from all
6319 participants.
</li
>
6321 <li
>The process must be based on formal and binding commitments for
6322 the disclosure and licensing of intellectual property rights.
</li
>
6324 <li
>Development and management should strive for consensus,
6325 and an appeals process must be clearly outlined.
</li
>
6327 <li
>The standard specification must be open to extensive
6328 public review at least once in its life-cycle, with
6329 comments duly discussed and acted upon, if required.
</li
>
6337 <p
>Use and Licensing of an Open Standard
</p
>
6340 <li
>The standard must describe an interface, not an implementation,
6341 and the industry must be capable of creating multiple, competing
6342 implementations to the interface described in the standard without
6343 undue or restrictive constraints. Interfaces include APIs,
6344 protocols, schemas, data formats and their encoding.
</li
>
6346 <li
> The standard must not contain any proprietary
"hooks
" that create
6347 a technical or economic barriers
</li
>
6349 <li
>Faithful implementations of the standard must
6350 interoperate. Interoperability means the ability of a computer
6351 program to communicate and exchange information with other computer
6352 programs and mutually to use the information which has been
6353 exchanged. This includes the ability to use, convert, or exchange
6354 file formats, protocols, schemas, interface information or
6355 conventions, so as to permit the computer program to work with other
6356 computer programs and users in all the ways in which they are
6357 intended to function.
</li
>
6359 <li
>It must be permissible for anyone to copy, distribute and read the
6360 standard for a nominal fee, or even no fee. If there is a fee, it
6361 must be low enough to not preclude widespread use.
</li
>
6363 <li
>It must be possible for anyone to obtain free (no royalties or
6364 fees; also known as
"royalty free
"), worldwide, non-exclusive and
6365 perpetual licenses to all essential patent claims to make, use and
6366 sell products based on the standard. The only exceptions are
6367 terminations per the reciprocity and defensive suspension terms
6368 outlined below. Essential patent claims include pending, unpublished
6369 patents, published patents, and patent applications. The license is
6370 only for the exact scope of the standard in question.
6374 <li
> May be conditioned only on reciprocal licenses to any of
6375 licensees
' patent claims essential to practice that standard
6376 (also known as a reciprocity clause)
</li
>
6378 <li
> May be terminated as to any licensee who sues the licensor
6379 or any other licensee for infringement of patent claims
6380 essential to practice that standard (also known as a
6381 "defensive suspension
" clause)
</li
>
6383 <li
> The same licensing terms are available to every potential
6389 <li
>The licensing terms of an open standards must not preclude
6390 implementations of that standard under open source licensing terms
6391 or restricted licensing terms
</li
>
6397 <p
>It is said that one of the nice things about standards is that
6398 there are so many of them. As you can see, the same holds true for
6399 open standard definitions. Most of the definitions have a lot in
6400 common, and it is not really controversial what properties a open
6401 standard should have, but the diversity of definitions have made it
6402 possible for those that want to avoid a level marked field and real
6403 competition to downplay the significance of open standards. I hope we
6404 can turn this tide by focusing on the advantages of Free and Open
6405 Standards.
</p
>
6410 <title>Is Ogg Theora a free and open standard?
</title>
6411 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html
</link>
6412 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html
</guid>
6413 <pubDate>Sat,
25 Dec
2010 20:
25:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6414 <description><p
><a href=
"http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition
">The
6415 Digistan definition
</a
> of a free and open standard reads like this:
</p
>
6419 <p
>The Digital Standards Organization defines free and open standard
6420 as follows:
</p
>
6424 <li
>A free and open standard is immune to vendor capture at all stages
6425 in its life-cycle. Immunity from vendor capture makes it possible to
6426 freely use, improve upon, trust, and extend a standard over time.
</li
>
6428 <li
>The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
6429 organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
6430 open decision-making procedure available to all interested
6433 <li
>The standard has been published and the standard specification
6434 document is available freely. It must be permissible to all to copy,
6435 distribute, and use it freely.
</li
>
6437 <li
>The patents possibly present on (parts of) the standard are made
6438 irrevocably available on a royalty-free basis.
</li
>
6440 <li
>There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.
</li
>
6444 <p
>The economic outcome of a free and open standard, which can be
6445 measured, is that it enables perfect competition between suppliers of
6446 products based on the standard.
</p
>
6449 <p
>For a while now I have tried to figure out of Ogg Theora is a free
6450 and open standard according to this definition. Here is a short
6451 writeup of what I have been able to gather so far. I brought up the
6452 topic on the Xiph advocacy mailing list
6453 <a href=
"http://lists.xiph.org/pipermail/advocacy/
2009-July/
001632.html
">in
6454 July
2009</a
>, for those that want to see some background information.
6455 According to Ivo Emanuel Gonçalves and Monty Montgomery on that list
6456 the Ogg Theora specification fulfils the Digistan definition.
</p
>
6458 <p
><strong
>Free from vendor capture?
</strong
></p
>
6460 <p
>As far as I can see, there is no single vendor that can control the
6461 Ogg Theora specification. It can be argued that the
6462 <a href=
"http://www.xiph.org/
">Xiph foundation
</A
> is such vendor, but
6463 given that it is a non-profit foundation with the expressed goal
6464 making free and open protocols and standards available, it is not
6465 obvious that this is a real risk. One issue with the Xiph
6466 foundation is that its inner working (as in board member list, or who
6467 control the foundation) are not easily available on the web. I
've
6468 been unable to find out who is in the foundation board, and have not
6469 seen any accounting information documenting how money is handled nor
6470 where is is spent in the foundation. It is thus not obvious for an
6471 external observer who control The Xiph foundation, and for all I know
6472 it is possible for a single vendor to take control over the
6473 specification. But it seem unlikely.
</p
>
6475 <p
><strong
>Maintained by open not-for-profit organisation?
</strong
></p
>
6477 <p
>Assuming that the Xiph foundation is the organisation its web pages
6478 claim it to be, this point is fulfilled. If Xiph foundation is
6479 controlled by a single vendor, it isn
't, but I have not found any
6480 documentation indicating this.
</p
>
6482 <p
>According to
6483 <a href=
"http://media.hiof.no/diverse/fad/rapport_4.pdf
">a report
</a
>
6484 prepared by Audun Vaaler og Børre Ludvigsen for the Norwegian
6485 government, the Xiph foundation is a non-commercial organisation and
6486 the development process is open, transparent and non-Discrimatory.
6487 Until proven otherwise, I believe it make most sense to believe the
6488 report is correct.
</p
>
6490 <p
><strong
>Specification freely available?
</strong
></p
>
6492 <p
>The specification for the
<a href=
"http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/
">Ogg
6493 container format
</a
> and both the
6494 <a href=
"http://www.xiph.org/vorbis/doc/
">Vorbis
</a
> and
6495 <a href=
"http://theora.org/doc/
">Theora
</a
> codeces are available on
6496 the web. This are the terms in the Vorbis and Theora specification:
6500 Anyone may freely use and distribute the Ogg and [Vorbis/Theora]
6501 specifications, whether in private, public, or corporate
6502 capacity. However, the Xiph.Org Foundation and the Ogg project reserve
6503 the right to set the Ogg [Vorbis/Theora] specification and certify
6504 specification compliance.
6508 <p
>The Ogg container format is specified in IETF
6509 <a href=
"http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/rfc3533.txt
">RFC
3533</a
>, and
6510 this is the term:
<p
>
6514 <p
>This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
6515 others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
6516 or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published and
6517 distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any kind,
6518 provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
6519 included on all such copies and derivative works. However, this
6520 document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
6521 the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
6522 Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of developing
6523 Internet standards in which case the procedures for copyrights defined
6524 in the Internet Standards process must be followed, or as required to
6525 translate it into languages other than English.
</p
>
6527 <p
>The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
6528 revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.
</p
>
6531 <p
>All these terms seem to allow unlimited distribution and use, an
6532 this term seem to be fulfilled. There might be a problem with the
6533 missing permission to distribute modified versions of the text, and
6534 thus reuse it in other specifications. Not quite sure if that is a
6535 requirement for the Digistan definition.
</p
>
6537 <p
><strong
>Royalty-free?
</strong
></p
>
6539 <p
>There are no known patent claims requiring royalties for the Ogg
6541 <a href=
"http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/ReadArticle.aspx?ArticleID=
65782">MPEG-LA
</a
>
6543 <a href=
"http://yro.slashdot.org/story/
10/
04/
30/
237238/Steve-Jobs-Hints-At-Theora-Lawsuit
">Steve
6544 Jobs
</a
> in Apple claim to know about some patent claims (submarine
6545 patents) against the Theora format, but no-one else seem to believe
6546 them. Both Opera Software and the Mozilla Foundation have looked into
6547 this and decided to implement Ogg Theora support in their browsers
6548 without paying any royalties. For now the claims from MPEG-LA and
6549 Steve Jobs seem more like FUD to scare people to use the H
.264 codec
6550 than any real problem with Ogg Theora.
</p
>
6552 <p
><strong
>No constraints on re-use?
</strong
></p
>
6554 <p
>I am not aware of any constraints on re-use.
</p
>
6556 <p
><strong
>Conclusion
</strong
></p
>
6558 <p
>3 of
5 requirements seem obviously fulfilled, and the remaining
2
6559 depend on the governing structure of the Xiph foundation. Given the
6560 background report used by the Norwegian government, I believe it is
6561 safe to assume the last two requirements are fulfilled too, but it
6562 would be nice if the Xiph foundation web site made it easier to verify
6565 <p
>It would be nice to see other analysis of other specifications to
6566 see if they are free and open standards.
</p
>
6571 <title>The reply from Edgar Villanueva to Microsoft in Peru
</title>
6572 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html
</link>
6573 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html
</guid>
6574 <pubDate>Sat,
25 Dec
2010 10:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6575 <description><p
>A few days ago
6576 <a href=
"http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article189879.ece
">an
6577 article
</a
> in the Norwegian Computerworld magazine about how version
6579 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Interoperability_Framework
">European
6580 Interoperability Framework
</a
> has been successfully lobbied by the
6581 proprietary software industry to remove the focus on free software.
6582 Nothing very surprising there, given
6583 <a href=
"http://news.slashdot.org/story/
10/
03/
29/
2115235/Open-Source-Open-Standards-Under-Attack-In-Europe
">earlier
6584 reports
</a
> on how Microsoft and others have stacked the committees in
6585 this work. But I find this very sad. The definition of
6586 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/dokumenter/standard-presse-def-
200506.txt
">an
6587 open standard from version
1</a
> was very good, and something I
6588 believe should be used also in the future, alongside
6589 <a href=
"http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition
">the
6590 definition from Digistan
</A
>. Version
2 have removed the open
6591 standard definition from its content.
</p
>
6593 <p
>Anyway, the news reminded me of the great reply sent by Dr. Edgar
6594 Villanueva, congressman in Peru at the time, to Microsoft as a reply
6595 to Microsofts attack on his proposal regarding the use of free software
6596 in the public sector in Peru. As the text was not available from a
6597 few of the URLs where it used to be available, I copy it here from
6598 <a href=
"http://gnuwin.epfl.ch/articles/en/reponseperou/villanueva_to_ms.html
">my
6599 source
</a
> to ensure it is available also in the future. Some
6600 background information about that story is available in
6601 <a href=
"http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/
6099">an article
</a
> from
6602 Linux Journal in
2002.
</p
>
6605 <p
>Lima,
8th of April,
2002<br
>
6606 To: Señor JUAN ALBERTO GONZÁLEZ
<br
>
6607 General Manager of Microsoft Perú
</p
>
6609 <p
>Dear Sir:
</p
>
6611 <p
>First of all, I thank you for your letter of March
25,
2002 in which you state the official position of Microsoft relative to Bill Number
1609, Free Software in Public Administration, which is indubitably inspired by the desire for Peru to find a suitable place in the global technological context. In the same spirit, and convinced that we will find the best solutions through an exchange of clear and open ideas, I will take this opportunity to reply to the commentaries included in your letter.
</p
>
6613 <p
>While acknowledging that opinions such as yours constitute a significant contribution, it would have been even more worthwhile for me if, rather than formulating objections of a general nature (which we will analyze in detail later) you had gathered solid arguments for the advantages that proprietary software could bring to the Peruvian State, and to its citizens in general, since this would have allowed a more enlightening exchange in respect of each of our positions.
</p
>
6615 <p
>With the aim of creating an orderly debate, we will assume that what you call
"open source software
" is what the Bill defines as
"free software
", since there exists software for which the source code is distributed together with the program, but which does not fall within the definition established by the Bill; and that what you call
"commercial software
" is what the Bill defines as
"proprietary
" or
"unfree
", given that there exists free software which is sold in the market for a price like any other good or service.
</p
>
6617 <p
>It is also necessary to make it clear that the aim of the Bill we are discussing is not directly related to the amount of direct savings that can by made by using free software in state institutions. That is in any case a marginal aggregate value, but in no way is it the chief focus of the Bill. The basic principles which inspire the Bill are linked to the basic guarantees of a state of law, such as:
</p
>
6621 <li
>Free access to public information by the citizen.
</li
>
6622 <li
>Permanence of public data.
</li
>
6623 <li
>Security of the State and citizens.
</li
>
6627 <p
>To guarantee the free access of citizens to public information, it is indispensable that the encoding of data is not tied to a single provider. The use of standard and open formats gives a guarantee of this free access, if necessary through the creation of compatible free software.
</p
>
6629 <p
>To guarantee the permanence of public data, it is necessary that the usability and maintenance of the software does not depend on the goodwill of the suppliers, or on the monopoly conditions imposed by them. For this reason the State needs systems the development of which can be guaranteed due to the availability of the source code.
</p
>
6631 <p
>To guarantee national security or the security of the State, it is indispensable to be able to rely on systems without elements which allow control from a distance or the undesired transmission of information to third parties. Systems with source code freely accessible to the public are required to allow their inspection by the State itself, by the citizens, and by a large number of independent experts throughout the world. Our proposal brings further security, since the knowledge of the source code will eliminate the growing number of programs with *spy code*.
</p
>
6633 <p
>In the same way, our proposal strengthens the security of the citizens, both in their role as legitimate owners of information managed by the state, and in their role as consumers. In this second case, by allowing the growth of a widespread availability of free software not containing *spy code* able to put at risk privacy and individual freedoms.
</p
>
6635 <p
>In this sense, the Bill is limited to establishing the conditions under which the state bodies will obtain software in the future, that is, in a way compatible with these basic principles.
</p
>
6638 <p
>From reading the Bill it will be clear that once passed:
<br
>
6639 <li
>the law does not forbid the production of proprietary software
</li
>
6640 <li
>the law does not forbid the sale of proprietary software
</li
>
6641 <li
>the law does not specify which concrete software to use
</li
>
6642 <li
>the law does not dictate the supplier from whom software will be bought
</li
>
6643 <li
>the law does not limit the terms under which a software product can be licensed.
</li
>
6647 <p
>What the Bill does express clearly, is that, for software to be acceptable for the state it is not enough that it is technically capable of fulfilling a task, but that further the contractual conditions must satisfy a series of requirements regarding the license, without which the State cannot guarantee the citizen adequate processing of his data, watching over its integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility throughout time, as these are very critical aspects for its normal functioning.
</p
>
6649 <p
>We agree, Mr. Gonzalez, that information and communication technology have a significant impact on the quality of life of the citizens (whether it be positive or negative). We surely also agree that the basic values I have pointed out above are fundamental in a democratic state like Peru. So we are very interested to know of any other way of guaranteeing these principles, other than through the use of free software in the terms defined by the Bill.
</p
>
6651 <p
>As for the observations you have made, we will now go on to analyze them in detail:
</p
>
6653 <p
>Firstly, you point out that:
"1. The bill makes it compulsory for all public bodies to use only free software, that is to say open source software, which breaches the principles of equality before the law, that of non-discrimination and the right of free private enterprise, freedom of industry and of contract, protected by the constitution.
"</p
>
6655 <p
>This understanding is in error. The Bill in no way affects the rights you list; it limits itself entirely to establishing conditions for the use of software on the part of state institutions, without in any way meddling in private sector transactions. It is a well established principle that the State does not enjoy the wide spectrum of contractual freedom of the private sector, as it is limited in its actions precisely by the requirement for transparency of public acts; and in this sense, the preservation of the greater common interest must prevail when legislating on the matter.
</p
>
6657 <p
>The Bill protects equality under the law, since no natural or legal person is excluded from the right of offering these goods to the State under the conditions defined in the Bill and without more limitations than those established by the Law of State Contracts and Purchasing (T.U.O. by Supreme Decree No.
012-
2001-PCM).
</p
>
6659 <p
>The Bill does not introduce any discrimination whatever, since it only establishes *how* the goods have to be provided (which is a state power) and not *who* has to provide them (which would effectively be discriminatory, if restrictions based on national origin, race religion, ideology, sexual preference etc. were imposed). On the contrary, the Bill is decidedly antidiscriminatory. This is so because by defining with no room for doubt the conditions for the provision of software, it prevents state bodies from using software which has a license including discriminatory conditions.
</p
>
6661 <p
>It should be obvious from the preceding two paragraphs that the Bill does not harm free private enterprise, since the latter can always choose under what conditions it will produce software; some of these will be acceptable to the State, and others will not be since they contradict the guarantee of the basic principles listed above. This free initiative is of course compatible with the freedom of industry and freedom of contract (in the limited form in which the State can exercise the latter). Any private subject can produce software under the conditions which the State requires, or can refrain from doing so. Nobody is forced to adopt a model of production, but if they wish to provide software to the State, they must provide the mechanisms which guarantee the basic principles, and which are those described in the Bill.
</p
>
6663 <p
>By way of an example: nothing in the text of the Bill would prevent your company offering the State bodies an office
"suite
", under the conditions defined in the Bill and setting the price that you consider satisfactory. If you did not, it would not be due to restrictions imposed by the law, but to business decisions relative to the method of commercializing your products, decisions with which the State is not involved.
</p
>
6665 <p
>To continue; you note that:
" 2. The bill, by making the use of open source software compulsory, would establish discriminatory and non competitive practices in the contracting and purchasing by public bodies...
"</p
>
6667 <p
>This statement is just a reiteration of the previous one, and so the response can be found above. However, let us concern ourselves for a moment with your comment regarding
"non-competitive ... practices.
"</p
>
6669 <p
>Of course, in defining any kind of purchase, the buyer sets conditions which relate to the proposed use of the good or service. From the start, this excludes certain manufacturers from the possibility of competing, but does not exclude them
"a priori
", but rather based on a series of principles determined by the autonomous will of the purchaser, and so the process takes place in conformance with the law. And in the Bill it is established that *no one* is excluded from competing as far as he guarantees the fulfillment of the basic principles.
</p
>
6671 <p
>Furthermore, the Bill *stimulates* competition, since it tends to generate a supply of software with better conditions of usability, and to better existing work, in a model of continuous improvement.
</p
>
6673 <p
>On the other hand, the central aspect of competivity is the chance to provide better choices to the consumer. Now, it is impossible to ignore the fact that marketing does not play a neutral role when the product is offered on the market (since accepting the opposite would lead one to suppose that firms
' expenses in marketing lack any sense), and that therefore a significant expense under this heading can influence the decisions of the purchaser. This influence of marketing is in large measure reduced by the bill that we are backing, since the choice within the framework proposed is based on the *technical merits* of the product and not on the effort put into commercialization by the producer; in this sense, competitiveness is increased, since the smallest software producer can compete on equal terms with the most powerful corporations.
</p
>
6675 <p
>It is necessary to stress that there is no position more anti-competitive than that of the big software producers, which frequently abuse their dominant position, since in innumerable cases they propose as a solution to problems raised by users:
"update your software to the new version
" (at the user
's expense, naturally); furthermore, it is common to find arbitrary cessation of technical help for products, which, in the provider
's judgment alone, are
"old
"; and so, to receive any kind of technical assistance, the user finds himself forced to migrate to new versions (with non-trivial costs, especially as changes in hardware platform are often involved). And as the whole infrastructure is based on proprietary data formats, the user stays
"trapped
" in the need to continue using products from the same supplier, or to make the huge effort to change to another environment (probably also proprietary).
</p
>
6677 <p
>You add:
"3. So, by compelling the State to favor a business model based entirely on open source, the bill would only discourage the local and international manufacturing companies, which are the ones which really undertake important expenditures, create a significant number of direct and indirect jobs, as well as contributing to the GNP, as opposed to a model of open source software which tends to have an ever weaker economic impact, since it mainly creates jobs in the service sector.
"</p
>
6679 <p
>I do not agree with your statement. Partly because of what you yourself point out in paragraph
6 of your letter, regarding the relative weight of services in the context of software use. This contradiction alone would invalidate your position. The service model, adopted by a large number of companies in the software industry, is much larger in economic terms, and with a tendency to increase, than the licensing of programs.
</p
>
6681 <p
>On the other hand, the private sector of the economy has the widest possible freedom to choose the economic model which best suits its interests, even if this freedom of choice is often obscured subliminally by the disproportionate expenditure on marketing by the producers of proprietary software.
</p
>
6683 <p
>In addition, a reading of your opinion would lead to the conclusion that the State market is crucial and essential for the proprietary software industry, to such a point that the choice made by the State in this bill would completely eliminate the market for these firms. If that is true, we can deduce that the State must be subsidizing the proprietary software industry. In the unlikely event that this were true, the State would have the right to apply the subsidies in the area it considered of greatest social value; it is undeniable, in this improbable hypothesis, that if the State decided to subsidize software, it would have to do so choosing the free over the proprietary, considering its social effect and the rational use of taxpayers money.
</p
>
6685 <p
>In respect of the jobs generated by proprietary software in countries like ours, these mainly concern technical tasks of little aggregate value; at the local level, the technicians who provide support for proprietary software produced by transnational companies do not have the possibility of fixing bugs, not necessarily for lack of technical capability or of talent, but because they do not have access to the source code to fix it. With free software one creates more technically qualified employment and a framework of free competence where success is only tied to the ability to offer good technical support and quality of service, one stimulates the market, and one increases the shared fund of knowledge, opening up alternatives to generate services of greater total value and a higher quality level, to the benefit of all involved: producers, service organizations, and consumers.
</p
>
6687 <p
>It is a common phenomenon in developing countries that local software industries obtain the majority of their takings in the service sector, or in the creation of
"ad hoc
" software. Therefore, any negative impact that the application of the Bill might have in this sector will be more than compensated by a growth in demand for services (as long as these are carried out to high quality standards). If the transnational software companies decide not to compete under these new rules of the game, it is likely that they will undergo some decrease in takings in terms of payment for licenses; however, considering that these firms continue to allege that much of the software used by the State has been illegally copied, one can see that the impact will not be very serious. Certainly, in any case their fortune will be determined by market laws, changes in which cannot be avoided; many firms traditionally associated with proprietary software have already set out on the road (supported by copious expense) of providing services associated with free software, which shows that the models are not mutually exclusive.
</p
>
6689 <p
>With this bill the State is deciding that it needs to preserve certain fundamental values. And it is deciding this based on its sovereign power, without affecting any of the constitutional guarantees. If these values could be guaranteed without having to choose a particular economic model, the effects of the law would be even more beneficial. In any case, it should be clear that the State does not choose an economic model; if it happens that there only exists one economic model capable of providing software which provides the basic guarantee of these principles, this is because of historical circumstances, not because of an arbitrary choice of a given model.
</p
>
6691 <p
>Your letter continues:
"4. The bill imposes the use of open source software without considering the dangers that this can bring from the point of view of security, guarantee, and possible violation of the intellectual property rights of third parties.
"</p
>
6693 <p
>Alluding in an abstract way to
"the dangers this can bring
", without specifically mentioning a single one of these supposed dangers, shows at the least some lack of knowledge of the topic. So, allow me to enlighten you on these points.
</p
>
6695 <p
>On security:
</p
>
6697 <p
>National security has already been mentioned in general terms in the initial discussion of the basic principles of the bill. In more specific terms, relative to the security of the software itself, it is well known that all software (whether proprietary or free) contains errors or
"bugs
" (in programmers
' slang). But it is also well known that the bugs in free software are fewer, and are fixed much more quickly, than in proprietary software. It is not in vain that numerous public bodies responsible for the IT security of state systems in developed countries require the use of free software for the same conditions of security and efficiency.
</p
>
6699 <p
>What is impossible to prove is that proprietary software is more secure than free, without the public and open inspection of the scientific community and users in general. This demonstration is impossible because the model of proprietary software itself prevents this analysis, so that any guarantee of security is based only on promises of good intentions (biased, by any reckoning) made by the producer itself, or its contractors.
</p
>
6701 <p
>It should be remembered that in many cases, the licensing conditions include Non-Disclosure clauses which prevent the user from publicly revealing security flaws found in the licensed proprietary product.
</p
>
6703 <p
>In respect of the guarantee:
</p
>
6705 <p
>As you know perfectly well, or could find out by reading the
"End User License Agreement
" of the products you license, in the great majority of cases the guarantees are limited to replacement of the storage medium in case of defects, but in no case is compensation given for direct or indirect damages, loss of profits, etc... If as a result of a security bug in one of your products, not fixed in time by yourselves, an attacker managed to compromise crucial State systems, what guarantees, reparations and compensation would your company make in accordance with your licensing conditions? The guarantees of proprietary software, inasmuch as programs are delivered ``AS IS
'', that is, in the state in which they are, with no additional responsibility of the provider in respect of function, in no way differ from those normal with free software.
</p
>
6707 <p
>On Intellectual Property:
</p
>
6709 <p
>Questions of intellectual property fall outside the scope of this bill, since they are covered by specific other laws. The model of free software in no way implies ignorance of these laws, and in fact the great majority of free software is covered by copyright. In reality, the inclusion of this question in your observations shows your confusion in respect of the legal framework in which free software is developed. The inclusion of the intellectual property of others in works claimed as one
's own is not a practice that has been noted in the free software community; whereas, unfortunately, it has been in the area of proprietary software. As an example, the condemnation by the Commercial Court of Nanterre, France, on
27th September
2001 of Microsoft Corp. to a penalty of
3 million francs in damages and interest, for violation of intellectual property (piracy, to use the unfortunate term that your firm commonly uses in its publicity).
</p
>
6711 <p
>You go on to say that:
"The bill uses the concept of open source software incorrectly, since it does not necessarily imply that the software is free or of zero cost, and so arrives at mistaken conclusions regarding State savings, with no cost-benefit analysis to validate its position.
"</p
>
6713 <p
>This observation is wrong; in principle, freedom and lack of cost are orthogonal concepts: there is software which is proprietary and charged for (for example, MS Office), software which is proprietary and free of charge (MS Internet Explorer), software which is free and charged for (Red Hat, SuSE etc GNU/Linux distributions), software which is free and not charged for (Apache, Open Office, Mozilla), and even software which can be licensed in a range of combinations (MySQL).
</p
>
6715 <p
>Certainly free software is not necessarily free of charge. And the text of the bill does not state that it has to be so, as you will have noted after reading it. The definitions included in the Bill state clearly *what* should be considered free software, at no point referring to freedom from charges. Although the possibility of savings in payments for proprietary software licenses are mentioned, the foundations of the bill clearly refer to the fundamental guarantees to be preserved and to the stimulus to local technological development. Given that a democratic State must support these principles, it has no other choice than to use software with publicly available source code, and to exchange information only in standard formats.
</p
>
6717 <p
>If the State does not use software with these characteristics, it will be weakening basic republican principles. Luckily, free software also implies lower total costs; however, even given the hypothesis (easily disproved) that it was more expensive than proprietary software, the simple existence of an effective free software tool for a particular IT function would oblige the State to use it; not by command of this Bill, but because of the basic principles we enumerated at the start, and which arise from the very essence of the lawful democratic State.
</p
>
6719 <p
>You continue:
"6. It is wrong to think that Open Source Software is free of charge. Research by the Gartner Group (an important investigator of the technological market recognized at world level) has shown that the cost of purchase of software (operating system and applications) is only
8% of the total cost which firms and institutions take on for a rational and truly beneficial use of the technology. The other
92% consists of: installation costs, enabling, support, maintenance, administration, and down-time.
"</p
>
6721 <p
>This argument repeats that already given in paragraph
5 and partly contradicts paragraph
3. For the sake of brevity we refer to the comments on those paragraphs. However, allow me to point out that your conclusion is logically false: even if according to Gartner Group the cost of software is on average only
8% of the total cost of use, this does not in any way deny the existence of software which is free of charge, that is, with a licensing cost of zero.
</p
>
6723 <p
>In addition, in this paragraph you correctly point out that the service components and losses due to down-time make up the largest part of the total cost of software use, which, as you will note, contradicts your statement regarding the small value of services suggested in paragraph
3. Now the use of free software contributes significantly to reduce the remaining life-cycle costs. This reduction in the costs of installation, support etc. can be noted in several areas: in the first place, the competitive service model of free software, support and maintenance for which can be freely contracted out to a range of suppliers competing on the grounds of quality and low cost. This is true for installation, enabling, and support, and in large part for maintenance. In the second place, due to the reproductive characteristics of the model, maintenance carried out for an application is easily replicable, without incurring large costs (that is, without paying more than once for the same thing) since modifications, if one wishes, can be incorporated in the common fund of knowledge. Thirdly, the huge costs caused by non-functioning software (
"blue screens of death
", malicious code such as virus, worms, and trojans, exceptions, general protection faults and other well-known problems) are reduced considerably by using more stable software; and it is well known that one of the most notable virtues of free software is its stability.
</p
>
6725 <p
>You further state that:
"7. One of the arguments behind the bill is the supposed freedom from costs of open-source software, compared with the costs of commercial software, without taking into account the fact that there exist types of volume licensing which can be highly advantageous for the State, as has happened in other countries.
"</p
>
6727 <p
>I have already pointed out that what is in question is not the cost of the software but the principles of freedom of information, accessibility, and security. These arguments have been covered extensively in the preceding paragraphs to which I would refer you.
</p
>
6729 <p
>On the other hand, there certainly exist types of volume licensing (although unfortunately proprietary software does not satisfy the basic principles). But as you correctly pointed out in the immediately preceding paragraph of your letter, they only manage to reduce the impact of a component which makes up no more than
8% of the total.
</p
>
6731 <p
>You continue:
"8. In addition, the alternative adopted by the bill (I) is clearly more expensive, due to the high costs of software migration, and (II) puts at risk compatibility and interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector, given the hundreds of versions of open source software on the market.
"</p
>
6733 <p
>Let us analyze your statement in two parts. Your first argument, that migration implies high costs, is in reality an argument in favor of the Bill. Because the more time goes by, the more difficult migration to another technology will become; and at the same time, the security risks associated with proprietary software will continue to increase. In this way, the use of proprietary systems and formats will make the State ever more dependent on specific suppliers. Once a policy of using free software has been established (which certainly, does imply some cost) then on the contrary migration from one system to another becomes very simple, since all data is stored in open formats. On the other hand, migration to an open software context implies no more costs than migration between two different proprietary software contexts, which invalidates your argument completely.
</p
>
6735 <p
>The second argument refers to
"problems in interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector
" This statement implies a certain lack of knowledge of the way in which free software is built, which does not maximize the dependence of the user on a particular platform, as normally happens in the realm of proprietary software. Even when there are multiple free software distributions, and numerous programs which can be used for the same function, interoperability is guaranteed as much by the use of standard formats, as required by the bill, as by the possibility of creating interoperable software given the availability of the source code.
</p
>
6737 <p
>You then say that:
"9. The majority of open source code does not offer adequate levels of service nor the guarantee from recognized manufacturers of high productivity on the part of the users, which has led various public organizations to retract their decision to go with an open source software solution and to use commercial software in its place.
"</p
>
6739 <p
>This observation is without foundation. In respect of the guarantee, your argument was rebutted in the response to paragraph
4. In respect of support services, it is possible to use free software without them (just as also happens with proprietary software), but anyone who does need them can obtain support separately, whether from local firms or from international corporations, again just as in the case of proprietary software.
</p
>
6741 <p
>On the other hand, it would contribute greatly to our analysis if you could inform us about free software projects *established* in public bodies which have already been abandoned in favor of proprietary software. We know of a good number of cases where the opposite has taken place, but not know of any where what you describe has taken place.
</p
>
6743 <p
>You continue by observing that:
"10. The bill discourages the creativity of the Peruvian software industry, which invoices
40 million US$/year, exports
4 million US$ (
10th in ranking among non-traditional exports, more than handicrafts) and is a source of highly qualified employment. With a law that encourages the use of open source, software programmers lose their intellectual property rights and their main source of payment.
"</p
>
6745 <p
>It is clear enough that nobody is forced to commercialize their code as free software. The only thing to take into account is that if it is not free software, it cannot be sold to the public sector. This is not in any case the main market for the national software industry. We covered some questions referring to the influence of the Bill on the generation of employment which would be both highly technically qualified and in better conditions for competition above, so it seems unnecessary to insist on this point.
</p
>
6747 <p
>What follows in your statement is incorrect. On the one hand, no author of free software loses his intellectual property rights, unless he expressly wishes to place his work in the public domain. The free software movement has always been very respectful of intellectual property, and has generated widespread public recognition of its authors. Names like those of Richard Stallman, Linus Torvalds, Guido van Rossum, Larry Wall, Miguel de Icaza, Andrew Tridgell, Theo de Raadt, Andrea Arcangeli, Bruce Perens, Darren Reed, Alan Cox, Eric Raymond, and many others, are recognized world-wide for their contributions to the development of software that is used today by millions of people throughout the world. On the other hand, to say that the rewards for authors rights make up the main source of payment of Peruvian programmers is in any case a guess, in particular since there is no proof to this effect, nor a demonstration of how the use of free software by the State would influence these payments.
</p
>
6749 <p
>You go on to say that:
"11. Open source software, since it can be distributed without charge, does not allow the generation of income for its developers through exports. In this way, the multiplier effect of the sale of software to other countries is weakened, and so in turn is the growth of the industry, while Government rules ought on the contrary to stimulate local industry.
"</p
>
6751 <p
>This statement shows once again complete ignorance of the mechanisms of and market for free software. It tries to claim that the market of sale of non- exclusive rights for use (sale of licenses) is the only possible one for the software industry, when you yourself pointed out several paragraphs above that it is not even the most important one. The incentives that the bill offers for the growth of a supply of better qualified professionals, together with the increase in experience that working on a large scale with free software within the State will bring for Peruvian technicians, will place them in a highly competitive position to offer their services abroad.
</p
>
6753 <p
>You then state that:
"12. In the Forum, the use of open source software in education was discussed, without mentioning the complete collapse of this initiative in a country like Mexico, where precisely the State employees who founded the project now state that open source software did not make it possible to offer a learning experience to pupils in the schools, did not take into account the capability at a national level to give adequate support to the platform, and that the software did not and does not allow for the levels of platform integration that now exist in schools.
"</p
>
6755 <p
>In fact Mexico has gone into reverse with the Red Escolar (Schools Network) project. This is due precisely to the fact that the driving forces behind the Mexican project used license costs as their main argument, instead of the other reasons specified in our project, which are far more essential. Because of this conceptual mistake, and as a result of the lack of effective support from the SEP (Secretary of State for Public Education), the assumption was made that to implant free software in schools it would be enough to drop their software budget and send them a CD ROM with Gnu/Linux instead. Of course this failed, and it couldn
't have been otherwise, just as school laboratories fail when they use proprietary software and have no budget for implementation and maintenance. That
's exactly why our bill is not limited to making the use of free software mandatory, but recognizes the need to create a viable migration plan, in which the State undertakes the technical transition in an orderly way in order to then enjoy the advantages of free software.
</p
>
6757 <p
>You end with a rhetorical question:
"13. If open source software satisfies all the requirements of State bodies, why do you need a law to adopt it? Shouldn
't it be the market which decides freely which products give most benefits or value?
"</p
>
6759 <p
>We agree that in the private sector of the economy, it must be the market that decides which products to use, and no state interference is permissible there. However, in the case of the public sector, the reasoning is not the same: as we have already established, the state archives, handles, and transmits information which does not belong to it, but which is entrusted to it by citizens, who have no alternative under the rule of law. As a counterpart to this legal requirement, the State must take extreme measures to safeguard the integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility of this information. The use of proprietary software raises serious doubts as to whether these requirements can be fulfilled, lacks conclusive evidence in this respect, and so is not suitable for use in the public sector.
</p
>
6761 <p
>The need for a law is based, firstly, on the realization of the fundamental principles listed above in the specific area of software; secondly, on the fact that the State is not an ideal homogeneous entity, but made up of multiple bodies with varying degrees of autonomy in decision making. Given that it is inappropriate to use proprietary software, the fact of establishing these rules in law will prevent the personal discretion of any state employee from putting at risk the information which belongs to citizens. And above all, because it constitutes an up-to-date reaffirmation in relation to the means of management and communication of information used today, it is based on the republican principle of openness to the public.
</p
>
6763 <p
>In conformance with this universally accepted principle, the citizen has the right to know all information held by the State and not covered by well- founded declarations of secrecy based on law. Now, software deals with information and is itself information. Information in a special form, capable of being interpreted by a machine in order to execute actions, but crucial information all the same because the citizen has a legitimate right to know, for example, how his vote is computed or his taxes calculated. And for that he must have free access to the source code and be able to prove to his satisfaction the programs used for electoral computations or calculation of his taxes.
</p
>
6765 <p
>I wish you the greatest respect, and would like to repeat that my office will always be open for you to expound your point of view to whatever level of detail you consider suitable.
</p
>
6767 <p
>Cordially,
<br
>
6768 DR. EDGAR DAVID VILLANUEVA NUÑEZ
<br
>
6769 Congressman of the Republic of Perú.
</p
>
6775 <title>Officeshots still going strong
</title>
6776 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_still_going_strong.html
</link>
6777 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_still_going_strong.html
</guid>
6778 <pubDate>Sat,
25 Dec
2010 09:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6779 <description><p
>Half a year ago I
6780 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html
">wrote
6781 a bit
</a
> about
<a href=
"http://www.officeshots.org/
">OfficeShots
</a
>,
6782 a web service to allow anyone to test how ODF documents are handled by
6783 the different programs reading and writing the ODF format.
</p
>
6785 <p
>I just had a look at the service, and it seem to be going strong.
6786 Very interesting to see the results reported in the gallery, how
6787 different Office implementations handle different ODF features. Sad
6788 to see that KOffice was not doing it very well, and happy to see that
6789 LibreOffice has been tested already (but sadly not listed as a option
6790 for OfficeShots users yet). I am glad to see that the ODF community
6791 got such a great test tool available.
</p
>
6796 <title>How to test if a laptop is working with Linux
</title>
6797 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_if_a_laptop_is_working_with_Linux.html
</link>
6798 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_if_a_laptop_is_working_with_Linux.html
</guid>
6799 <pubDate>Wed,
22 Dec
2010 14:
55:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6800 <description><p
>The last few days I have spent at work here at the
<a
6801 href=
"http://www.uio.no/
">University of Oslo
</a
> testing if the new
6802 batch of computers will work with Linux. Every year for the last few
6803 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
6804 computers, and this year HP won the bid. Two different desktops and
6805 five different laptops are on the list this year. We in the UNIX
6806 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
6807 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
6808 university.
</p
>
6810 <p
>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
6811 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well. To test, I PXE
6812 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
6813 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware. When
6814 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
6815 on. If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
6816 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
6817 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.
</p
>
6819 <p
>Anyway, to get to the point of this post. Here is the simple tests
6820 I perform on a new model.
</p
>
6824 <li
>Is PXE installation working? I
'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
6825 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment. If I feel like it, I also test with
6826 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.
</li
>
6828 <li
>Is X.org working? If the graphical login screen show up after
6829 installation, X.org is working.
</li
>
6831 <li
>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working? Running glxgears (in
6832 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
6833 reported by the program.
</li
>
6835 <li
>Is sound working? With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
6836 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful. If there
6837 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
6838 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound. I
6839 normally test this by playing
6840 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/
20101012-chef/
">a HTML5
6841 video
</a
> in Firefox/Iceweasel.
</li
>
6843 <li
>Is the USB subsystem working? I test this by plugging in a USB
6844 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.
</li
>
6846 <li
>Is the CD/DVD player working? I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
6847 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.
</li
>
6849 <li
>Is any built in camera working? Test using cheese, and see if a
6850 picture from the v4l device show up.
</li
>
6852 <li
>Is bluetooth working? Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
6853 any bluetooth devices are discovered. In my office, I normally see a
6856 <li
>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working. I have
6857 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
6858 notice this.
</li
>
6860 <li
>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working? I
'm testing if the
6861 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
6864 <li
>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
6865 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
6866 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc? The set of buttons differ from
6867 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
6870 <li
>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
6871 acceleration sensors etc. I rarely test these, as I do not know how
6872 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
6873 existence.
</li
>
6877 <p
>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
6878 for the HP machines I am testing. I
'm not done yet, so I will report
6879 the test results later. For now I can report that HP
8100 Elite work
6880 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook
8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
6881 and audio fail on RHEL6. Ubuntu Maverik worked with
8440p. As you
6882 can see, I have most machines left to test. One interesting
6883 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
6884 RHEL6 with glxgears. No idea why.
</p
>
6889 <title>Some thoughts on BitCoins
</title>
6890 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html
</link>
6891 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html
</guid>
6892 <pubDate>Sat,
11 Dec
2010 15:
10:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6893 <description><p
>As I continue to explore
6894 <a href=
"http://www.bitcoin.org/
">BitCoin
</a
>, I
've starting to wonder
6895 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
6896 and regulations here in Norway. Here are some random notes.
</p
>
6898 <p
>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
6899 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
6900 is known to everyone. This means that if a BitCoin address has been
6901 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
6902 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
6903 that address. There is even a web service to look at the details for
6904 all transactions. There I can see that my address
6905 <a href=
"http://blockexplorer.com/address/
15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
</a
>
6906 have received
16.06 Bitcoin, the
6907 <a href=
"http://blockexplorer.com/address/
1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv
8MHqvwst
3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv
8MHqvwst
3</a
>
6908 address of Simon Phipps have received
181.97 BitCoin and the address
6909 <a href=
"http://blockexplorer.com/address/
1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt
">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt
</A
>
6910 of EFF have received
2447.38 BitCoins so far. Thank you to each and
6911 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
6912 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
6913 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
6914 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction. I
'm told
6915 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
6916 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
6917 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.
</p
>
6919 <p
>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
6920 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
6921 without declaring it. There are money laundering, tax and accounting
6922 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
6923 If the Skolelinux foundation
6924 (
<a href=
"http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html
">SLX
6925 Debian Labs
</a
>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
6926 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
6927 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
6928 not, should everything or nothing be declared? What exchange rate
6929 should be used when calculating taxes? Would receivers have to pay
6930 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
6931 BitCoin? I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.
</p
>
6933 <p
>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
6934 accepted by a lot of users. It must be possible to get easy access to
6935 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
6936 easy to spend it. At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
6937 access to, but there are very few places to spend it. I am not really
6938 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
6939 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins. I
6940 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
6941 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
6942 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
6943 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular. I
'm sure they
6944 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
6945 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
6946 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
6947 currencies.
</p
>
6949 <p
>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
6950 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
6951 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
6952 to see which one get the next lump of cash). The
"winner
" get
50
6953 BitCoin when this happen. Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
6954 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
6955 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
6956 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the
50
6958 <a href=
"http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/
">BitCoin Pool
</a
>
6959 if this sounds interesting. I have not had time to try to set up a
6960 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
6961 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
6964 <p
>Update
2010-
12-
15: Found an
<a
6965 href=
"http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi
">interesting
6966 criticism
</a
> of bitcoin. Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
6967 it was interesting to read. The arguments presented seem to be
6968 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.
</p
>
6973 <title>Now accepting bitcoins - anonymous and distributed p2p crypto-money
</title>
6974 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html
</link>
6975 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html
</guid>
6976 <pubDate>Fri,
10 Dec
2010 08:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
6977 <description><p
>With this weeks lawless
6978 <a href=
"http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/
2010/
12/
06/wikileaks/index.html
">governmental
6979 attacks
</a
> on Wikileak and
6980 <a href=
"http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/
2010/
12/
06/war_on_speech
">free
6981 speech
</a
>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
6982 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
6984 <a href=
"http://webmink.com/
2010/
12/
06/now-accepting-bitcoin/
">Simon
6985 Phipps on bitcoin
</a
> reminded me about a project that a friend of
6986 mine mentioned earlier. I decided to follow Simon
's example, and get
6987 involved with
<a href=
"http://www.bitcoin.org/
">BitCoin
</a
>. I got
6988 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
6989 some bitcoins to get started. I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
6990 for helping me remember BitCoin.
</p
>
6992 <p
>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder? It is a digital
6993 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
6994 networks. It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
6995 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
6996 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions. The
6997 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets
2.9
6998 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
6999 line client builds just fine. Hopefully Jonas
7000 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
578157">will get the package into
7001 Debian
</a
> soon.
</p
>
7003 <p
>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
7004 There are
<a href=
"http://www.bitcoin.org/trade
">companies accepting
7005 bitcoins
</a
> when selling services and goods, and there are even
7006 currency
"stock
" markets where the exchange rate is decided. There
7007 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising. If you
7008 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
7010 <a href=
"https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/
">some for free
</a
> (
0.05
7011 bitcoin at the time of writing). Use
7012 <a href=
"http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/
">BitcoinWatch
</a
> to keep an eye
7013 on the current exchange rates.
</p
>
7015 <p
>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
7016 machines. If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
7017 donations to the address
7018 <b
>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b
</b
>. Thank you!
</p
>
7023 <title>Student group continue the work on my Reprap
3D printer
</title>
7024 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Student_group_continue_the_work_on_my_Reprap_3D_printer.html
</link>
7025 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Student_group_continue_the_work_on_my_Reprap_3D_printer.html
</guid>
7026 <pubDate>Thu,
9 Dec
2010 19:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7027 <description><p
>A few days ago, I was introduces to some students in the robot
7028 student assosiation
<a href=
"http://www.robotica.no/
">Robotica
7029 Osloensis
</a
> at the University of Oslo where I work, who planned to
7030 get their own
3D printer. They wanted to learn from me based on my
7031 work in the area. After having a short lunch meeting with them, I
7032 offered them to borrow my reprap kit, as I never had time to complete
7033 the build and this seem unlike to change any time soon. I look
7034 forward to see how this goes. This monday their volunteer driver
7035 picked up my kit and drove it to their lab, and tomorrow I am told the
7036 last exam is over so they can start work on getting the
3D printer
7037 operational.
</p
>
7039 <p
>The robotic group have already build several robots on their own,
7040 and seem capable of getting the reprap operational. I really look
7041 forward to being able to print all the cool
3D designs published on
7042 <a href=
"http://www.thingiverse.com/
">Thingiverse
</a
>. I even got
7043 some
3D scans I got made during Dagen@IFI when one of the groups at
7044 the computer science department at the university demonstrated their
7045 very cool
3D scanner.
</p
>
7050 <title>Debian Edu development gathering and General Assembly for FRiSK
</title>
7051 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_development_gathering_and_General_Assembly_for_FRiSK.html
</link>
7052 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_development_gathering_and_General_Assembly_for_FRiSK.html
</guid>
7053 <pubDate>Mon,
29 Nov
2010 18:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7054 <description><p
>On friday, the first Debian Edu / Skolelinux
7055 <a href=
"http://www.friprogramvareiskolen.no/Gathering/
2010-
12-
03-
05-Oslo
">development
7056 gathering
</a
> in a long time take place here in Oslo, Norway. I
7057 really look forward to seeing all the good people working on the
7058 Squeeze release. The gathering is open for everyone interested in
7059 learning more about Debian Edu / Skolelinux.
</p
>
7061 <p
>On Saturday, the Norwegian member organization taking care of
7062 organizing these development gatherings, Fri Programvare i Skolen,
7064 <a href=
"http://friprogramvareiskolen.no/Genfors/
2010">General Assembly
7065 for
2010</a
>. Membership is open for all, and currently there are
388
7066 people registered as members. Last year
32 members cast their vote in
7067 the memberdb based election system. I hope more people find time to
7068 vote this year.
</p
>
7073 <title>Why isn
't Debian Edu using VLC?
</title>
7074 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html
</link>
7075 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html
</guid>
7076 <pubDate>Sat,
27 Nov
2010 11:
30:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7077 <description><p
>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
7078 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
7079 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
7080 to play a video file or stream. Only if VLC fail will I drag out
7081 gmplayer to see if it can do better. The reason is mostly the failure
7082 model and trust. When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
7083 reporting the problem. When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
7084 just hangs. The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.
<p
>
7086 <p
>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
7087 mplayer in
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian
7088 Edu/Skolelinux
</a
>. The reason is simple. We need a good browser
7089 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
7090 not very good. For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
7091 is no way for the user to pause the video. Also, when I
7092 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia
">last
7093 tested the browser plugins
</a
> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
7094 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked. If
7095 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
7096 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.
</P
>
7098 <p
>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
7099 annoying. The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
7100 keyboard shortcuts. When the player is in full screen mode, its
7101 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
7102 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode. I
7103 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
7104 window mode. Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
7105 the current video. It is very nice when playing short videos from the
7106 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
7107 what is going on.
</p
>
7112 <title>Lenny-
>Squeeze upgrades of the Gnome and KDE desktop, now with apt-get autoremove
</title>
7113 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades_of_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop__now_with_apt_get_autoremove.html
</link>
7114 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades_of_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop__now_with_apt_get_autoremove.html
</guid>
7115 <pubDate>Mon,
22 Nov
2010 14:
15:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7116 <description><p
>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
7117 upgrade testing of the
7118 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/
">Lenny
7119 Gnome and KDE Desktop
</a
> to do
<tt
>apt-get autoremove
</tt
> when using apt-get.
7120 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
7121 can now present the updated result from today:
</p
>
7123 <p
>This is for Gnome:
</p
>
7125 <p
>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude
</p
>
7127 <blockquote
><p
>
7132 browser-plugin-gnash
7139 freedesktop-sound-theme
7141 gconf-defaults-service
7156 gnome-desktop-environment
7160 gnome-session-canberra
7165 gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
7171 libapache2-mod-dnssd
7174 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
7177 libboost-date-time1.42
.0
7178 libboost-python1.42
.0
7179 libboost-thread1.42
.0
7181 libchamplain-gtk-
0.4-
0
7183 libclutter-gtk-
0.10-
0
7190 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
7205 libgnomepanel2.24-cil
7210 libgtksourceview2.0-common
7211 libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
7212 libmono-addins0.2-cil
7213 libmono-cairo2.0-cil
7214 libmono-corlib2.0-cil
7215 libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
7216 libmono-posix2.0-cil
7217 libmono-security2.0-cil
7218 libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
7219 libmono-system2.0-cil
7222 libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
7223 libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
7233 libtelepathy-farsight0
7242 nautilus-sendto-empathy
7246 python-aptdaemon-gtk
7248 python-beautifulsoup
7263 python-gtksourceview2
7274 python-pkg-resources
7281 python-twisted-conch
7287 python-zope.interface
7292 rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
7299 system-config-printer-udev
7301 telepathy-mission-control-
5
7312 </p
></blockquote
>
7314 <p
>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
</p
>
7316 <blockquote
><p
>
7322 fast-user-switch-applet
7341 libgtksourceview2.0-
0
7343 libsdl1.2debian-alsa
7349 system-config-printer
7354 </p
></blockquote
>
7356 <p
>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get
</p
>
7358 <blockquote
><p
>
7359 gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
7360 </p
></blockquote
>
7362 <p
>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get
</p
>
7364 <blockquote
><p
>
7366 </p
></blockquote
>
7368 <p
>This is for KDE:
</p
>
7370 <p
>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude
</p
>
7372 <blockquote
><p
>
7374 </p
></blockquote
>
7376 <p
>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
</p
>
7378 <blockquote
><p
>
7381 </p
></blockquote
>
7383 <p
>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get
</p
>
7385 <blockquote
><p
>
7399 kdeartwork-emoticons
7401 kdeartwork-theme-icon
7405 kdebase-workspace-bin
7406 kdebase-workspace-data
7420 kscreensaver-xsavers
7435 plasma-dataengines-workspace
7437 plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
7438 plasma-runners-addons
7439 plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
7440 plasma-scriptengine-python
7441 plasma-scriptengine-qedje
7442 plasma-scriptengine-ruby
7443 plasma-scriptengine-webkit
7444 plasma-scriptengines
7445 plasma-wallpapers-addons
7446 plasma-widget-folderview
7447 plasma-widget-networkmanagement
7451 xscreensaver-data-extra
7453 xscreensaver-gl-extra
7454 xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
7455 </p
></blockquote
>
7457 <p
>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get
</p
>
7459 <blockquote
><p
>
7461 google-gadgets-common
7479 libggadget-qt-
1.0-
0b
7484 libkonqsidebarplugin4a
7493 libplasma-geolocation-interface4
7495 libplasmagenericshell4
7509 libsmokeknewstuff2-
3
7510 libsmokeknewstuff3-
3
7512 libsmokektexteditor3
7520 libsmokeqtnetwork4-
3
7526 libsmokeqtuitools4-
3
7538 plasma-dataengines-addons
7539 plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
7540 plasma-widget-lancelot
7541 plasma-widgets-addons
7542 plasma-widgets-workspace
7546 update-notifier-common
7547 </p
></blockquote
>
7549 <p
>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
7550 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
7551 differences. I have no idea what packages should be installed after
7552 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.
</p
>
7557 <title>Migrating Xen virtual machines using LVM to KVM using disk images
</title>
7558 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Migrating_Xen_virtual_machines_using_LVM_to_KVM_using_disk_images.html
</link>
7559 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Migrating_Xen_virtual_machines_using_LVM_to_KVM_using_disk_images.html
</guid>
7560 <pubDate>Mon,
22 Nov
2010 11:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7561 <description><p
>Most of the computers in use by the
7562 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project
</a
>
7563 are virtual machines. And they have been Xen machines running on a
7564 fairly old IBM eserver xseries
345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
7565 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge
2950 host machine. This was a
7566 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
7567 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
7568 know is not supported by KVM. So to migrate, we had to convert
7569 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.
</p
>
7572 <a href=
"http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/
35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
">a
7573 nice recipe
</a
> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
7574 migration. It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
7575 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
7576 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data. I NFS mounted the
7577 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.
</p
>
7583 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/
35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
7588 if [ -z
"$
1" ] ; then
7589 echo
"Usage: $
0 &lt;hostname
&gt;
"
7595 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
7596 echo
"error: unable to find LVM volume for $host
"
7600 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs. not sure why.
7601 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk
'{sum = sum + $
4} END { print int(sum *
1.05) }
')
7602 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk
'{sum = sum + $
4} END { print int(sum *
1.05) }
')
7603 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
7606 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=
1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
7607 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
7609 parted $img mklabel msdos
7610 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap
0 $disksize
7611 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
7612 parted $img set
1 boot on
7615 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
7616 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
7618 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=
1M
7619 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
7620 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
7622 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
7623 losetup -d /dev/loop0
7626 <p
>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
7627 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.
</p
>
7629 <p
>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
7630 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-
686 and
7631 set up grub to boot from the disk image. After this, the KVM machines
7632 seem to work just fine.
</p
>
7637 <title>Lenny-
>Squeeze upgrades, apt vs aptitude with the Gnome and KDE desktop
</title>
7638 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop.html
</link>
7639 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop.html
</guid>
7640 <pubDate>Sat,
20 Nov
2010 22:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7641 <description><p
>I
'm still running upgrade testing of the
7642 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/
">Lenny
7643 Gnome and KDE Desktop
</a
>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
7644 status. Here is a short update based on a test I ran
20101118.
</p
>
7646 <p
>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
7647 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
7648 can see if anything should be changed.
</p
>
7650 <p
>This is for Gnome:
</p
>
7652 <p
>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude
</p
>
7654 <blockquote
><p
>
7655 apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
7656 browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-
4.3 cups-pk-helper
7657 dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
7658 freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
7659 gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
7660 geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
7661 gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
7662 gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
7663 gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
7664 gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
7665 gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
7666 gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
7667 gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
7668 libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
7669 libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-
0 libboost-date-time1.42
.0
7670 libboost-python1.42
.0 libboost-thread1.42
.0 libchamplain-
0.4-
0
7671 libchamplain-gtk-
0.4-
0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-
0.10-
0
7672 libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-
1.0-
2
7673 libepc-common libepc-ui-
1.0-
2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
7674 libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
7675 libgdl-
1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-
0 libgif4
7676 libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
7677 libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
7678 libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
7679 libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
7680 libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
7681 libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
7682 libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
7683 libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
7684 libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-
6
7685 libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6
.8
7686 libpolkit-gtk-
1-
0 libpt-
1.10.10-plugins-alsa
7687 libpt-
1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6
.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
7688 libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-
4
7689 libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-
0.99-
0
7690 libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
7691 mono-
2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
7692 nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
7693 openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-
4suite-xml
7694 python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
7695 python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
7696 python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
7697 python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
7698 python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
7699 python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
7700 python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
7701 python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
7702 python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
7703 python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
7704 python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
7705 python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
7706 python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
7707 remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
7708 rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
7709 software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
7710 telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-
5 telepathy-salut tomboy
7711 totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
7712 transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
7714 </p
></blockquote
>
7716 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
7718 <blockquote
><p
>
7719 arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
7720 epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
7721 fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
7722 gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
7723 gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
7724 gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
7725 guile-
1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
7726 libavahi-ui0 libbind9-
50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-
11 libcdio7
7727 libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-
1.0-
0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
7728 libedata-cal1.2-
6 libedataserver1.2-
9 libeel2-
2.20 libepc-
1.0-
1
7729 libepc-ui-
1.0-
1 libexchange-storage1.2-
3 libfaad0 libgadu3
7730 libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-
3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
7731 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-
0 libgksuui1.0-
1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-
2
7732 libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-
1 libgnomeprint2.2-
0
7733 libgnomeprintui2.2-
0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-
1.0-
0
7734 libgtkhtml2-
0 libgtksourceview1.0-
0 libgtksourceview2.0-
0
7735 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
7736 libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
7737 libmagick++
10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
7738 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
7739 libnm-util0 libopal-
2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-
10 libpisock9
7740 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-
1.10.10 libraw1394-
8
7741 libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-
8
7742 libspeexdsp1 libssh2-
1 libsuitesparse-
3.1.0 libsvga1
7743 libswfdec-
0.6-
90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
7744 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
7745 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
7746 sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
7747 totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
7748 </p
></blockquote
>
7750 <p
>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get
</p
>
7752 <blockquote
><p
>
7753 gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
7754 </p
></blockquote
>
7756 <p
>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get
</p
>
7758 <blockquote
><p
>
7760 </p
></blockquote
>
7762 <p
>This is for KDE:
</p
>
7764 <p
>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude
</p
>
7766 <blockquote
><p
>
7767 autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-
4.3 dcoprss
7768 edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
7769 ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
7770 gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
7771 kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
7772 kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
7773 kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
7774 kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
7775 kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
7776 kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
7777 kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
7778 kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
7779 killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
7780 kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
7781 ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42
.0
7782 libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
7783 libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
7784 libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
7785 libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
7786 libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
7787 libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
7788 libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
7789 libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
7790 libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
7791 lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
7792 openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
7793 parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
7794 pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
7795 speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
7797 </p
></blockquote
>
7799 <p
>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
</p
>
7801 <blockquote
><p
>
7802 amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
7803 dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
7804 kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
7805 kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
7806 keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
7807 kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
7808 kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
7809 klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
7810 kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
7811 kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
7812 kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
7813 ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
7814 ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
7815 kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
7816 kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
7817 libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
7818 libavahi-core5 libavc1394-
0 libbind9-
50 libbluetooth2
7819 libboost-python1.34
.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
7820 libdirectfb-
1.0-
0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
7821 libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-
0 libicu38
7822 libiec61883-
0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
7823 libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
7824 libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
7825 libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
7826 libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
7827 libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
7828 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
7829 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-
8 librss1 libsensors3
7830 libsmbios2 libssh2-
1 libsuitesparse-
3.1.0 libswfdec-
0.6-
90
7831 libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
7832 mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
7833 texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
7834 ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
7835 </p
></blockquote
>
7837 <p
>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get
</p
>
7839 <blockquote
><p
>
7840 dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
7841 kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
7842 kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
7843 kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
7844 netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
7845 xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra
7846 xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
7847 </p
></blockquote
>
7849 <p
>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get
</p
>
7851 <blockquote
><p
>
7852 kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
7853 </p
></blockquote
>
7858 <title>Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd
</title>
7859 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html
</link>
7860 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html
</guid>
7861 <pubDate>Sat,
20 Nov
2010 07:
20:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7862 <description><p
>Answering
7863 <a href=
"http://www.listware.net/
201011/gnash-dev/
67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html
">the
7864 call from the Gnash project
</a
> for
7865 <a href=
"http://www.gnashdev.org:
8010">buildbot
</a
> slaves to test the
7866 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
7867 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
7868 Debian/Squeeze. I hope this can help the developers in getting new
7869 releases out more often.
</p
>
7871 <p
>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
7872 I have considered setting up a
<a
7873 href=
"http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/
">Debian/kfreebsd
</a
>
7874 machine as well. I have also considered using the kfreebsd
7875 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the
5
7876 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video. Because of this, I
7877 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
7878 kfreebsd. Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
7879 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
7880 screen at random locations). Have not gotten very far with the
7881 testing. Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
7882 fatal problem. Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
7883 useful as a file server for NUUG. Will try to find time to set up a
7884 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.
</p
>
7889 <title>Debian in
3D
</title>
7890 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html
</link>
7891 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html
</guid>
7892 <pubDate>Tue,
9 Nov
2010 16:
10:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7893 <description><p
><img src=
"http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/
23/e0/c4/f9/
2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg
"></p
>
7895 <p
>3D printing is just great. I just came across this Debian logo in
7897 <a href=
"http://blog.thingiverse.com/
2010/
11/
09/participatory-branding/
">the
7898 thingiverse blog
</a
>.
</p
>
7903 <title>Making room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
</title>
7904 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Making_room_on_the_Debian_Edu_Sqeeze_DVD.html
</link>
7905 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Making_room_on_the_Debian_Edu_Sqeeze_DVD.html
</guid>
7906 <pubDate>Sun,
7 Nov
2010 11:
45:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
7907 <description><p
>Prioritising packages for the Debian Edu /
7908 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Skolelinux
</a
> DVD, which is
7909 supposed provide a school with all the services and user applications
7910 needed on the pupils computer network has always been hard. Even
7911 schools without Internet connections should be able to get Debian Edu
7912 working using this DVD.
</p
>
7914 <p
>The job became a lot harder when apt and aptitude started
7915 installing recommended packages by default. We want the same set of
7916 packages to be installed when using the DVD and the netinst CD, and
7917 that means all recommended packages need to be on the DVD. I created
7918 a patch for debian-cd in
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
601203">BTS
7919 report #
601203</a
> to do this, and since this change was applied to
7920 the Debian Edu DVD build, we have been seriously short on space.
</p
>
7922 <p
>A few days ago we decided to drop blender, wxmaxima and kicad from
7923 the default installation to save space on the DVD, believing that
7924 those needing these applications are few and can get them from the
7925 Debian archive.
</p
>
7927 <p
>Yesterday, I had a look what source packages to see which packages
7928 were using most space. A few large packages are well know;
7929 openoffice.org, openclipart and fluid-soundfont. But I also
7930 discovered that lilypond used
106 MiB and fglrx-driver used
53 MiB.
7931 The lilypond package is pulled in as a dependency for rosegarden, and
7932 when looking a bit closer I discovered that
99 MiB of the
106 MiB were
7933 the documentation package, which is recommended by the binary package.
7934 I decided to drop this documentation package from our DVD, as most of
7935 our users will use the GUI front-ends and do not need the lilypond
7936 documentation. Similarly, I dropped the non-free fglrx-driver package
7937 which might be installed by d-i when its hardware is detected, as the
7938 free X driver should work.
</p
>
7940 <p
>With this change, we finally got space for the LXDE and Gnome
7941 desktop packages as well as the language specific packages making the
7942 DVD more useful again.
</p
>
7947 <title>Software updates
2010-
10-
24</title>
7948 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html
</link>
7949 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html
</guid>
7950 <pubDate>Sun,
24 Oct
2010 22:
45:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
7951 <description><p
>Some updates.
</p
>
7953 <p
>My
<a href=
"http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2
">gnash pledge
</a
> to
7954 raise money for the project is going well. The lower limit of
10
7955 signers was reached in
24 hours, and so far
13 people have signed it.
7956 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
7957 how far we can get before the time limit of December
24 is reached.
7960 <p
>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
7961 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
7962 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
7964 <a href=
"http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html
">kcov
</a
>,
7965 and can be used using
<tt
>kcov
&lt;directory
&gt;
&lt;binary
&gt;
</tt
>.
7966 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
7967 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
7968 libglib2.0-dev. Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
7969 solvable. I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.
</p
>
7971 <p
>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for
<a
7972 href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/
2010/
10/msg00002.html
">a
7973 new alpha release of Debian Edu
</a
>, and just published the second
7974 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
7975 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Skolelinux
</a
>
7976 release. Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
7977 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
7978 client servers and diskless workstations. A nice touch added
7979 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
7980 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.
</p
>
7985 <title>Pledge for funding to the Gnash project to get AVM2 support
</title>
7986 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Pledge_for_funding_to_the_Gnash_project_to_get_AVM2_support.html
</link>
7987 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Pledge_for_funding_to_the_Gnash_project_to_get_AVM2_support.html
</guid>
7988 <pubDate>Tue,
19 Oct
2010 14:
45:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
7989 <description><p
><a href=
"http://www.getgnash.org/
">The Gnash project
</a
> is the
7990 most promising solution for a Free Software Flash implementation. It
7991 has done great so far, but there is still far to go, and recently its
7992 funding has dried up. I believe AVM2 support in Gnash is vital to the
7993 continued progress of the project, as more and more sites show up with
7994 AVM2 flash files.
</p
>
7996 <p
>To try to get funding for developing such support, I have started
7997 <a href=
"http://www.pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2
">a pledge
</a
> with the
7998 following text:
</P
>
8000 <p
><blockquote
>
8002 <p
>"I will pay
100$ to the Gnash project to develop AVM2 support but
8003 only if
10 other people will do the same.
"</p
>
8005 <p
>- Petter Reinholdtsen, free software developer
</p
>
8007 <p
>Deadline to sign up by:
24th December
2010</p
>
8009 <p
>The Gnash project need to get support for the new Flash file
8010 format AVM2 to work with a lot of sites using Flash on the
8011 web. Gnash already work with a lot of Flash sites using the old AVM1
8012 format, but more and more sites are using the AVM2 format these
8013 days. The project web page is available from
8014 http://www.getgnash.org/ . Gnash is a free software implementation
8015 of Adobe Flash, allowing those of us that do not accept the terms of
8016 the Adobe Flash license to get access to Flash sites.
</p
>
8018 <p
>The project need funding to get developers to put aside enough
8019 time to develop the AVM2 support, and this pledge is my way to try
8020 to get this to happen.
</p
>
8022 <p
>The project accept donations via the OpenMediaNow foundation,
8023 <a href=
"http://www.openmedianow.org/?q=node/
32">http://www.openmedianow.org/?q=node/
32</a
> .
</p
>
8025 </blockquote
></p
>
8027 <p
>I hope you will support this effort too. I hope more than
10
8028 people will participate to make this happen. The more money the
8029 project gets, the more features it can develop using these funds.
8035 <title>First version of a Perl library to control the Spykee robot
</title>
8036 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_version_of_a_Perl_library_to_control_the_Spykee_robot.html
</link>
8037 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_version_of_a_Perl_library_to_control_the_Spykee_robot.html
</guid>
8038 <pubDate>Sat,
9 Oct
2010 14:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8039 <description><p
>This summer I got the chance to buy cheap Spykee robots, and since
8040 then I have worked on getting Linux software in place to control them.
8041 The firmware for the robot is available from the producer, and using
8042 that source it was trivial to figure out the protocol specification.
8043 I
've started on a perl library to control it, and made some demo
8044 programs using this perl library to allow one to control the
8047 <p
>The library is quite functional already, and capable of controlling
8048 the driving, fetching video, uploading MP3s and play them. There are
8049 a few less important features too.
</p
>
8051 <p
>Since a few weeks ago, I ran out of time to spend on this project,
8052 but I never got around to releasing the current source. I decided
8053 today that it was time to do something about it, and uploaded the
8054 source to my Debian package store at people.skolelinux.org.
</p
>
8056 <p
>Because it was simpler for me, I made a Debian package and
8057 published the source and deb. If you got a spykee robot, grab the
8058 source or binary package:
</p
>
8061 <li
><a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian/packages/lenny/libspykee-perl_0.0
.20101009-
1.tar.gz
">libspykee-perl_0.0
.20101009-
1.tar.gz
</a
></li
>
8062 <li
><a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian/packages/lenny/libspykee-perl_0.0
.20101009-
1.dsc
">libspykee-perl_0.0
.20101009-
1.dsc
</a
></li
>
8063 <li
><a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian/packages/lenny/libspykee-perl_0.0
.20101009-
1_all.deb
">libspykee-perl_0.0
.20101009-
1_all.deb
</a
></li
>
8064 </ul
></p
>
8066 <p
>If you are interested in helping out with developing this library,
8067 please let me know.
</p
>
8072 <title>Links for
2010-
10-
03</title>
8073 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Links_for_2010_10_03.html
</link>
8074 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Links_for_2010_10_03.html
</guid>
8075 <pubDate>Sun,
3 Oct
2010 22:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8076 <description><p
><ul
>
8078 <li
><a href=
"http://arstechnica.com/business/news/
2010/
09/there-is-no-plan-b-why-the-ipv4-to-ipv6-transition-will-be-ugly.ars
">There
8079 is no Plan B: why the IPv4-to-IPv6 transition will be ugly
</a
></li
>
8081 <li
>Scanner looking under clothes
8082 <a href=
"http://www.dagbladet.no/
2010/
10/
03/nyheter/utenriks/reise/overvakingskamera/flyplasser/
13667192/
">has
8083 already been misused at Heathrow
</a
>.
</li
>
8085 <li
><a href=
"http://wiki.softwarelivre.org/Landell
">Landell
8086 Webcasting
</a
> - interesting alternative for
8087 <ahref=
"http://dvswitch.alioth.debian.org/wiki/
">DVSwitch
</a
> with
8090 </ul
></p
>
8095 <title>Terms of use for video produced by a Canon IXUS
130 digital camera
</title>
8096 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html
</link>
8097 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html
</guid>
8098 <pubDate>Thu,
9 Sep
2010 23:
55:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8099 <description><p
>A few days ago I had the mixed pleasure of bying a new digital
8100 camera, a Canon IXUS
130. It was instructive and very disturbing to
8101 be able to verify that also this camera producer have the nerve to
8102 specify how I can or can not use the videos produced with the camera.
8103 Even thought I was aware of the issue, the options with new cameras
8104 are limited and I ended up bying the camera anyway. What is the
8105 problem, you might ask? It is software patents, MPEG-
4, H
.264 and the
8106 MPEG-LA that is the problem, and our right to record our experiences
8107 without asking for permissions that is at risk.
8109 <p
>On page
27 of the Danish instruction manual, this section is
8113 <p
>This product is licensed under AT
&T patents for the MPEG-
4 standard
8114 and may be used for encoding MPEG-
4 compliant video and/or decoding
8115 MPEG-
4 compliant video that was encoded only (
1) for a personal and
8116 non-commercial purpose or (
2) by a video provider licensed under the
8117 AT
&T patents to provide MPEG-
4 compliant video.
</p
>
8119 <p
>No license is granted or implied for any other use for MPEG-
4
8123 <p
>In short, the camera producer have chosen to use technology
8124 (MPEG-
4/H
.264) that is only provided if I used it for personal and
8125 non-commercial purposes, or ask for permission from the organisations
8126 holding the knowledge monopoly (patent) for technology used.
</p
>
8128 <p
>This issue has been brewing for a while, and I recommend you to
8130 "<a href=
"http://www.osnews.com/story/
23236/Why_Our_Civilization_s_Video_Art_and_Culture_is_Threatened_by_the_MPEG-LA
">Why
8131 Our Civilization
's Video Art and Culture is Threatened by the
8132 MPEG-LA
</a
>" by Eugenia Loli-Queru and
8133 "<a href=
"http://webmink.com/
2010/
09/
03/h-
264-and-foss/
">H
.264 Is Not
8134 The Sort Of Free That Matters
</a
>" by Simon Phipps to learn more about
8135 the issue. The solution is to support the
8136 <a href=
"http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition
">free and
8137 open standards
</a
> for video, like
<a href=
"http://www.theora.org/
">Ogg
8138 Theora
</a
>, and avoid MPEG-
4 and H
.264 if you can.
</p
>
8143 <title>Some notes on Flash in Debian and Debian Edu
</title>
8144 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_notes_on_Flash_in_Debian_and_Debian_Edu.html
</link>
8145 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_notes_on_Flash_in_Debian_and_Debian_Edu.html
</guid>
8146 <pubDate>Sat,
4 Sep
2010 10:
10:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8147 <description><p
>In the
<a href=
"http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote
">Debian
8148 popularity-contest numbers
</a
>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
8149 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian. The sixth
8150 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla. This is a clear indication that
8151 working flash is important for Debian users. Around
10 percent of the
8152 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
8153 installed.
</p
>
8155 <p
>In the report written by Lars Risan in August
2008
8156 («
<a href=
"http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile
&do=view
&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf
">Skolelinux
8157 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
8158 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs
</a
>»), one of the most important problems
8159 schools experienced with
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian
8160 Edu/Skolelinux
</a
> was the lack of working Flash. A lot of educational
8161 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
8162 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
8163 good reason to stay with Windows.
</p
>
8165 <p
>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
8166 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
8167 everything you told him but could work fairly well. This was a
8168 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
8169 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
8170 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
8171 example Internet Explorer
6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
8172 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
8173 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
8174 pages they want to visit.
</p
>
8176 <p
>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
8177 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
8178 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
8179 Video to working out of the box. For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
8180 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
8181 the new release
0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
8182 unstable. The new version work with more sites that version
0.8.7.
8183 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
8184 release team have not had time to reply to it yet. I hope they agree
8185 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
8186 accept the new package into Squeeze.
</p
>
8191 <title>My first perl GUI application - controlling a Spykee robot
</title>
8192 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_first_perl_GUI_application___controlling_a_Spykee_robot.html
</link>
8193 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_first_perl_GUI_application___controlling_a_Spykee_robot.html
</guid>
8194 <pubDate>Wed,
1 Sep
2010 21:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8195 <description><p
>This evening I made my first Perl GUI application. The last few
8196 days I have worked on a Perl module for controlling my recently
8197 aquired Spykee robots, and the module is now getting complete enought
8198 that it is possible to use it to control the robot driving at least.
8199 It was now time to figure out how to use it to create some GUI to
8200 allow me to drive the robot around. I picked PerlQt as I have had
8201 positive experiences with the Qt API before, and spent a few minutes
8202 browsing the web for examples. Using Qt Designer seemed like a short
8203 cut, so I ended up writing the perl GUI using Qt Designer and
8204 compiling it into a perl program using the puic program from
8205 libqt-perl. Nothing fancy yet, but it got buttons to connect and
8206 drive around.
</p
>
8208 <p
>The perl module I have written provide a object oriented API for
8209 controlling the robot. Here is an small example on how to use it:
</p
>
8211 <p
><pre
>
8213 Spykee::discover(sub {$robot{$_[
0]} = $_[
1]});
8214 my $host = (keys %robot)[
0];
8215 my $spykee = Spykee-
>new();
8216 $spykee-
>contact($host,
"admin
",
"admin
");
8219 $spykee-
>right();
8221 $spykee-
>forward();
8226 </pre
></p
>
8228 <p
>Thanks to the release of the source of the robot firmware, I could
8229 peek into the implementation at the other end to figure out how to
8230 implement the protocol used by the robot. I
've implemented several of
8231 the commands the robot understand, but is still missing the camera
8232 support to make it possible to control the robot from remote. First I
8233 want to implement support for uploading new firmware and configuring
8234 the wireless network, to make it possible to bootstrap a Spykee robot
8235 without the producers Windows and MacOSX software (I only have Linux,
8236 so I had to ask a friend to come over to get the robot testing
8237 going. :).
</p
>
8239 <p
>Will release the source to the public soon, but need to figure out
8240 where to make it available first. I will add a link to
8241 <a href=
"http://wiki.nuug.no/grupper/robot/
">the NUUG wiki
</a
> for
8242 those that want to check back later to find it.
</p
>
8247 <title>Broken hard link handling with sshfs
</title>
8248 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_hard_link_handling_with_sshfs.html
</link>
8249 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_hard_link_handling_with_sshfs.html
</guid>
8250 <pubDate>Mon,
30 Aug
2010 19:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8251 <description><p
>Just got an email from Tobias Gruetzmacher as a followup on my
8252 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_umask_handling_with_sshfs.html
">previous
8253 post about sshfs
</a
>. He reported another problem with sshfs. It
8254 fail to handle hard links properly. A simple way to spot this is to
8255 look at the . and .. entries in the directory tree. These should have
8256 a link count
>1, but on sshfs the count is
1. I just tested to see
8257 what happen when trying to hardlink, and this fail as well:
</p
>
8261 ln: creating hard link `bar
' =
> `foo
': Function not implemented
8265 <p
>I have not yet found time to implement a test for this in my file
8266 system test code, but believe having working hard links is useful to
8267 avoid surprised unix programs. Not as useful as working file locking
8268 and symlinks, which are required to get a working desktop, but useful
8269 nevertheless. :)
</p
>
8271 <p
>The latest version of the file system test code is available via
8273 <a href=
"http://github.com/gebi/fs-test
">http://github.com/gebi/fs-test
</a
></p
>
8278 <title>Broken umask handling with sshfs
</title>
8279 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_umask_handling_with_sshfs.html
</link>
8280 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_umask_handling_with_sshfs.html
</guid>
8281 <pubDate>Thu,
26 Aug
2010 13:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8282 <description><p
>My file system sematics program
8283 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html
">presented
8284 a few days ago
</a
> is very useful to verify that a file system can
8285 work as a unix home directory,and today I had to extend it a bit. I
'm
8286 looking into alternatives for home directory access here at the
8287 University of Oslo, and one of the options is sshfs. My friend
8288 Finn-Arne mentioned a while back that they had used sshfs with Debian
8289 Edu, but stopped because of problems. I asked today what the problems
8290 where, and he mentioned that sshfs failed to handle umask properly.
8291 Trying to detect the problem I wrote this addition to my fs testing
8295 mode_t touch_get_mode(const char *name, mode_t mode) {
8297 int fd = open(name, O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_LARGEFILE, mode);
8300 struct stat statbuf;
8301 if (-
1 != fstat(fd,
&statbuf)) {
8302 retval = statbuf.st_mode
& 0x1ff;
8309 /* Try to detect problem discovered using sshfs */
8310 int test_umask(void) {
8311 printf(
"info: testing umask effect on file creation\n
");
8313 mode_t orig_umask = umask(
000);
8315 if (
0666 != (newmode = touch_get_mode(
"foobar
",
0666))) {
8316 printf(
" error: Wrong file mode %o when creating using mode
666 and umask
000\n
",
8320 if (
0660 != (newmode = touch_get_mode(
"foobar
",
0666))) {
8321 printf(
" error: Wrong file mode %o when creating using mode
666 and umask
007\n
",
8329 int main(int argc, char **argv) {
8336 <p
>Sure enough. On NFS to a netapp, I get this result:
</p
>
8339 Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system
8340 info: testing symlink creation
8341 info: testing subdirectory creation
8342 info: testing fcntl locking
8343 Read-locking
1 byte from
1073741824
8344 Read-locking
510 byte from
1073741826
8345 Unlocking
1 byte from
1073741824
8346 Write-locking
1 byte from
1073741824
8347 Write-locking
510 byte from
1073741826
8348 Unlocking
2 byte from
1073741824
8349 info: testing umask effect on file creation
8352 <p
>When mounting the same directory using sshfs, I get this
8356 Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system
8357 info: testing symlink creation
8358 info: testing subdirectory creation
8359 info: testing fcntl locking
8360 Read-locking
1 byte from
1073741824
8361 Read-locking
510 byte from
1073741826
8362 Unlocking
1 byte from
1073741824
8363 Write-locking
1 byte from
1073741824
8364 Write-locking
510 byte from
1073741826
8365 Unlocking
2 byte from
1073741824
8366 info: testing umask effect on file creation
8367 error: Wrong file mode
644 when creating using mode
666 and umask
000
8368 error: Wrong file mode
640 when creating using mode
666 and umask
007
8371 <p
>So, I can conclude that sshfs is better than smb to a Netapp or a
8372 Windows server, but not good enough to be used as a home
8373 directory.
</p
>
8375 <p
>Update
2010-
08-
26: Reported the issue in
8376 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
594498">BTS report #
594498</a
></p
>
8378 <p
>Update
2010-
08-
27: Michael Gebetsroither report that he found the
8379 script so useful that he created a GIT repository and stored it in
8380 <a href=
"http://github.com/gebi/fs-test
">http://github.com/gebi/fs-test
</a
>.
</p
>
8385 <title>Rob Weir: How to Crush Dissent
</title>
8386 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Rob_Weir__How_to_Crush_Dissent.html
</link>
8387 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Rob_Weir__How_to_Crush_Dissent.html
</guid>
8388 <pubDate>Sun,
15 Aug
2010 22:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8389 <description><p
>I found the notes from Rob Weir on
8390 <a href=
"http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~
3/VGb23-kta8c/how-to-crush-dissent.html
">how
8391 to crush dissent
</a
> matching my own thoughts on the matter quite
8392 well. Highly recommended for those wondering which road our society
8393 should go down. In my view we have been heading the wrong way for a
8394 long time.
</p
>
8399 <title>No hardcoded config on Debian Edu clients
</title>
8400 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/No_hardcoded_config_on_Debian_Edu_clients.html
</link>
8401 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/No_hardcoded_config_on_Debian_Edu_clients.html
</guid>
8402 <pubDate>Mon,
9 Aug
2010 20:
15:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8403 <description><p
>As reported earlier, the last few days I have looked at how Debian
8404 Edu clients are configured, and tried to get rid of all hardcoded
8405 configuration settings on the clients. I believe the work to be
8406 mostly done, and the clients seem to work just fine with dynamically
8407 generated configuration.
</p
>
8409 <p
>What is the point, you might ask? The point is to allow a Debian
8410 Edu desktop to integrate into an existing network infrastructure
8411 without any manual configuration.
</p
>
8413 <p
>This is what happens when installing a Debian Edu client here at
8414 the University of Oslo using PXE. With the PXE installation, I am
8415 asked for language (Norwegian Bokmål), locality (Norway) and keyboard
8416 layout (no-latin1), Debian Edu profile (Roaming Workstation), if I
8417 accept to reformat the hard drive (yes), if I want to submit info to
8418 popcon.debian.org (no) and root password (secret). After answering
8419 these questions, the installer goes ahead and does its thing, and
8420 after around
50 minutes it is done. I press enter to finish the
8421 installation, and the machine reboots into KDE. When the machine is
8422 ready and kdm asks for login information, I enter my university
8423 username and password, am told by kdm that a local home directory has
8424 been created and that I must log in again, and finally log in with the
8425 same username and password to the KDE
4.4 desktop. At no point during
8426 this process did it ask for university specific settings, and all the
8427 required configuration was dynamically detected using information
8428 fetched via DHCP and DNS. The roaming workstation is now ready for
8431 <p
>How was this done, you might wonder? First of all, here is the
8432 list of things that need to be configured on the client to get it
8433 working properly out of the box:
</p
>
8436 <li
>IP address/netmask and DNS server.
</li
>
8437 <li
>Web proxy URL.
</li
>
8438 <li
>LDAP server for NSS directory information (user, group, etc).
</li
>
8439 <li
>Kerberos server for PAM password checking.
</li
>
8440 <li
>SMB mount point to access the network home directory. (*)
</li
>
8441 <li
>Central syslog server to send syslog messages to. (*)
</li
>
8442 <li
>Sitesummary collector URL to submit info to central server. (*)
</li
>
8445 <p
>(Hm, did I forget anything? Let me knew if I did.)
</p
>
8447 <p
>The points marked (*) are not required to be able to use the
8448 machine, but needed to provide central storage and allowing system
8449 administrators to track their machines. Since yesterday, everything
8450 but the sitesummary collector URL is dynamically discovered at boot
8451 and installation time in the svn version of Debian Edu.
</p
>
8453 <p
>The IP and DNS setup is fetched during boot using DHCP as usual.
8454 When a DHCP update arrives, the proxy setup is updated by looking for
8455 http://wpat/wpad.dat and using the content of this WPAD file to
8456 configure the http and ftp proxy in /etc/environment and
8457 /etc/apt/apt.conf. I decided to update the proxy setup using a DHCP
8458 hook to ensure that the client stops using the Debian Edu proxy when
8459 it is moved outside the Debian Edu network, and instead uses any local
8460 proxy present on the new network when it moves around.
</p
>
8462 <p
>The DNS names of the LDAP, Kerberos and syslog server and related
8463 configuration are generated using DNS information at boot. First the
8464 installer looks for a host named ldap in the current DNS domain. If
8465 not found, it looks for _ldap._tcp SRV records in DNS instead. If an
8466 LDAP server is found, its root DSE entry is requested and the
8467 attributes namingContexts and defaultNamingContext are used to
8468 determine which LDAP base to use for NSS. If there are several
8469 namingContexts attibutes and the defaultNamingContext is present, that
8470 LDAP subtree is used as the base. If defaultNamingContext is missing,
8471 the subtrees listed as namingContexts are searched in sequence for any
8472 object with class posixAccount or posixGroup, and the first one with
8473 such an object is used as the LDAP base. For Kerberos, a similar
8474 search is done by first looking for a host named kerberos, and then
8475 for the _kerberos._tcp SRV record. I
've been unable to find a way to
8476 look up the Kerberos realm, so for this the upper case string of the
8477 current DNS domain is used.
</p
>
8479 <p
>For the syslog server, the hosts syslog and loghost are searched
8480 for, and the _syslog._udp SRV record is consulted if no such host is
8481 found. This algorithm works for both Debian Edu and the University of
8482 Oslo. A similar strategy would work for locating the sitesummary
8483 server, but have not been implemented yet. I decided to fetch and
8484 save these settings during installation, to make sure moving to a
8485 different network does not change the set of users being allowed to
8486 log in nor the passwords required to log in. Usernames and passwords
8487 will be cached by sssd when the user logs in on the Debian Edu
8488 network, and will not change as the laptop move around. For a
8489 non-roaming machine, there is no caching, but given that it is
8490 supposed to stay in place it should not matter much. Perhaps we
8491 should switch those to use sssd too?
</p
>
8493 <p
>The user
's SMB mount point for the network home directory is
8494 located when the user logs in for the first time. The LDAP server is
8495 consulted to look for the user
's LDAP object and the sambaHomePath
8496 attribute is used if found. If it isn
't found, the home directory
8497 path fetched from NSS is used instead. Assuming the path is of the
8498 form /site/server/directory/username, the second part is looked up in
8499 DNS and used to generate a SMB URL of the form
8500 smb://server.domain/username. This algorithm works for both Debian
8501 edu and the University of Oslo. Perhaps there are better attributes
8502 to use or a better algorithm that works for more sites, but this will
8503 do for now. :)
</p
>
8505 <p
>This work should make it easier to integrate the Debian Edu clients
8506 into any LDAP/Kerberos infrastructure, and make the current setup even
8507 more flexible than before. I suspect it will also work for thin
8508 client servers, allowing one to easily set up LTSP and hook it into a
8509 existing network infrastructure, but I have not had time to test this
8512 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing these things for Debian
8513 Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
8515 <p
>Update
2010-
08-
09: Simon Farnsworth gave me a heads-up on how to
8516 detect Kerberos realm from DNS, by looking for _kerberos TXT entries
8517 before falling back to the upper case DNS domain name. Will have to
8518 implement it for Debian Edu. :)
</p
>
8523 <title>Testing if a file system can be used for home directories...
</title>
8524 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html
</link>
8525 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html
</guid>
8526 <pubDate>Sun,
8 Aug
2010 21:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8527 <description><p
>A few years ago, I was involved in a project planning to use
8528 Windows file servers as home directory servers for Debian
8529 Edu/Skolelinux machines. This was thought to be no problem, as the
8530 access would be through the SMB network file system protocol, and we
8531 knew other sites used SMB with unix and samba as the file server to
8532 mount home directories without any problems. But, after months of
8533 struggling, we had to conclude that our goal was impossible.
</p
>
8535 <p
>The reason is simply that while SMB can be used for home
8536 directories when the file server is Samba running on Unix, this only
8537 work because of Samba have some extensions and the fact that the
8538 underlying file system is a unix file system. When using a Windows
8539 file server, the underlying file system do not have POSIX semantics,
8540 and several programs will fail if the users home directory where they
8541 want to store their configuration lack POSIX semantics.
</p
>
8543 <p
>As part of this work, I wrote a small C program I want to share
8544 with you all, to replicate a few of the problematic applications (like
8545 OpenOffice.org and GCompris) and see if the file system was working as
8546 it should. If you find yourself in spooky file system land, it might
8547 help you find your way out again. This is the fs-test.c source:
</p
>
8551 * Some tests to check the file system sematics. Used to verify that
8552 * CIFS from a windows server do not work properly as a linux home
8554 * License: GPL v2 or later
8556 * needs libsqlite3-dev and build-essential installed
8557 * compile with: gcc -Wall -lsqlite3 -DTEST_SQLITE fs-test.c -o fs-test
8560 #define _FILE_OFFSET_BITS
64
8561 #define _LARGEFILE_SOURCE
1
8562 #define _LARGEFILE64_SOURCE
1
8564 #define _GNU_SOURCE /* for asprintf() */
8566 #include
&lt;errno.h
>
8567 #include
&lt;fcntl.h
>
8568 #include
&lt;stdio.h
>
8569 #include
&lt;string.h
>
8570 #include
&lt;stdlib.h
>
8571 #include
&lt;sys/file.h
>
8572 #include
&lt;sys/stat.h
>
8573 #include
&lt;sys/types.h
>
8574 #include
&lt;unistd.h
>
8578 * Test sqlite open, as done by gcompris require the libsqlite3-dev
8579 * package and linking with -lsqlite3. A more low level test is
8581 * See also
&lt;URL: http://www.sqlite.org./faq.html#q5
>.
8583 #include
&lt;sqlite3.h
>
8584 #define CREATE_TABLE_USERS \
8585 "CREATE TABLE users (user_id INT UNIQUE, login TEXT, lastname TEXT, firstname TEXT, birthdate TEXT, class_id INT );
"
8586 int test_sqlite_open(void) {
8588 char *name =
"testsqlite.db
";
8591 int rc = sqlite3_open(name,
&db);
8593 printf(
"error: sqlite open of %s failed: %s\n
", name, sqlite3_errmsg(db));
8599 rc = sqlite3_exec(db,CREATE_TABLE_USERS, NULL,
0,
&zErrMsg);
8600 if( rc != SQLITE_OK ){
8601 printf(
"error: sqlite table create failed: %s\n
", zErrMsg);
8605 printf(
"info: sqlite worked\n
");
8609 #endif /* TEST_SQLITE */
8612 * Demonstrate locking issue found in gcompris using sqlite3. This
8613 * work with ext3, but not with cifs server on Windows
2003. This is
8614 * done in the sqlite3 library.
8616 *
&lt;URL:http://www.cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/
2001-
08/msg00854.html
> and the
8617 * POSIX specification
8618 *
&lt;URL:http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/
009695399/functions/fcntl.html
>.
8620 int test_gcompris_locking(void) {
8622 char *name =
"testsqlite.db
";
8624 int fd = open(name, O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_LARGEFILE,
0644);
8625 printf(
"info: testing fcntl locking\n
");
8627 fl.l_whence = SEEK_SET;
8628 fl.l_pid = getpid();
8629 printf(
" Read-locking
1 byte from
1073741824");
8630 fl.l_start =
1073741824;
8632 fl.l_type = F_RDLCK;
8633 if (
0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK,
&fl) ) printf(
" - error!\n
"); else printf(
"\n
");
8635 printf(
" Read-locking
510 byte from
1073741826");
8636 fl.l_start =
1073741826;
8638 fl.l_type = F_RDLCK;
8639 if (
0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK,
&fl) ) printf(
" - error!\n
"); else printf(
"\n
");
8641 printf(
" Unlocking
1 byte from
1073741824");
8642 fl.l_start =
1073741824;
8644 fl.l_type = F_UNLCK;
8645 if (
0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK,
&fl) ) printf(
" - error!\n
"); else printf(
"\n
");
8647 printf(
" Write-locking
1 byte from
1073741824");
8648 fl.l_start =
1073741824;
8650 fl.l_type = F_WRLCK;
8651 if (
0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK,
&fl) ) printf(
" - error!\n
"); else printf(
"\n
");
8653 printf(
" Write-locking
510 byte from
1073741826");
8654 fl.l_start =
1073741826;
8656 if (
0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK,
&fl) ) printf(
" - error!\n
"); else printf(
"\n
");
8658 printf(
" Unlocking
2 byte from
1073741824");
8659 fl.l_start =
1073741824;
8661 fl.l_type = F_UNLCK;
8662 if (
0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK,
&fl) ) printf(
" - error!\n
"); else printf(
"\n
");
8669 * Test if permissions of freshly created directories allow entries
8670 * below them. This was a problem with OpenOffice.org and gcompris.
8671 * Mounting with option
'sync
' seem to solve this problem while
8672 * slowing down file operations.
8674 int test_subdirectory_creation(void) {
8676 char *path = strdup(
"test
");
8679 printf(
"info: testing subdirectory creation\n
");
8680 for (level =
0; level
&lt; LEVELS; level++) {
8681 char *newpath = NULL;
8682 if (-
1 == mkdir(path,
0777)) {
8683 printf(
" error: Unable to create directory
'%s
': %s\n
",
8684 path, strerror(errno));
8687 asprintf(
&newpath,
"%s/%s
", path,
"test
");
8695 * Test if symlinks can be created. This was a problem detected with
8698 int test_symlinks(void) {
8699 printf(
"info: testing symlink creation\n
");
8700 unlink(
"symlink
");
8701 if (-
1 == symlink(
"file
",
"symlink
"))
8702 printf(
" error: Unable to create symlink\n
");
8706 int main(int argc, char **argv) {
8707 printf(
"Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system\n
");
8709 test_subdirectory_creation();
8712 #endif /* TEST_SQLITE */
8713 test_gcompris_locking();
8718 <p
>When everything is working, it should print something like
8722 Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system
8723 info: testing symlink creation
8724 info: testing subdirectory creation
8726 info: testing fcntl locking
8727 Read-locking
1 byte from
1073741824
8728 Read-locking
510 byte from
1073741826
8729 Unlocking
1 byte from
1073741824
8730 Write-locking
1 byte from
1073741824
8731 Write-locking
510 byte from
1073741826
8732 Unlocking
2 byte from
1073741824
8735 <p
>I do not remember the exact details of the problems we saw, but one
8736 of them was with locking, where if I remember correctly, POSIX allow a
8737 read-only lock to be upgraded to a read-write lock without unlocking
8738 the read-only lock (while Windows do not). Another was a bug in the
8739 CIFS/SMB client implementation in the Linux kernel where directory
8740 meta information would be wrong for a fraction of a second, making
8741 OpenOffice.org fail to create its deep directory tree because it was
8742 not allowed to create files in its freshly created directory.
</p
>
8744 <p
>Anyway, here is a nice tool for your tool box, might you never need
8747 <p
>Update
2010-
08-
27: Michael Gebetsroither report that he found the
8748 script so useful that he created a GIT repository and stored it in
8749 <a href=
"http://github.com/gebi/fs-test
">http://github.com/gebi/fs-test
</a
>.
</p
>
8754 <title>Autodetecting Client setup for roaming workstations in Debian Edu
</title>
8755 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Autodetecting_Client_setup_for_roaming_workstations_in_Debian_Edu.html
</link>
8756 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Autodetecting_Client_setup_for_roaming_workstations_in_Debian_Edu.html
</guid>
8757 <pubDate>Sat,
7 Aug
2010 14:
45:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8758 <description><p
>A few days ago, I
8759 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_roaming_workstation___at_the_university_of_Oslo.html
">tried
8760 to install
</a
> a Roaming workation profile from Debian Edu/Squeeze
8761 while on the university network here at the University of Oslo, and
8762 noticed how much had to change to get it operational using the
8763 university infrastructure. It was fairly easy, but it occured to me
8764 that Debian Edu would improve a lot if I could get the client to
8765 connect without any changes at all, and thus let the client configure
8766 itself during installation and first boot to use the infrastructure
8767 around it. Now I am a huge step further along that road.
</p
>
8769 <p
>With our current squeeze-test packages, I can select the roaming
8770 workstation profile and get a working laptop connecting to the
8771 university LDAP server for user and group and our active directory
8772 servers for Kerberos authentication. All this without any
8773 configuration at all during installation. My users home directory got
8774 a bookmark in the KDE menu to mount it via SMB, with the correct URL.
8775 In short, openldap and sssd is correctly configured. In addition to
8776 this, the client look for http://wpad/wpad.dat to configure a web
8777 proxy, and when it fail to find it no proxy settings are stored in
8778 /etc/environment and /etc/apt/apt.conf. Iceweasel and KDE is
8779 configured to look for the same wpad configuration and also do not use
8780 a proxy when at the university network. If the machine is moved to a
8781 network with such wpad setup, it would automatically use it when DHCP
8782 gave it a IP address.
</p
>
8784 <p
>The LDAP server is located using DNS, by first looking for the DNS
8785 entry ldap.$domain. If this do not exist, it look for the
8786 _ldap._tcp.$domain SRV records and use the first one as the LDAP
8787 server. Next, it connects to the LDAP server and search all
8788 namingContexts entries for posixAccount or posixGroup objects, and
8789 pick the first one as the LDAP base. For Kerberos, a similar
8790 algorithm is used to locate the LDAP server, and the realm is the
8791 uppercase version of $domain.
</p
>
8793 <p
>So, what is not working, you might ask. SMB mounting my home
8794 directory do not work. No idea why, but suspected the incorrect
8795 Kerberos settings in /etc/krb5.conf and /etc/samba/smb.conf might be
8796 the cause. These are not properly configured during installation, and
8797 had to be hand-edited to get the correct Kerberos realm and server,
8798 but SMB mounting still do not work. :(
</p
>
8800 <p
>With this automatic configuration in place, I expect a Debian Edu
8801 roaming profile installation would be able to automatically detect and
8802 connect to any site using LDAP and Kerberos for NSS directory and PAM
8803 authentication. It should also work out of the box in a Active
8804 Directory environment providing posixAccount and posixGroup objects
8805 with UID and GID values.
</p
>
8807 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing these things for Debian
8808 Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
8813 <title>Debian Edu roaming workstation - at the university of Oslo
</title>
8814 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_roaming_workstation___at_the_university_of_Oslo.html
</link>
8815 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_roaming_workstation___at_the_university_of_Oslo.html
</guid>
8816 <pubDate>Tue,
3 Aug
2010 23:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8817 <description><p
>The new roaming workstation profile in Debian Edu/Squeeze is fairly
8818 similar to the laptop setup am I working on using Ubuntu for the
8819 University of Oslo, and just for the heck of it, I tested today how
8820 hard it would be to integrate that profile into the university
8821 infrastructure. In this case, it is the university LDAP server,
8822 Active Directory Kerberos server and SMB mounting from the Netapp file
8825 <p
>I was pleasantly surprised that the only three files needed to be
8826 changed (/etc/sssd/sssd.conf, /etc/ldap.conf and
8827 /etc/mklocaluser.d/
20-debian-edu-config) and one file had to be added
8828 (/usr/share/perl5/Debian/Edu_Local.pm), to get the client working.
8829 Most of the changes were to get the client to use the university LDAP
8830 for NSS and Kerberos server for PAM, but one was to change a hard
8831 coded DNS domain name in the mklocaluser hook from .intern to
8834 <p
>This testing was so encouraging, that I went ahead and adjusted the
8835 Debian Edu scripts and setup in subversion to centralise the roaming
8836 workstation setup a bit more and avoid the hardcoded DNS domain name,
8837 so that when I test this tomorrow, I expect to get away with modifying
8838 only /etc/sssd/sssd.conf and /etc/ldap.conf to get it to use the
8839 university servers.
</p
>
8841 <p
>My goal is to get the clients to have no hardcoded settings and
8842 fetch all their initial setup during installation and first boot, to
8843 allow them to be inserted also into environments where the default
8844 setup in Debian Edu has been changed or as with the university, where
8845 the environment is different but provides the protocols Debian Edu
8851 <title>Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery
</title>
8852 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html
</link>
8853 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html
</guid>
8854 <pubDate>Tue,
27 Jul
2010 23:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8855 <description><p
>I discovered this while doing
8856 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html
">automated
8857 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze
</a
>. A few packages
8858 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
8859 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
8860 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.
</p
>
8862 <p
>An example is from todays
8863 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-
20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt
">upgrade
8864 of KDE using aptitude
</a
>. In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
8865 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade. The cause is simple. If a
8866 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
8867 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
8868 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
8869 because its dependencies are unavailable.
</p
>
8871 <p
>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:
</p
>
8873 <blockquote
><pre
>
8874 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
8875 perl-modules depends on perl (
>=
5.10.1-
1); however:
8876 Version of perl on system is
5.10.0-
19lenny
2.
8877 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
8878 dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
8879 </pre
></blockquote
>
8881 <p
>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
8882 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
527917">reported as a bug
</a
>, and will
8883 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
8884 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
8885 failures. Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
8886 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
8887 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
8888 of dependency loops.
</p
>
8891 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/
2010/
06/msg00116.html
">the
8892 tireless effort by Bill Allombert
</a
>, the number of circular
8894 <a href=
"http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html
">left in Debian
8895 is dropping
</a
>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)
</p
>
8897 <p
>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
8898 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
590605">update-notifier
</a
> and
8899 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
590604">different behaviour
</a
> between
8900 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
8901 dependency. Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
8907 <title>First Debian Edu test release (alpha0) based on Squeeze is released
</title>
8908 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Debian_Edu_test_release__alpha0__based_on_Squeeze_is_released.html
</link>
8909 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Debian_Edu_test_release__alpha0__based_on_Squeeze_is_released.html
</guid>
8910 <pubDate>Tue,
27 Jul
2010 17:
45:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
8911 <description><p
>I just posted this announcement culminating several months of work
8912 with the next Debian Edu release. Not nearly done, but one major step
8913 completed.
</p
>
8916 <p
>This is the first test release based on Squeeze. The focus of this
8917 release is to test the user application selection. To have a look,
8918 install the standalone profile and let the developers know if the set
8919 of installed packages i.e. applications should be modified. If some
8920 user application is missing, or if there are some applications that no
8921 longer make sense to be included in Debian Edu, please let us know.
8922 Also, if a useful application is missing the translation for your
8923 language of choice, please let us know too.
</p
>
8925 <p
>In addition, feedback and help to polish the desktop (menus,
8926 artwork, starters, etc.) is appreciated. We would like to ship a nice
8927 and handy KDE4 desktop targeted for schools out of the box.
</p
>
8929 <p
>The other profiles should be installable, but there is a lot more
8930 work left to be done before they are ready, so do not expect to
8933 <p
>Changes compared to the lenny based version
</p
>
8936 <li
>Everything from Debian Squeeze
8938 <li
>Desktop environment KDE
4.4 =
> the new KDE desktop in
8939 combination with some new artwork
8940 <li
>Web browser Iceweasel
3.5
8941 <li
>OpenOffice.org
3.2
8942 <li
>Educational toolbox GCompris
9.3
8943 <li
>Music creator Rosegarden
10.04.2
8944 <li
>Image editor Gimp
2.6.10
8945 <li
>Virtual universe Celestia
1.6.0
8946 <li
>Virtual stargazer Stellarium
0.10.4
8947 <li
>3D modeler Blender
2.49.2 (new application)
8948 <li
>Video editor Kdenlive
0.7.7 (new application)
8949 </ul
></li
>
8950 <li
>Now using Kerberos for password checking (migration not finished).
8956 <li
>SMTP (sender verification)
8959 <li
>New experimental roaming workstation profile for laptops.
</li
>
8960 <li
>Show welcome page to users when they first log in. The URL is
8961 fetched from LDAP.
</li
>
8962 <li
>New LXDE desktop option, in addition to KDE (default) and Gnome.
</li
>
8963 <li
>General cleanup (not finished)
</li
>
8965 <p
>The following features are not working as they should
</p
>
8968 <li
>No web based administration tool for creating users and groups. The
8969 scripts ldap-createuser-krb and ldap-add-user-to-group can be used
8970 for testing.
</li
>
8971 <li
>DVD installs are missing debian-installer images for the PXE boot,
8972 and do not set up the PXE menu on eth0 because of this. LTSP
8973 clients should still boot from eth1 on thin client servers.
</li
>
8974 <li
>The restructured KDE menu is not implemented.
</li
>
8975 <li
>The LDAP server setup need to be reviewed for security.
</li
>
8976 <li
>The LDAP directory structure need to be reworked.
</li
>
8977 <li
>Different sets of packages are installed when using the DVD and the
8978 netinst CD. More packages are installed using the netinst CD.
</li
>
8979 <li
>The jackd package fail to install. This is believed to be caused by
8980 some ongoing transition, and hopefully should be solved soon. The
8981 jackd1 package can be installed manually for those that need it.
</li
>
8982 <li
>Some packages lack translations. See
8983 http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Squeeze for updated status,
8984 and help out with translations.
</li
>
8987 <p
>To download this multiarch netinstall release you can use
</p
>
8990 <li
><a href=
"ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso
">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso
</a
></li
>
8991 <li
><a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso
">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso
</a
></li
>
8992 <li
>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso
</li
>
8994 <p
>To download this multiarch dvd release you can use
</p
>
8997 <li
><a href=
"ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso
">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso
</a
></li
>
8998 <li
><a href=
"http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso
">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso
</a
></li
>
8999 <li
>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso
</li
>
9002 <p
>There is no source DVD available yet. It will be prepared when we
9003 get closer to the final release.
</p
>
9005 <p
>The MD5SUM of these images are
</p
>
9008 <li
>3dbf45d59f42a53518b6e3c9ec3b5eb6 debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso
</li
>
9009 <li
>22f2cbfce281d1c6e478be452638675d debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso
</li
>
9012 <p
>The SHA1SUM of these images are
</p
>
9014 <li
>c53d1b69b40cf37cd27aefaf33f6f6a3821bedf0 debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso
</li
>
9015 <li
>2ec29d7db676d59d32197b05c277ffe16348376c debian-edu-
6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso
</li
>
9017 <p
>How to report bugs:
9018 http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugsInBugzilla
</p
>
9020 <p
>Please direct replies to debian-edu@lists.debian.org
</p
>
9026 <title>One step closer to single signon in Debian Edu
</title>
9027 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/One_step_closer_to_single_signon_in_Debian_Edu.html
</link>
9028 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/One_step_closer_to_single_signon_in_Debian_Edu.html
</guid>
9029 <pubDate>Sun,
25 Jul
2010 10:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9030 <description><p
>The last few months me and the other Debian Edu developers have
9031 been working hard to get the Debian/Squeeze based version of Debian
9032 Edu/Skolelinux into shape. This future version will use Kerberos for
9033 authentication, and services are slowly migrated to single signon,
9034 getting rid of password questions one at the time.
</p
>
9036 <p
>It will also feature a roaming workstation profile with local home
9037 directory, for laptops that are only some times on the Skolelinux
9038 network, and for this profile a shortcut is created in Gnome and KDE
9039 to gain access to the users home directory on the file server. This
9040 shortcut uses SMB at the moment, and yesterday I had time to test if
9041 SMB mounting had started working in KDE after we added the cifs-utils
9042 package. I was pleasantly surprised how well it worked.
</p
>
9044 <p
>Thanks to the recent changes to our samba configuration to get it
9045 to use Kerberos for authentication, there were no question about user
9046 password when mounting the SMB volume. A simple click on the shortcut
9047 in the KDE menu, and a window with the home directory popped
9050 <p
>One step closer to a single signon solution out of the box in
9051 Debian Edu. We already had PAM, LDAP, IMAP and SMTP in place, and now
9052 also Samba. Next step is Cups and hopefully also NFS.
</p
>
9054 <p
>We had planned a alpha0 release of Debian Edu for today, but thanks
9055 to the autobuilder administrators for some architectures being slow to
9056 sign packages, we are still missing the fixed LTSP package we need for
9057 the release. It was uploaded three days ago with urgency=high, and if
9058 it had entered testing yesterday we would have been able to test it in
9059 time for a alpha0 release today. As the binaries for ia64 and powerpc
9060 still not uploaded to the Debian archive, we need to delay the alpha
9061 release another day.
</p
>
9063 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing Kerberos for Debian Edu,
9064 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
9069 <title>OpenStreetmap one step closer to having routing on its front page
</title>
9070 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenStreetmap_one_step_closer_to_having_routing_on_its_front_page.html
</link>
9071 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenStreetmap_one_step_closer_to_having_routing_on_its_front_page.html
</guid>
9072 <pubDate>Sun,
18 Jul
2010 16:
45:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9073 <description><p
>Thanks to
9074 <a href=
"http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Opengeodata/~
3/wUTCzDZk3lc/project-of-the-week-which-way-home
">todays
9075 opengeodata blog entry
</a
>, I just discovered that the
9076 OpenStreetmap.org site have gotten
9077 <a href=
"http://nroets.dev.openstreetmap.org/demo/index.html?layers=B000FTFTT
">support
9078 for calculating routes
</a
>. The support is still experimental and
9079 only available from the development server, until more experience is
9080 gathered on the user interface and any scalability issues.
</p
>
9082 <p
>Earlier, the routing I knew about using the OpenStreetmap.org data
9083 was provided by
<a href=
"http://maps.cloudmade.com/
">Cloudmade
</a
>,
9084 but having it on the main page is required to make everyone aware of
9085 the issue. I
've had people reject Openstreetmap.org as a viable
9086 alternative for them because the front page lacked routing support,
9087 and I hope their needs will be catered for when routing show up on the
9088 www.openstreetmap.org front page.
</p
>
9093 <title>What are they searching for - PowerDNS and ISC DHCP in LDAP
</title>
9094 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_are_they_searching_for___PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_in_LDAP.html
</link>
9095 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_are_they_searching_for___PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_in_LDAP.html
</guid>
9096 <pubDate>Sat,
17 Jul
2010 21:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9097 <description><p
>This is a
9098 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html
">followup
</a
>
9100 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_a_change_to_LDAP_schemas_allowing_DNS_and_DHCP_info_to_be_combined_into_one_object.html
">previous
9102 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html
">merging
9103 all
</a
> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.
</p
>
9105 <p
>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
9106 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
9107 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server. The two
9108 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.
</p
>
9110 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
9111 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
9112 on a Debian Edu main-server. Here is a summary.
9114 <p
><strong
>powerdns
</strong
></p
>
9116 <a href=
"http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend
">Clues
9117 on how to
</a
> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
9120 <p
>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
9121 One
"strict
" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
9122 using the same LDAP objects, and a
"tree
" mode where the forward and
9123 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
9124 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
9125 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.
</p
>
9127 <p
>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
9128 base, and uses a
"base
" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
9129 "dc=tjener,dc=intern,
" to the base with a filter for
9130 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)
" for the forward entry and
9131 "dc=
2,dc=
2,dc=
0,dc=
10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,
" with a filter for
9132 "(associateddomain=
2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)
" for the reverse entry. For
9133 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
9134 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
9135 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
9136 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
9137 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
9138 spfrecord and modifytimestamp. For reverse entries it is looking for
9139 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
9140 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
9141 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp. The equivalent
9142 ldapsearch commands could look like this:
</p
>
9144 <blockquote
><pre
>
9145 ldapsearch -h ldap \
9146 -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
9147 -s base -x
'(associateddomain=tjener.intern)
' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
9148 cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
9149 rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
9150 nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
9151 rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
9153 ldapsearch -h ldap \
9154 -b dc=
2,dc=
2,dc=
0,dc=
10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
9155 -s base -x
'(associateddomain=
2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)
'
9156 dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
9157 hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
9158 srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
9159 </pre
></blockquote
>
9161 <p
>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
9162 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
9163 example LDAP objects used there. In addition to these objects, the
9164 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9165 also exist.
</p
>
9167 <blockquote
><pre
>
9168 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9170 objectclass: dnsdomain
9171 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
9174 associateddomain: tjener.intern
9176 dn: dc=
2,dc=
2,dc=
0,dc=
10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9178 objectclass: dnsdomain2
9179 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
9181 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
9182 associateddomain:
2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
9183 </pre
></blockquote
>
9185 <p
>In strict mode, the server behaves differently. When looking for
9186 forward DNS entries, it is doing a
"subtree
" scoped search with the
9187 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
9188 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)
" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
9189 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
9190 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
9191 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp. For reverse entires it also do a
9192 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is
"(arecord=
10.0.2.2)
"
9193 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
9194 modifytimestamp. In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
9195 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
9198 <p
>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
9199 like this:
</p
>
9201 <blockquote
><pre
>
9202 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
9203 '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)
' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
9204 cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
9205 rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
9206 nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
9207 rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
9209 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
9210 '(arecord=
10.0.2.2)
' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
9211 </pre
></blockquote
>
9213 <p
>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
9214 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
9215 reverse lookups.
</p
>
9217 <p
>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
9218 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
9219 need to generate a DNS reply. This make it able to work with any
9220 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.
</p
>
9222 <p
>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC
1274) and
9223 dnsdomain2 schemas. The latter is used for reverse entries like
9224 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.
</p
>
9226 <p
>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
9227 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
9228 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain). The use
9229 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
9230 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.
</p
>
9232 <p
>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
9233 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
9234 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
9235 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
9236 (zonename and relativedomainname).
</p
>
9238 <p
>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
9239 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
9240 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
9241 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
9242 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
9243 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):
</p
>
9245 <blockquote
><pre
>
9246 objectclass ( some-oid NAME
'dnsDomainAux
'
9249 MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
9250 DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
9251 TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
9252 NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
9253 A6Record $ DNAMERecord
9255 </pre
></blockquote
>
9257 <p
>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
9258 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
9259 all the attributes PowerDNS wants. I
've sent an email to the PowerDNS
9260 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
9261 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
9262 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.
</p
>
9264 <p
><strong
>ISC dhcp
</strong
></p
>
9266 <p
>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
9267 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want. This
9268 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
9269 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
9270 what is needed without having to read the source code.
</p
>
9272 <p
>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
9273 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
9274 stored. These are the relevant entries from
9275 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:
</p
>
9277 <blockquote
><pre
>
9278 ldap-base-dn
"dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
";
9279 ldap-dhcp-server-cn
"dhcp
";
9280 </pre
></blockquote
>
9282 <p
>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
9283 configuration it need. The cn
"dhcp
" is located using the given LDAP
9284 base and the filter
"(
&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))
". The
9285 search result is this entry:
</p
>
9287 <blockquote
><pre
>
9288 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9291 objectClass: dhcpServer
9292 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9293 </pre
></blockquote
>
9295 <p
>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
9296 subtree with DHCP configuration. The DHCP configuration subtree base
9297 is located using a base scope search with base
"cn=DHCP
9298 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
" and filter
9299 "(
&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))
".
9300 The search result is this entry:
</p
>
9302 <blockquote
><pre
>
9303 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9306 objectClass: dhcpService
9307 objectClass: dhcpOptions
9308 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9309 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
9310 dhcpStatements: authoritative
9311 dhcpOption: smtp-server code
69 = array of ip-address
9312 dhcpOption: www-server code
72 = array of ip-address
9313 dhcpOption: wpad-url code
252 = text
9314 </pre
></blockquote
>
9316 <p
>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time. When
9317 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
9318 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
9319 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
9320 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost. These provide options
9321 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc. Leaving out the
9322 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
9323 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
9324 related computer objects.
</p
>
9326 <p
>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
9327 of the client (
00:
00:
00:
00:
00:
00 in this example), using a subtree
9328 scoped search with
"cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
" as
9329 the base and
"(
&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
9330 00:
00:
00:
00:
00:
00))
" as the filter. This is what a host object look
9333 <blockquote
><pre
>
9334 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9337 objectClass: dhcpHost
9338 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet
00:
00:
00:
00:
00:
00
9339 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
9340 </pre
></blockquote
>
9342 <p
>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
9343 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
9344 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure. On the
9345 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
9346 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries. The latter should make
9347 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
9348 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
9349 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
9350 structural object class.
9352 <p
><strong
>Conclusion
</strong
></p
>
9354 <p
>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
9355 to which LDAP schemas to use. While its
"tree
" mode is rigid when it
9356 come to the the LDAP structure, the
"strict
" mode is very flexible,
9357 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
9358 in the configuration.
</p
>
9360 <p
>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
9361 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
9362 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
9363 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
9364 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
9365 structure.
</p
>
9367 <p
>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
9368 this might work for Debian Edu:
</p
>
9370 <blockquote
><pre
>
9372 cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
9373 cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
9374 cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
9375 cn=
10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
9376 cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
9377 cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
9378 cn=
192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
9379 cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
9380 ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
9381 cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
9382 </pre
></blockquote
>
9384 <P
>This is not tested yet. If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
9385 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
9386 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
9387 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.
</p
>
9389 <p
>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
9390 like this:
</p
>
9392 <blockquote
><pre
>
9393 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9396 objectClass: dhcpHost
9397 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
9398 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
9399 associateddomain: hostname.intern
9400 arecord:
10.11.12.13
9401 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet
00:
00:
00:
00:
00:
00
9402 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
9403 </pre
></blockquote
>
9405 </p
>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
9406 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
9407 auxiliary object class.
</p
>
9412 <title>Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects
</title>
9413 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html
</link>
9414 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html
</guid>
9415 <pubDate>Wed,
14 Jul
2010 23:
45:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9416 <description><p
>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
9417 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
9418 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
9419 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
9420 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.
</p
>
9422 <p
>I
've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
9423 information finally found a solution that seem to work.
</p
>
9425 <p
>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
9426 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry. If
9427 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
9428 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
9429 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
9430 to a slave DNS server.
</p
>
9432 <p
>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
9433 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
9434 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
9435 I
've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
9436 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup. It
9437 seem to work.
</p
>
9439 <p
>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
9440 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
9441 an earlier email. The combined LDAP object will look something like
9444 <blockquote
><pre
>
9445 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9447 objectClass: dhcphost
9448 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
9449 objectclass: dnsdomainaux
9450 associateddomain: hostname.intern
9451 arecord:
10.11.12.13
9452 dhcphwaddress: ethernet
00:
00:
00:
00:
00:
00
9453 dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
9455 </pre
></blockquote
>
9457 <p
>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
9458 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
9459 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress. LTSP will use
9460 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.
</p
>
9462 <p
>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
9463 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
9464 outside the
"DHCP Config
" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
9465 that. If I can
't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
9466 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
9467 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
9468 content. I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
9469 might be a good place to put it.
</p
>
9471 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
9472 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
9477 <title>Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP
</title>
9478 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html
</link>
9479 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html
</guid>
9480 <pubDate>Sun,
11 Jul
2010 22:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9481 <description><p
>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
9482 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
9483 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
9484 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.
</p
>
9486 <p
>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
9487 to get configuration from LDAP. The idea is to look up the MAC
9488 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
9489 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
9490 LTSP clients.
</p
>
9492 <p
>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
9493 in a
"computer
" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
9494 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.
</p
>
9496 <p
>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
9497 this approach. A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
9498 need to be written. Comments, suggestions, etc?
</p
>
9500 <blockquote
><pre
>
9501 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
9503 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
9505 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
9506 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
9507 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
9509 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
9510 # existence of attribute names.
9512 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
9513 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
9514 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
9516 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
9517 # configuration settings. Something like this should work:
9519 # objectclass (
1.1.2.2 NAME
'ltspClientAux
'
9522 # MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
9524 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
9525 if [
"$LDAPSERVER
" ] ; then
9526 LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
9527 for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk
'{print $
5}
'|sort -u) ; do
9528 filter=
"(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))
"
9529 ldapsearch -h
"$LDAPSERVER
" -b
"$LDAPBASE
" -v -x
"$filter
" | \
9530 grep
'^ltspConfig
' | while read attr value ; do
9531 # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
9532 attr=$(echo $attr | sed
's/^ltspConfig//i
' | tr a-z A-Z)
9533 # bass value on to clients
9534 eval
"$attr=$value; export $attr
"
9538 </pre
></blockquote
>
9540 <p
>I
'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
9541 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
9542 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
9543 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
9544 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)
</p
>
9546 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
9547 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
9549 <p
>Update
2010-
07-
17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
9550 configuration in LDAP that was created around year
2000 by
9551 <a href=
"http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html
">PC
9552 Xperience, Inc.,
2000</a
>. I found its
9553 <a href=
"http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/
">files
</a
> on a
9554 personal home page over at redhat.com.
</p
>
9559 <title>jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI
</title>
9560 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html
</link>
9561 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html
</guid>
9562 <pubDate>Fri,
9 Jul
2010 12:
55:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9563 <description><p
>Since
9564 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html
">my
9565 last post
</a
> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
9566 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma. The java application
9567 <a href=
"http://jxplorer.org/
">jXplorer
</a
> is claimed to be capable of
9568 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
9569 authenticate using Kerberos. I have only tested the Kerberos
9570 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
9571 LDAP with my test user yet. It is
9572 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html
">available in
9573 Debian
</a
> testing and unstable at the moment. The only problem I
9574 have with it is how it handle errors. If something go wrong, its
9575 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
9576 and remove the failing query. Nothing big, but very annoying.
</p
>
9581 <title>Lenny-
>Squeeze upgrades, apt vs aptitude with the Gnome desktop
</title>
9582 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_desktop.html
</link>
9583 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_desktop.html
</guid>
9584 <pubDate>Sat,
3 Jul
2010 23:
55:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9585 <description><p
>Here is a short update on my
<a
9586 href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/
">my
9587 Debian Lenny-
>Squeeze upgrade testing
</a
>. Here is a summary of the
9588 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude. I
'm
9589 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
9590 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
9591 (
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
584861">#
584861</a
> and
9592 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
585716">#
585716</a
>).
</p
>
9594 <p
>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
9595 complete list of the installed packages. Based on this I see these
9596 differences when I did a test run today. As usual, I do not really
9597 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
9598 publish the difference.
</p
>
9600 <p
>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude
</p
>
9602 <blockquote
><p
>
9603 at-spi cpp-
4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
9604 libatspi1.0-
0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-
1-common
9605 libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
9606 libgtksourceview-common libpt-
1.10.10-plugins-alsa
9607 libpt-
1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
9608 libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
9609 python-
4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
9610 python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
9611 </p
></blockquote
>
9613 <p
>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
</p
>
9615 <blockquote
><p
>
9616 bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
9617 gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
9618 libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-
50
9619 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-
11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
9620 libdirectfb-
1.0-
0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-
6 libedataserver1.2-
9
9621 libeel2-
2.20 libepc-
1.0-
1 libepc-ui-
1.0-
1 libexchange-storage1.2-
3
9622 libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-
3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
9623 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-
0 libgksuui1.0-
1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-
2
9624 libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-
1 libgnomeprint2.2-
0
9625 libgnomeprintui2.2-
0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-
0
9626 libgtksourceview1.0-
0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
9627 libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++
10
9628 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
9629 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-
2.2 libosp5
9630 libparted1.8-
10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
9631 libpt-
1.10.10 libraw1394-
8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-
8
9632 libssh2-
1 libsuitesparse-
3.1.0 libswfdec-
0.6-
90 libtalloc1
9633 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
9634 libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
9635 mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
9636 </p
></blockquote
>
9638 <p
>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get
</p
>
9640 <blockquote
><p
>
9641 gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
9642 python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
9643 xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
9644 xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
9645 xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
9646 xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
9647 xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
9648 xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
9649 xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
9650 xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
9651 xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
9652 xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
9653 xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
9654 xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
9655 xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
9656 xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
9657 xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
9658 xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
9659 xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
9660 xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
9661 xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
9662 </p
></blockquote
>
9664 <p
>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get
</p
>
9666 <blockquote
><p
>
9667 deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
9668 xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
9669 xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
9670 </p
></blockquote
>
9672 <p
>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
9673 <a href=
"http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=
9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120
">changed
9674 in git
</a
> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
9675 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
9676 the difference somewhat.
9681 <title>Caching password, user and group on a roaming Debian laptop
</title>
9682 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Caching_password__user_and_group_on_a_roaming_Debian_laptop.html
</link>
9683 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Caching_password__user_and_group_on_a_roaming_Debian_laptop.html
</guid>
9684 <pubDate>Thu,
1 Jul
2010 11:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9685 <description><p
>For a laptop, centralized user directories and password checking is
9686 a bit troubling. Laptops are typically used also when not connected
9687 to the network, and it is vital for a user to be able to log in or
9688 unlock the screen saver also when a central server is unavailable.
9689 This is possible by caching passwords and directory information (user
9690 and group attributes) locally, and the packages to do so are available
9691 in Debian. Here follow two recipes to set this up in Debian/Squeeze.
9692 It is also possible to set up in Debian/Lenny, but require more manual
9693 setup there because pam-auth-update is missing in Lenny.
</p
>
9695 <h2
>LDAP/Kerberos + nscd + libpam-ccreds + libpam-mklocaluser/pam_mkhomedir
</h2
>
9697 This is the traditional method with a twist. The password caching is
9698 provided by libpam-ccreds (version
10-
4 or later is needed on
9699 Squeeze), and the directory caching is done by nscd. The directory
9700 lookup and password checking is done using LDAP. If one want to use
9701 Kerberos for password checking the libpam-ldapd package can be
9702 replaced with libpam-krb5 or libpam-heimdal. If one is happy having a
9703 local home directory with the path listed in LDAP, one can use the
9704 pam_mkhomedir module from pam-modules to make this happen instead of
9705 using libpam-mklocaluser. A setup for pam-auth-update to enable
9706 pam_mkhomedir will have to be written until a fix for
9707 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
568577">bug #
568577</a
> is in the
9708 archive. Because I believe it is a bad idea to have local home
9709 directories using misleading paths like /site/server/partition/, I
9710 prefer to create a local user with the home directory in /home/. This
9711 is done using the libpam-mklocaluser package.
</p
>
9713 <p
>These packages need to be installed and configured
</p
>
9715 <blockquote
><pre
>
9716 libnss-ldapd libpam-ldapd nscd libpam-ccreds libpam-mklocaluser
9717 </pre
></blockquote
>
9719 <p
>The ldapd packages will ask for LDAP connection information, and
9720 one have to fill in the values that fits ones own site. Make sure the
9721 PAM part uses encrypted connections, to make sure the password is not
9722 sent in clear text to the LDAP server. I
've been unable to get TLS
9723 certificate checking for a self signed certificate working, which make
9724 LDAP authentication unsafe for Debian Edu (nslcd is not checking if it
9725 is talking to the correct LDAP server), and very much welcome feedback
9726 on how to get this working.
</p
>
9728 <p
>Because nscd do not have a default configuration fit for offline
9729 caching until
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
485282">bug #
485282</a
>
9730 is fixed, this configuration should be used instead of the one
9731 currently in /etc/nscd.conf. The changes are in the fields
9732 reload-count and positive-time-to-live, and is based on the
9733 instructions I found in the
9734 <a href=
"http://www.flyn.org/laptopldap/
">LDAP for Mobile Laptops
</a
>
9735 instructions by Flyn Computing.
</p
>
9737 <blockquote
><pre
>
9739 reload-count unlimited
9742 enable-cache passwd yes
9743 positive-time-to-live passwd
2592000
9744 negative-time-to-live passwd
20
9745 suggested-size passwd
211
9746 check-files passwd yes
9747 persistent passwd yes
9749 max-db-size passwd
33554432
9750 auto-propagate passwd yes
9752 enable-cache group yes
9753 positive-time-to-live group
2592000
9754 negative-time-to-live group
20
9755 suggested-size group
211
9756 check-files group yes
9757 persistent group yes
9759 max-db-size group
33554432
9760 auto-propagate group yes
9762 enable-cache hosts no
9763 positive-time-to-live hosts
2592000
9764 negative-time-to-live hosts
20
9765 suggested-size hosts
211
9766 check-files hosts yes
9767 persistent hosts yes
9769 max-db-size hosts
33554432
9771 enable-cache services yes
9772 positive-time-to-live services
2592000
9773 negative-time-to-live services
20
9774 suggested-size services
211
9775 check-files services yes
9776 persistent services yes
9778 max-db-size services
33554432
9779 </pre
></blockquote
>
9781 <p
>While we wait for a mechanism to update /etc/nsswitch.conf
9782 automatically like the one provided in
9783 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
496915">bug #
496915</a
>, the file
9784 content need to be manually replaced to ensure LDAP is used as the
9785 directory service on the machine. /etc/nsswitch.conf should normally
9786 look like this:
</p
>
9788 <blockquote
><pre
>
9792 hosts: files mdns4_minimal [NOTFOUND=return] dns mdns4
9798 netgroup: files ldap
9799 </pre
></blockquote
>
9801 <p
>The important parts are that ldap is listed last for passwd, group,
9802 shadow and netgroup.
</p
>
9804 <p
>With these changes in place, any user in LDAP will be able to log
9805 in locally on the machine using for example kdm, get a local home
9806 directory created and have the password as well as user and group
9809 <h2
>LDAP/Kerberos + nss-updatedb + libpam-ccreds +
9810 libpam-mklocaluser/pam_mkhomedir
</h2
>
9812 <p
>Because nscd have had its share of problems, and seem to have
9813 problems doing proper caching, I
've seen suggestions and recipes to
9814 use nss-updatedb to copy parts of the LDAP database locally when the
9815 LDAP database is available. I have not tested such setup, because I
9816 discovered sssd.
</p
>
9818 <h2
>LDAP/Kerberos + sssd + libpam-mklocaluser
</h2
>
9820 <p
>A more flexible and robust setup than the nscd combination
9821 mentioned earlier that has shown up recently, is the
9822 <a href=
"https://fedorahosted.org/sssd/
">sssd
</a
> package from Redhat.
9823 It is part of the
<a href=
"http://www.freeipa.org/
">FreeIPA
</A
> project
9824 to provide a Active Directory like directory service for Linux
9825 machines. The sssd system combines the caching of passwords and user
9826 information into one package, and remove the need for nscd and
9827 libpam-ccreds. It support LDAP and Kerberos, but not NIS. Version
9828 1.2 do not support netgroups, but it is said that it will support this
9829 in version
1.5 expected to show up later in
2010. Because the
9830 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/s/sssd.html
">sssd package
</a
>
9831 was missing in Debian, I ended up co-maintaining it with Werner, and
9832 version
1.2 is now in testing.
9834 <p
>These packages need to be installed and configured to get the
9835 roaming setup I want
</p
>
9837 <blockquote
><pre
>
9838 libpam-sss libnss-sss libpam-mklocaluser
9839 </pre
></blockquote
>
9841 The complete setup of sssd is done by editing/creating
9842 <tt
>/etc/sssd/sssd.conf
</tt
>.
9844 <blockquote
><pre
>
9846 config_file_version =
2
9847 reconnection_retries =
3
9853 filter_groups = root
9855 reconnection_retries =
3
9858 reconnection_retries =
3
9862 cache_credentials = true
9865 auth_provider = ldap
9866 chpass_provider = ldap
9868 ldap_uri = ldap://ldap
9869 ldap_search_base = dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9870 ldap_tls_reqcert = never
9871 ldap_tls_cacert = /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
9872 </pre
></blockquote
>
9874 <p
>I got the same problem here with certificate checking. Had to set
9875 "ldap_tls_reqcert = never
" to get it working.
</p
>
9877 <p
>With the libnss-sss package in testing at the moment, the
9878 nsswitch.conf file is update automatically, so there is no need to
9879 modify it manually.
</p
>
9881 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
9882 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
9887 <title>LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI
</title>
9888 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html
</link>
9889 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html
</guid>
9890 <pubDate>Mon,
28 Jun
2010 00:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9891 <description><p
>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
9892 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
9893 tool to browse the LDAP tree. The only one I was able to find in
9894 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
9895 <a href=
"http://luma.sourceforge.net/
">LUMA
</a
>, which has proved to
9896 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
9897 populated by default in Skolelinux. Thanks to it, I have been able to
9898 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
9899 objects. It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze. If you
9900 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)
</p
>
9902 <p
>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
9903 the BTS yet. There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
9904 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
9905 Debian submenu in KDE. I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
9908 <p
>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet. I would
9909 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
9910 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet. So in the mean time, I use
9911 <a href=
"http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/
">ldapvi
</a
> for that.
</p
>
9913 <p
>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
9914 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
9916 <p
>Update
2010-
06-
29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
9917 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html
">gq
</a
> package as a
9918 useful GUI alternative. It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
9919 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze. Unless that
9920 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.
</p
>
9925 <title>Idea for a change to LDAP schemas allowing DNS and DHCP info to be combined into one object
</title>
9926 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_a_change_to_LDAP_schemas_allowing_DNS_and_DHCP_info_to_be_combined_into_one_object.html
</link>
9927 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_a_change_to_LDAP_schemas_allowing_DNS_and_DHCP_info_to_be_combined_into_one_object.html
</guid>
9928 <pubDate>Thu,
24 Jun
2010 00:
35:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9929 <description><p
>A while back, I
9930 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html
">complained
9931 about the fact
</a
> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
9932 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
9933 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.
</p
>
9935 <p
>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
9936 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
9937 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
9938 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.
</p
>
9940 <p
>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
9941 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
9942 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
9943 Debian Edu.
</p
>
9945 <p
>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
9947 <a href=
"http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-
00">DHCP
9948 schema
</a
> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
9949 available today from IETF.
</p
>
9952 --- dhcp.schema (revision
65192)
9953 +++ dhcp.schema (working copy)
9955 objectclass (
2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
9956 NAME
'dhcpHost
'
9957 DESC
'This represents information about a particular client
'
9961 MAY (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
9962 X-NDS_CONTAINMENT (
'dhcpService
' 'dhcpSubnet
' 'dhcpGroup
') )
9965 <p
>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
9966 Edu/Squeeze. We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
9967 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.
</p
>
9969 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
9970 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
9975 <title>Calling tasksel like the installer, while still getting useful output
</title>
9976 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Calling_tasksel_like_the_installer__while_still_getting_useful_output.html
</link>
9977 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Calling_tasksel_like_the_installer__while_still_getting_useful_output.html
</guid>
9978 <pubDate>Wed,
16 Jun
2010 14:
55:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
9979 <description><p
>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
9980 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run. Until now,
9981 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
9982 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
9983 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
9986 <blockquote
><pre
>
9987 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
9988 tasksel --new-install
9989 </pre
></blockquote
>
9991 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
9992 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
9993 any output what so ever.
9995 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
9996 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
9997 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
9998 happen. Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
9999 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
10000 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run. I ended up using
10003 <blockquote
><pre
>
10004 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
10005 cmd=
"$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed
's/debconf-apt-progress -- //
')
"
10007 </pre
></blockquote
>
10009 <p
>The content of $cmd is typically something like
"<tt
>aptitude -q
10010 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
10011 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
10012 ~pimportant
</tt
>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
10013 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
10014 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
10015 installation.
</p
>
10017 <p
>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
10018 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
10019 like this.
</p
>
10024 <title>Officeshots taking shape
</title>
10025 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html
</link>
10026 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html
</guid>
10027 <pubDate>Sun,
13 Jun
2010 11:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10028 <description><p
>For those of us caring about document exchange and
10029 interoperability,
<a href=
"http://www.officeshots.org/
">OfficeShots
</a
>
10030 is a great service. It is to ODF documents what
10031 <a href=
"http://browsershots.org/
">BrowserShots
</a
> is for web
10034 <p
>A while back, I was contacted by Knut Yrvin at the part of Nokia
10035 that used to be Trolltech, who wanted to help the OfficeShots project
10036 and wondered if the University of Oslo where I work would be
10037 interested in supporting the project. I helped him to navigate his
10038 request to the right people at work, and his request was answered with
10039 a spot in the machine room with power and network connected, and Knut
10040 arranged funding for a machine to fill the spot. The machine is
10041 administrated by the OfficeShots people, so I do not have daily
10042 contact with its progress, and thus from time to time check back to
10043 see how the project is doing.
</p
>
10045 <p
>Today I had a look, and was happy to see that the Dell box in our
10046 machine room now is the host for several virtual machines running as
10047 OfficeShots factories, and the project is able to render ODF documents
10048 in
17 different document processing implementation on Linux and
10049 Windows. This is great.
</p
>
10054 <title>Lenny-
>Squeeze upgrades, removals by apt and aptitude
</title>
10055 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__removals_by_apt_and_aptitude.html
</link>
10056 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__removals_by_apt_and_aptitude.html
</guid>
10057 <pubDate>Sun,
13 Jun
2010 09:
05:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10058 <description><p
>My
10059 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html
">testing
10060 of Debian upgrades
</a
> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I
've
10061 finally made the upgrade logs available from
10062 <a href=
"http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/
">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/
</a
>.
10063 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
10064 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting. This time
10065 I will only focus on their removal plans.
</p
>
10067 <p
>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
10068 to remove
72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze. The
10069 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
10070 xserver-xorg-video* drivers. Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
10071 sure why. When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove
129
10072 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
10073 longer needed. Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
10074 I do not know. Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?
</p
>
10076 <p
>For KDE, apt-get want to remove
82 packages, among them kdebase
10077 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
10078 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove
192 packages, none which are
10079 too surprising.
</p
>
10081 <p
>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
10082 and avoided, and perhaps others as well. Here are the complete list
10083 of planned removals. The complete logs is available from the URL
10084 above. Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
10085 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
10086 conffile questions. No idea why. I worked around it by using
10087 '<tt
>echo
>> /proc/
<em
>pidofdpkg
</em
>/fd/
0</tt
>' to tell dpkg to
10088 continue.
</p
>
10090 <p
><b
>apt-get gnome
72</b
>
10091 <br
>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
10092 gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
10093 iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-
1-
0
10094 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
10095 nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
10096 serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
10097 xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
10098 xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
10099 xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
10100 xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
10101 xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
10102 xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
10103 xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
10104 xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
10105 xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10106 xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
10107 xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
10108 xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
10109 xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
10110 xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
10111 xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
10112 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
10113 xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
10114 xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
10115 xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
10116 xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
10117 xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
10118 xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-
1.9
10119 xulrunner-
1.9-gnome-support
</p
>
10121 <p
><b
>aptitude gnome
129</b
>
10123 <br
>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-
4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
10124 djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
10125 gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
10126 gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
10127 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
10128 libcamel1.2-
11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
10129 libdirectfb-
1.0-
0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-
9 libeel2-
2.20
10130 libeel2-data libepc-
1.0-
1 libepc-ui-
1.0-
1 libfaad0 libgail-common
10131 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-
3 libgda3-common libgdl-
1-
0 libgdl-
1-common
10132 libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-
0 libgksuui1.0-
1 libgmyth0
10133 libgnomecups1.0-
1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-
0
10134 libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-
0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
10135 libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-
0
10136 libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-
0 libgucharmap6
10137 libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++
10
10138 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
10139 libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-
2.2
10140 libosp5 libparted1.8-
10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-
1.10.10
10141 libpt-
1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-
1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-
8
10142 libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-
8 libssh2-
1
10143 libsuitesparse-
3.1.0 libswfdec-
0.6-
90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
10144 libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
10145 libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
10146 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
10147 openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
10148 python-
4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
10149 python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
10150 python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
10151 swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
10152 xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10153 xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
10156 <p
><b
>apt-get kde
82</b
>
10158 <br
>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
10159 kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
10160 kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
10161 kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
10162 kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
10163 libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
10164 xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
10165 xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
10166 xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
10167 xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
10168 xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
10169 xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
10170 xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
10171 xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
10172 xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10173 xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
10174 xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
10175 xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
10176 xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
10177 xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
10178 xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
10179 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
10180 xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
10181 xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
10182 xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
10183 xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
10184 xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
10185 xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-
1.9</p
>
10187 <p
><b
>aptitude kde
192</b
>
10188 <br
>bluez-utils cpp-
4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
10189 djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
10190 ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
10191 kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
10192 kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
10193 kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
10194 kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
10195 kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
10196 kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
10197 kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
10198 kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
10199 klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
10200 kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
10201 krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
10202 ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
10203 kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
10204 kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
10205 libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
10206 libavahi-core5 libavc1394-
0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
10207 libboost-python1.34
.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
10208 libdirectfb-
1.0-
0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
10209 libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-
0
10210 libicu38 libiec61883-
0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
10211 libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
10212 libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
10213 libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
10214 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
10215 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-
8 libsmbios2
10216 libssh2-
1 libsuitesparse-
3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
10217 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
10218 libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
10219 openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
10220 superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
10221 texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
10222 xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10223 xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
10224 xulrunner-
1.9</p
>
10230 <title>Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze
</title>
10231 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html
</link>
10232 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html
</guid>
10233 <pubDate>Fri,
11 Jun
2010 22:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10234 <description><p
>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
10235 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly. A few bugs
10236 have been discovered and reported in the process
10237 (
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
585410">#
585410</a
> in nagios3-cgi,
10238 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
584879">#
584879</a
> already fixed in
10239 enscript and
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
584861">#
584861</a
> in
10240 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
10241 am working on a script to automate the test.
</p
>
10243 <p
>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
10244 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
10245 it. To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
10246 script is inserted. To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
10247 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
10248 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).
</p
>
10250 <p
>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
10251 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
10252 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
10253 is created. The bug report
10254 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
566000">#
566000</a
> make me suspect
10255 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
10256 to make sure the upgrade go well. Testing on virtual and real
10257 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
10258 do the trick in such settings anyway. This is a
10259 <a href=
"http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-
26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-
804130/
">known
10260 issue
</a
> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
10261 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
10262 working with old kernels or something like that. I really wish the
10263 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
10264 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
10265 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
10266 Debian Squeeze.
</p
>
10268 <p
>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades. This test
10269 script, which I call
<tt
>upgrade-test
</tt
> for now, is doing the
10272 <blockquote
><pre
>
10276 if [
"$
1" ] ; then
10285 exec
&lt; /dev/null
10287 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
10288 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
10290 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
10291 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
10292 cat
> $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
&lt;
&lt;EOF
10296 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
10298 umount $tmpdir/proc
10300 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
10301 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
10302 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
10304 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
10306 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger. It need the test scripts
10307 # to return the correct answers.
10308 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
10309 chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
10311 # Include the desktop and laptop task
10312 for test in desktop laptop ; do
10313 echo
> $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
&lt;
&lt;EOF
10317 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
10320 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
10321 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
10322 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
10323 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
10325 echo deb $mirror $to main
> $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
10326 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
10327 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
10328 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
10330 </pre
></blockquote
>
10332 <p
>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
10333 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
10334 differently so far. I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
10335 regularly and post the result on the web. The Gnome upgrade currently
10336 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
10337 kdebase-workspace-data
</p
>
10339 <p
>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
10340 (KDE
167 KiB, Gnome
516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
10341 post, so I will refrain from trying. I can report that for Gnome,
10342 aptitude report
760 packages upgraded,
448 newly installed,
129 to
10343 remove and
1 not upgraded and
1024MB need to be downloaded while for
10344 KDE the same numbers are
702 packages upgraded,
507 newly installed,
10345 193 to remove and
0 not upgraded and
1117MB need to be downloaded
</p
>
10347 <p
>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
10348 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
10349 booting without a hitch. Was unsure if there were still bugs with
10350 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
10351 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
10352 packages.
</p
>
10357 <title>Upstart or sysvinit - as init.d scripts see it
</title>
10358 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Upstart_or_sysvinit___as_init_d_scripts_see_it.html
</link>
10359 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Upstart_or_sysvinit___as_init_d_scripts_see_it.html
</guid>
10360 <pubDate>Sun,
6 Jun
2010 23:
55:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10361 <description><p
>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
10362 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
10363 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd. The packages with such
10364 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
10365 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart. Because of
10366 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
10367 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.
</p
>
10369 <p
>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
10370 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
10371 COLUMNS):
</p
>
10373 <blockquote
><pre
>
10379 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
10381 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
10382 </pre
></blockquote
>
10384 <p
>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
10387 <blockquote
><pre
>
10388 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-
2.88
10393 </pre
></blockquote
>
10395 <p
>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
10396 sysvinit are not set by upstart. Not sure if it is intentional or not
10397 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.
</p
>
10399 <p
>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
10400 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
10406 <title>A manual for standards wars...
</title>
10407 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html
</link>
10408 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html
</guid>
10409 <pubDate>Sun,
6 Jun
2010 14:
15:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10410 <description><p
>Via the
10411 <a href=
"http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~
3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-
10.html
">blog
10412 of Rob Weir
</a
> I came across the very interesting essay named
10413 <a href=
"http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf
">The Art of
10414 Standards Wars
</a
> (PDF
25 pages). I recommend it for everyone
10415 following the standards wars of today.
</p
>
10420 <title>Sitesummary tip: Listing computer hardware models used at site
</title>
10421 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_computer_hardware_models_used_at_site.html
</link>
10422 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_computer_hardware_models_used_at_site.html
</guid>
10423 <pubDate>Thu,
3 Jun
2010 12:
05:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10424 <description><p
>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
10425 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
10426 information extracted from each machine. The script to do so is
10427 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
10428 the Skolelinux build servers:
</p
>
10430 <blockquote
><pre
>
10431 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
10433 Dell Computer Corporation
1
10436 eserver xSeries
345 -[
8670M1X]-
1
10440 </pre
></blockquote
>
10442 <p
>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
10443 provided in each machine. Here there are Intel machines without model
10444 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
10445 machines listed as [no-dmi-info]. One can add -l as a command line
10446 option to list the individual machines.
</p
>
10448 <p
>A larger list is
10449 <a href=
"http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/
">available from the the
10450 city of Narvik
</a
>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
10451 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly. In their report there
10452 are ~
1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
10453 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
10454 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
10455 collector.
</p
>
10460 <title>KDM fail at boot with NVidia cards - and no one try to fix it?
</title>
10461 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/KDM_fail_at_boot_with_NVidia_cards___and_no_one_try_to_fix_it_.html
</link>
10462 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/KDM_fail_at_boot_with_NVidia_cards___and_no_one_try_to_fix_it_.html
</guid>
10463 <pubDate>Tue,
1 Jun
2010 17:
05:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10464 <description><p
>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
10465 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled. The
10466 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
10467 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
10470 <p
>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
10471 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
583312">#
583312</a
> initially filed
10472 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
10473 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
10474 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
524751">#
524751</a
> initially filed against
10475 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.
</p
>
10477 <p
>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
10478 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
10479 distribution work out of the box for these users. The nvidia driver
10480 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
10481 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
10482 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
10483 distribution that work for them. I have no idea what the solution is,
10484 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.
</p
>
10486 <p
>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.
</p
>
10491 <title>Parallellized boot seem to hold up well in Debian/testing
</title>
10492 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_seem_to_hold_up_well_in_Debian_testing.html
</link>
10493 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_seem_to_hold_up_well_in_Debian_testing.html
</guid>
10494 <pubDate>Thu,
27 May
2010 23:
55:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10495 <description><p
>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
10496 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
10497 issues are known and should be solved:
10499 <p
><ul
>
10501 <li
>The wicd package seen to
10502 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
508289">break NFS mounting
</a
> and
10503 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
581586">network setup
</a
> when
10504 parallel booting is enabled. No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
10505 seem to be on the case.
</li
>
10507 <li
>The nvidia X driver seem to
10508 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
583312">have a race condition
</a
>
10509 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect. The
10510 maintainer is on the case.
</li
>
10512 <li
>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
10513 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
10514 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
575080">try to switch back
</a
> to
10515 sysv-rc. One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
10516 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
10517 sysv-rc more robust. Will investigate some more and probably upload a
10518 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
10519 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.
</li
>
10521 </ul
></p
>
10523 <p
>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
10524 solvable before Squeeze is released. In addition to these there are
10525 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
10526 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.
</p
>
10528 <p
>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
10529 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
10530 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org
">the
10531 list of usertagged bugs related to this
</a
>.
</p
>
10533 <p
>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.
</p
>
10538 <title>More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer
</title>
10539 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html
</link>
10540 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html
</guid>
10541 <pubDate>Sat,
22 May
2010 21:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10542 <description><p
>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
10543 found time today to return to the project. Having to spend less time
10544 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
10545 definitely helped freeing some time.
</p
>
10547 <p
>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu. We
10548 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
10549 get disk and network controllers working. Without having these
10550 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
10551 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
10552 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
10553 an external medium is a support pain. Initially, I expected it to be
10554 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
10555 debian-installer to find and use them. This proved to be wrong.
10556 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
10557 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
10558 /cdrom/firmware/). This also proved to not work, and at this point I
10559 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
10560 going to work.
</p
>
10562 <p
>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
10563 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
10564 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
10565 packages. It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
10566 "external
" media devices. Today I changed it to also look in the
10567 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
10568 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu. I also changed it to
10569 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
10570 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
10571 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
10574 <p
>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
10575 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
10576 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
10577 run these before activating the firmware during installation. The
10578 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
10579 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.
</p
>
10581 <p
>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
10582 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
10587 <title>Pieces of the roaming laptop puzzle in Debian
</title>
10588 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Pieces_of_the_roaming_laptop_puzzle_in_Debian.html
</link>
10589 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Pieces_of_the_roaming_laptop_puzzle_in_Debian.html
</guid>
10590 <pubDate>Wed,
19 May
2010 19:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10591 <description><p
>Today, the last piece of the puzzle for roaming laptops in Debian
10592 Edu finally entered the Debian archive. Today, the new
10593 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/libp/libpam-mklocaluser.html
">libpam-mklocaluser
</a
>
10594 package was accepted. Two days ago, two other pieces was accepted
10596 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/pam-python.html
">pam-python
</a
>
10597 package needed by libpam-mklocaluser, and the
10598 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/s/sssd.html
">sssd
</a
> package
10599 passed NEW on Monday. In addition, the
10600 <a href=
"http://packages.qa.debian.org/libp/libpam-ccreds.html
">libpam-ccreds
</a
>
10601 package we need is in experimental (version
10-
4) since Saturday, and
10602 hopefully will be moved to unstable soon.
</p
>
10604 <p
>This collection of packages allow for two different setups for
10605 roaming laptops. The traditional setup would be using libpam-ccreds,
10606 nscd and libpam-mklocaluser with LDAP or Kerberos authentication,
10607 which should work out of the box if the configuration changes proposed
10608 for nscd in
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
485282">BTS report
10609 #
485282</a
> is implemented. The alternative setup is to use sssd with
10610 libpam-mklocaluser to connect to LDAP or Kerberos and let sssd take
10611 care of the caching of passwords and group information.
</p
>
10613 <p
>I have so far been unable to get sssd to work with the LDAP server
10614 at the University, but suspect the issue is some SSL/GnuTLS related
10615 problem with the server certificate. I plan to update the Debian
10616 package to version
1.2, which is scheduled for next week, and hope to
10617 find time to make sure the next release will include both the
10618 Debian/Ubuntu specific patches. Upstream is friendly and responsive,
10619 and I am sure we will find a good solution.
</p
>
10621 <p
>The idea is to set up the roaming laptops to authenticate using
10622 LDAP or Kerberos and create a local user with home directory in /home/
10623 when a usre in LDAP logs in via KDM or GDM for the first time, and
10624 cache the password for offline checking, as well as caching group
10625 memberhips and other relevant LDAP information. The
10626 libpam-mklocaluser package was created to make sure the local home
10627 directory is in /home/, instead of /site/server/directory/ which would
10628 be the home directory if pam_mkhomedir was used. To avoid confusion
10629 with support requests and configuration, we do not want local laptops
10630 to have users in a path that is used for the same users home directory
10631 on the home directory servers.
</p
>
10633 <p
>One annoying problem with gdm is that it do not show the PAM
10634 message passed to the user from libpam-mklocaluser when the local user
10635 is created. Instead gdm simply reject the login with some generic
10636 message. The message is shown in kdm, ssh and login, so I guess it is
10637 a bug in gdm. Have not investigated if there is some other message
10638 type that can be used instead to get gdm to also show the message.
</p
>
10640 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10641 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
10646 <title>Parallellized boot is now the default in Debian/unstable
</title>
10647 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_is_now_the_default_in_Debian_unstable.html
</link>
10648 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_is_now_the_default_in_Debian_unstable.html
</guid>
10649 <pubDate>Fri,
14 May
2010 22:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10650 <description><p
>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
10651 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
10652 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
10653 expected, if I am to believe the
10654 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/
2010/
05/msg00122.html
">input
10655 on debian-devel@
</a
>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
10656 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
10657 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen. If serious problems are
10658 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
10659 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
10662 More information about
10663 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot
">dependency
10664 based boot sequencing
</a
> is available from the Debian wiki. It is
10665 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
10666 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:
</p
>
10668 <blockquote
><pre
>
10670 </pre
></blockquote
>
10672 <p
>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
10673 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
10674 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org
">the
10675 list of usertagged bugs related to this
</a
>.
</p
>
10680 <title>Sitesummary tip: Listing MAC address of all clients
</title>
10681 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_MAC_address_of_all_clients.html
</link>
10682 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_MAC_address_of_all_clients.html
</guid>
10683 <pubDate>Fri,
14 May
2010 21:
10:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10684 <description><p
>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
10685 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary
">sitesummary
10686 system
</a
> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
10687 network. Each machine will automatically report its status to the
10688 central server after boot and once per night. The network setup is
10689 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
10690 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines. This is useful
10691 to update the DHCP configuration.
</p
>
10693 <p
>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
10694 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary. Run
10695 this on the collector host:
</p
>
10697 <blockquote
><pre
>
10698 perl -MSiteSummary -e
'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(
" ", get_macaddresses(shift)),
"\n
"; });
'
10699 </pre
></blockquote
>
10701 <p
>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
10702 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.
</p
>
10704 <p
>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
10705 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
10706 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
10707 tables in LDAP using this information. Such tool is unfortunately not
10708 written yet.
</p
>
10713 <title>systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart
</title>
10714 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html
</link>
10715 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html
</guid>
10716 <pubDate>Thu,
13 May
2010 22:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10717 <description><p
>The last few days a new boot system called
10718 <a href=
"http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd
">systemd
</a
>
10720 <a href=
"http://
0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html
">introduced
</a
>
10722 to the free software world. I have not yet had time to play around
10723 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
10724 <a href=
"http://upstart.ubuntu.com/
">upstart
</a
>, and might prove to be
10725 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
10726 based boot system. Tollef is
10727 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
580814">in the process
</a
> of getting
10728 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work. I
10729 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
10730 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
10731 at the moment do not.
</p
>
10733 <p
>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
10734 platform support. It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
10735 some new kernel features enabled to function properly. This means
10736 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
10737 system. Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
10738 way forward.
</p
>
10740 <p
>In the mean time, based on the
10741 <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/
2010/
05/msg00122.html
">input
10742 on debian-devel@
</a
> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
10743 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
10744 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
10745 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies. A
10746 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
10747 already in experimental. If all go well, Squeeze will be released
10748 with parallel booting enabled by default.
</p
>
10753 <title>Parallellizing the boot in Debian Squeeze - ready for wider testing
</title>
10754 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellizing_the_boot_in_Debian_Squeeze___ready_for_wider_testing.html
</link>
10755 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellizing_the_boot_in_Debian_Squeeze___ready_for_wider_testing.html
</guid>
10756 <pubDate>Thu,
6 May
2010 23:
25:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10757 <description><p
>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
10758 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
10759 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies. If you want
10760 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
10761 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot
">dependency
10762 based boot sequencing
</a
> is enabled, and add this line to
10763 /etc/default/rcS:
</p
>
10765 <blockquote
><pre
>
10766 CONCURRENCY=makefile
10767 </pre
></blockquote
>
10769 <p
>That is it. It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
10770 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
10771 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
10772 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts. Startpar is configured
10773 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
10774 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
10775 make this happen.
</p
>
10777 <p
>Give it a try, and see if you like the result. If some services
10778 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
10779 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
10780 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies). Report bugs and get
10781 the package maintainers to fix it. :)
</p
>
10783 <p
>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
10784 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct. I
10785 expect we will get there in Squeeze+
1, if we get manage to test and
10786 fix the remaining issues.
</p
>
10788 <p
>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
10789 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
10790 <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org
">the
10791 list of usertagged bugs related to this
</a
>.
</p
>
10796 <title>Forcing new users to change their password on first login
</title>
10797 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Forcing_new_users_to_change_their_password_on_first_login.html
</link>
10798 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Forcing_new_users_to_change_their_password_on_first_login.html
</guid>
10799 <pubDate>Sun,
2 May
2010 13:
47:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10800 <description><p
>One interesting feature in Active Directory, is the ability to
10801 create a new user with an expired password, and thus force the user to
10802 change the password on the first login attempt.
</p
>
10804 <p
>I
'm not quite sure how to do that with the LDAP setup in Debian
10805 Edu, but did some initial testing with a local account. The account
10806 and password aging information is available in /etc/shadow, but
10807 unfortunately, it is not possible to specify an expiration time for
10808 passwords, only a maximum age for passwords.
</p
>
10810 <p
>A freshly created account (using adduser test) will have these
10811 settings in /etc/shadow:
</p
>
10813 <blockquote
><pre
>
10814 root@tjener:~# chage -l test
10815 Last password change : May
02,
2010
10816 Password expires : never
10817 Password inactive : never
10818 Account expires : never
10819 Minimum number of days between password change :
0
10820 Maximum number of days between password change :
99999
10821 Number of days of warning before password expires :
7
10823 </pre
></blockquote
>
10825 <p
>The only way I could come up with to create a user with an expired
10826 account, is to change the date of the last password change to the
10827 lowest value possible (January
1th
1970), and the maximum password age
10828 to the difference in days between that date and today. To make it
10829 simple, I went for
30 years (
30 *
365 =
10950) and January
2th (to
10830 avoid testing if
0 is a valid value).
</p
>
10832 <p
>After using these commands to set it up, it seem to work as
10833 intended:
</p
>
10835 <blockquote
><pre
>
10836 root@tjener:~# chage -d
1 test; chage -M
10950 test
10837 root@tjener:~# chage -l test
10838 Last password change : Jan
02,
1970
10839 Password expires : never
10840 Password inactive : never
10841 Account expires : never
10842 Minimum number of days between password change :
0
10843 Maximum number of days between password change :
10950
10844 Number of days of warning before password expires :
7
10846 </pre
></blockquote
>
10848 <p
>So far I have tested this with ssh and console, and kdm (in
10849 Squeeze) login, and all ask for a new password before login in the
10850 user (with ssh, I was thrown out and had to log in again).
</p
>
10852 <p
>Perhaps we should set up something similar for Debian Edu, to make
10853 sure only the user itself have the account password?
</p
>
10855 <p
>If you want to comment on or help out with implementing this for
10856 Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
10858 <p
>Update
2010-
05-
02 17:
20: Paul Tötterman tells me on IRC that the
10859 shadow(
8) page in Debian/testing now state that setting the date of
10860 last password change to zero (
0) will force the password to be changed
10861 on the first login. This was not mentioned in the manual in Lenny, so
10862 I did not notice this in my initial testing. I have tested it on
10863 Squeeze, and
'<tt
>chage -d
0 username
</tt
>' do work there. I have not
10864 tested it on Lenny yet.
</p
>
10866 <p
>Update
2010-
05-
02-
19:
05: Jim Paris tells me via email that an
10867 equivalent command to expire a password is
'<tt
>passwd -e
10868 username
</tt
>', which insert zero into the date of the last password
10874 <title>Thoughts on roaming laptop setup for Debian Edu
</title>
10875 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thoughts_on_roaming_laptop_setup_for_Debian_Edu.html
</link>
10876 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thoughts_on_roaming_laptop_setup_for_Debian_Edu.html
</guid>
10877 <pubDate>Wed,
28 Apr
2010 20:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10878 <description><p
>For some years now, I have wondered how we should handle laptops in
10879 Debian Edu. The Debian Edu infrastructure is mostly designed to
10880 handle stationary computers, and less suited for computers that come
10883 <p
>Now I finally believe I have an sensible idea on how to adjust
10884 Debian Edu for laptops, by introducing a new profile for them, for
10885 example called Roaming Workstations. Here are my thought on this.
10886 The setup would consist of the following:
</p
>
10890 <li
>During installation, the user name of the owner / primary user of
10891 the laptop is requested and a local home directory is set up for
10892 the user, with uid and gid information fetched from the LDAP
10893 server. This allow the user to work also when offline. The
10894 central home directory can be available in a subdirectory on
10895 request, for example mounted via CIFS. It could be mounted
10896 automatically when a user log in while on the Debian Edu network,
10897 and unmounted when the machine is taken away (network down,
10898 hibernate, etc), it can be set up to do automatic mounting on
10899 request (using autofs), or perhaps some GUI button on the desktop
10900 can be used to access it when needed. Perhaps it is enough to use
10901 the fish protocol in KDE?
</li
>
10903 <li
>Password checking is set up to use LDAP or Kerberos
10904 authentication when the machine is on the Debian Edu network, and
10905 to cache the password for offline checking when the machine unable
10906 to reach the LDAP or Kerberos server. This can be done using
10907 <a href=
"http://www.padl.com/OSS/pam_ccreds.html
">libpam-ccreds
</a
>
10908 or the Fedora developed
10909 <a href=
"https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/SSSD
">System
10910 Security Services Daemon
</a
> packages.
</li
>
10912 <li
>File synchronisation with the central home directory is set up
10913 using a shared directory in both the local and the central home
10914 directory, using unison.
</li
>
10916 <li
>Printing should be set up to print to all printers broadcasting
10917 their existence on the local network, and should then work out of
10918 the box with CUPS. For sites needing accurate printer quotas, some
10919 system with Kerberos authentication or printing via ssh could be
10920 implemented.
</li
>
10922 <li
>For users that should have local root access to their laptop,
10923 sudo should be used to allow this to the local user.
</li
>
10925 <li
>It would be nice if user and group information from LDAP is
10926 cached on the client, but given that there are entries for the
10927 local user and primary group in /etc/, it should not be needed.
</li
>
10931 <p
>I believe all the pieces to implement this are in Debian/testing at
10932 the moment. If we work quickly, we should be able to get this ready
10933 in time for the Squeeze release to freeze. Some of the pieces need
10934 tweaking, like libpam-ccreds should get support for pam-auth-update
10935 (
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
566718">#
566718</a
>) and nslcd (or
10936 perhaps debian-edu-config) should get some integration code to stop
10937 its daemon when the LDAP server is unavailable to avoid long timeouts
10938 when disconnected from the net. If we get Kerberos enabled, we need
10939 to make sure we avoid long timeouts there too.
</p
>
10941 <p
>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10942 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.
</p
>
10947 <title>Great book:
"Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity, Copyright, and the Future of the Future
"</title>
10948 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Great_book___Content__Selected_Essays_on_Technology__Creativity__Copyright__and_the_Future_of_the_Future_.html
</link>
10949 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Great_book___Content__Selected_Essays_on_Technology__Creativity__Copyright__and_the_Future_of_the_Future_.html
</guid>
10950 <pubDate>Mon,
19 Apr
2010 17:
10:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10951 <description><p
>The last few weeks i have had the pleasure of reading a
10952 thought-provoking collection of essays by Cory Doctorow, on topics
10953 touching copyright, virtual worlds, the future of man when the
10954 conscience mind can be duplicated into a computer and many more. The
10955 book titled
"Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity,
10956 Copyright, and the Future of the Future
" is available with few
10957 restrictions on the web, for example from
10958 <a href=
"http://craphound.com/content/
">his own site
</a
>. I read the
10960 <a href=
"http://www.feedbooks.com/book/
2883">feedbooks
</a
> using
10961 <a href=
"http://www.fbreader.org/
">fbreader
</a
> and my N810. I
10962 strongly recommend this book.
</p
>
10967 <title>Kerberos for Debian Edu/Squeeze?
</title>
10968 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kerberos_for_Debian_Edu_Squeeze_.html
</link>
10969 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kerberos_for_Debian_Edu_Squeeze_.html
</guid>
10970 <pubDate>Wed,
14 Apr
2010 17:
20:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
10971 <description><p
><a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/
20100413-kerberos/
">Yesterdays
10972 NUUG presentation
</a
> about Kerberos was inspiring, and reminded me
10973 about the need to start using Kerberos in Skolelinux. Setting up a
10974 Kerberos server seem to be straight forward, and if we get this in
10975 place a long time before the Squeeze version of Debian freezes, we
10976 have a chance to migrate Skolelinux away from NFSv3 for the home
10977 directories, and over to an architecture where the infrastructure do
10978 not have to trust IP addresses and machines, and instead can trust
10979 users and cryptographic keys instead.
</p
>
10981 <p
>A challenge will be integration and administration. Is there a
10982 Kerberos implementation for Debian where one can control the
10983 administration access in Kerberos using LDAP groups? With it, the
10984 school administration will have to maintain access control using flat
10985 files on the main server, which give a huge potential for errors.
</p
>
10987 <p
>A related question I would like to know is how well Kerberos and
10988 pam-ccreds (offline password check) work together. Anyone know?
</p
>
10990 <p
>Next step will be to use Kerberos for access control in Lwat and
10991 Nagios. I have no idea how much work that will be to implement. We
10992 would also need to document how to integrate with Windows AD, as such
10993 shared network will require two Kerberos realms that need to cooperate
10994 to work properly.
</p
>
10996 <p
>I believe a good start would be to start using Kerberos on the
10997 skolelinux.no machines, and this way get ourselves experience with
10998 configuration and integration. A natural starting point would be
10999 setting up ldap.skolelinux.no as the Kerberos server, and migrate the
11000 rest of the machines from PAM via LDAP to PAM via Kerberos one at the
11003 <p
>If you would like to contribute to get this working in Skolelinux,
11004 I recommend you to see the video recording from yesterdays NUUG
11005 presentation, and start using Kerberos at home. The video show show
11006 up in a few days.
</p
>
11011 <title>After
6 years of waiting, the Xreset.d feature is implemented
</title>
11012 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/After_6_years_of_waiting__the_Xreset_d_feature_is_implemented.html
</link>
11013 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/After_6_years_of_waiting__the_Xreset_d_feature_is_implemented.html
</guid>
11014 <pubDate>Sat,
6 Mar
2010 18:
15:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11015 <description><p
>6 years ago, as part of the Debian Edu development I am involved
11016 in, I asked for a hook in the kdm and gdm setup to run scripts as root
11017 when the user log out. A bug was submitted against the xfree86-common
11018 package in
2004 (
<a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/
230422">#
230422</a
>),
11019 and revisited every time Debian Edu was working on a new release.
11020 Today, this finally paid off.
</p
>
11022 <p
>The framework for this feature was today commited to the git
11023 repositry for the xorg package, and the git repository for xdm has
11024 been updated to use this framework. Next on my agenda is to make sure
11025 kdm and gdm also add code to use this framework.
</p
>
11027 <p
>In Debian Edu, we want to ability to run commands as root when the
11028 user log out, to get rid of runaway processes and do general cleanup
11029 after a user. With this framework in place, we finally can do that in
11030 a generic way that work with all display managers using this
11031 framework. My goal is to get all display managers in Debian use it,
11032 similar to how they use the Xsession.d framework today.
<p
>
11037 <title>Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Lenny released, work continues
</title>
11038 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Lenny_released__work_continues.html
</link>
11039 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Lenny_released__work_continues.html
</guid>
11040 <pubDate>Thu,
11 Feb
2010 17:
15:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11041 <description><p
>On Tuesday, the Debian/Lenny based version of
11042 <a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Skolelinux
</a
> was finally
11043 shipped. This was a major leap forward for the project, and I am very
11044 pleased that we finally got the release wrapped up. Work on the first
11045 point release starts imediately, as we plan to get that one out a
11046 month after the major release, to include all fixes for bugs we found
11047 and fixed too late in the release process to include last Tuesday.
</p
>
11049 <p
>Perhaps it even is time for some partying?
</p
>
11051 <p
>After this first point release, my plan is to focus again on the
11052 next major release, based on Squeeze. We will try to get as many of
11053 the fixes we need into the official Debian packages before the freeze,
11054 and have just a few weeks or months to make it happen.
</p
>
11059 <title>Automatic Munin and Nagios configuration
</title>
11060 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_Munin_and_Nagios_configuration.html
</link>
11061 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_Munin_and_Nagios_configuration.html
</guid>
11062 <pubDate>Wed,
27 Jan
2010 15:
15:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11063 <description><p
>One of the new features in the next Debian/Lenny based release of
11064 Debian Edu/Skolelinux, which is scheduled for release in the next few
11065 days, is automatic configuration of the service monitoring system
11066 Nagios. The previous release had automatic configuration of trend
11067 analysis using Munin, and this Lenny based release take that a step
11070 <p
>When installing a Debian Edu Main-server, it is automatically
11071 configured as a Munin and Nagios server. In addition, it is
11072 configured to be a server for the
11073 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary
">SiteSummary
11074 system
</a
> I have written for use in Debian Edu. The SiteSummary
11075 system is inspired by a system used by the University of Oslo where I
11076 work. In short, the system provide a centralised collector of
11077 information about the computers on the network, and a client on each
11078 computer submitting information to this collector. This allow for
11079 automatic information on which packages are installed on each machine,
11080 which kernel the machines are using, what kind of configuration the
11081 packages got etc. This also allow us to automatically generate Munin
11082 and Nagios configuration.
</p
>
11084 <p
>All computers reporting to the sitesummary collector with the
11085 munin-node package installed is automatically enabled as a Munin
11086 client and graphs from the statistics collected from that machine show
11087 up automatically on http://www/munin/ on the Main-server.
</p
>
11089 <p
>All non-laptop computers reporting to the sitesummary collector are
11090 automatically monitored for network presence (ping and any network
11091 services detected). In addition, all computers (also laptops) with
11092 the nagios-nrpe-server package installed and configured the way
11093 sitesummary would configure it, are monitored for full disks, software
11094 raid status, swap free and other checks that need to run locally on
11095 the machine.
</p
>
11097 <p
>The result is that the administrator on a school using Debian Edu
11098 based on Lenny will be able to check the health of his installation
11099 with one look at the Nagios settings, without having to spend any time
11100 keeping the Nagios configuration up-to-date.
</p
>
11102 <p
>The only configuration one need to do to get Nagios up and running
11103 is to set the password used to get access via HTTP. The system
11104 administrator need to run
"<tt
>htpasswd /etc/nagios3/htpasswd.users
11105 nagiosadmin
</tt
>" to create a nagiosadmin user and set a password for
11106 it to be able to log into the Nagios web pages. After that,
11107 everything is taken care of.
</p
>
11112 <title>Relative popularity of document formats (MS Office vs. ODF)
</title>
11113 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Relative_popularity_of_document_formats__MS_Office_vs__ODF_.html
</link>
11114 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Relative_popularity_of_document_formats__MS_Office_vs__ODF_.html
</guid>
11115 <pubDate>Wed,
12 Aug
2009 15:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11116 <description><p
>Just for fun, I did a search right now on Google for a few file ODF
11117 and MS Office based formats (not to be mistaken for ISO or ECMA
11118 OOXML), to get an idea of their relative usage. I searched using
11119 'filetype:odt
' and equvalent terms, and got these results:
</P
>
11122 <tr
><th
>Type
</th
><th
>ODF
</th
><th
>MS Office
</th
></tr
>
11123 <tr
><td
>Tekst
</td
> <td
>odt:
282000</td
> <td
>docx:
308000</td
></tr
>
11124 <tr
><td
>Presentasjon
</td
> <td
>odp:
75600</td
> <td
>pptx:
183000</td
></tr
>
11125 <tr
><td
>Regneark
</td
> <td
>ods:
26500 </td
> <td
>xlsx:
145000</td
></tr
>
11128 <p
>Next, I added a
'site:no
' limit to get the numbers for Norway, and
11129 got these numbers:
</p
>
11132 <tr
><th
>Type
</th
><th
>ODF
</th
><th
>MS Office
</th
></tr
>
11133 <tr
><td
>Tekst
</td
> <td
>odt:
2480 </td
> <td
>docx:
4460</td
></tr
>
11134 <tr
><td
>Presentasjon
</td
> <td
>odp:
299 </td
> <td
>pptx:
741</td
></tr
>
11135 <tr
><td
>Regneark
</td
> <td
>ods:
187 </td
> <td
>xlsx:
372</td
></tr
>
11138 <p
>I wonder how these numbers change over time.
</p
>
11140 <p
>I am aware of Google returning different results and numbers based
11141 on where the search is done, so I guess these numbers will differ if
11142 they are conduced in another country. Because of this, I did the same
11143 search from a machine in California, USA, a few minutes after the
11144 search done from a machine here in Norway.
</p
>
11148 <tr
><th
>Type
</th
><th
>ODF
</th
><th
>MS Office
</th
></tr
>
11149 <tr
><td
>Tekst
</td
> <td
>odt:
129000</td
> <td
>docx:
308000</td
></tr
>
11150 <tr
><td
>Presentasjon
</td
> <td
>odp:
44200</td
> <td
>pptx:
93900</td
></tr
>
11151 <tr
><td
>Regneark
</td
> <td
>ods:
26500 </td
> <td
>xlsx:
82400</td
></tr
>
11154 <p
>And with
'site:no
':
11157 <tr
><th
>Type
</th
><th
>ODF
</th
><th
>MS Office
</th
></tr
>
11158 <tr
><td
>Tekst
</td
> <td
>odt:
2480</td
> <td
>docx:
3410</td
></tr
>
11159 <tr
><td
>Presentasjon
</td
> <td
>odp:
175</td
> <td
>pptx:
604</td
></tr
>
11160 <tr
><td
>Regneark
</td
> <td
>ods:
186 </td
> <td
>xlsx:
296</td
></tr
>
11163 <p
>Interesting difference, not sure what to conclude from these
11169 <title>ISO still hope to fix OOXML
</title>
11170 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ISO_still_hope_to_fix_OOXML.html
</link>
11171 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ISO_still_hope_to_fix_OOXML.html
</guid>
11172 <pubDate>Sat,
8 Aug
2009 14:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11173 <description><p
>According to
<a
11174 href=
"http://twerner.blogspot.com/
2009/
08/defects-of-office-open-xml.html
">a
11175 blog post from Torsten Werner
</a
>, the current defect report for ISO
11176 29500 (ISO OOXML) is
809 pages. His interesting point is that the
11177 defect report is
71 pages more than the full ODF
1.1 specification.
11178 Personally I find it more interesting that ISO still believe ISO OOXML
11179 can be fixed in ISO. Personally, I believe it is broken beyon repair,
11180 and I completely lack any trust in ISO for being able to get anywhere
11181 close to solving the problems. I was part of the Norwegian committee
11182 involved in the OOXML fast track process, and was not impressed with
11183 Standard Norway and ISO in how they handled it.
</p
>
11185 <p
>These days I focus on ODF instead, which seem like a specification
11186 with the future ahead of it. We are working in NUUG to organise a ODF
11187 seminar this autumn.
</p
>
11192 <title>Debian has switched to dependency based boot sequencing
</title>
11193 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_has_switched_to_dependency_based_boot_sequencing.html
</link>
11194 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_has_switched_to_dependency_based_boot_sequencing.html
</guid>
11195 <pubDate>Mon,
27 Jul
2009 23:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11196 <description><p
>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version
2.87dsf-
2,
11197 and the upload of insserv version
1.12.0-
10 yesterday, Debian unstable
11198 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing. This
11199 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
11200 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
11201 installation. Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
11202 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.
</p
>
11204 <p
>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
11205 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
11206 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.
</p
>
11211 <title>Taking over sysvinit development
</title>
11212 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html
</link>
11213 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html
</guid>
11214 <pubDate>Wed,
22 Jul
2009 23:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11215 <description><p
>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
11216 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
11217 take over the package and become the new upstream. The number of
11218 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
11219 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
11220 the package up to date.
</p
>
11222 <p
>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
11223 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman. About
10 days ago, I made
11224 a new upstream tarball with version number
2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
11225 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
11226 distributions. We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
11227 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge. Since the
11228 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
11229 upstream project at
<a href=
"http://savannah.nongnu.org/
">Savannah
</a
>, and continue
11230 development there. The project is registered and currently waiting
11231 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
11232 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
11233 working on the future release.
</p
>
11235 <p
>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
11236 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.
</p
>
11241 <title>Debian boots quicker and quicker
</title>
11242 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html
</link>
11243 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html
</guid>
11244 <pubDate>Wed,
24 Jun
2009 21:
40:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11245 <description><p
>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
11246 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
11247 could find more ways to speed up the boot system. This was an Ubuntu
11249 <a href=
"https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint
">developer
11250 gathering
</a
>. It was quite productive. We also discussed the future
11251 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
11252 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
11253 asynchronous and event base. The Ubuntu approach using udev and
11254 upstart might be a good way forward. Time will show.
</p
>
11256 <p
>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
11257 process in Debian. All of these should be applied to get a quick
11262 <li
>Use dash as /bin/sh.
</li
>
11264 <li
>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
11265 clock is in UTC.
</li
>
11267 <li
>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
11268 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot
">dependency
11269 based boot sequencing
</a
>, and enable concurrent booting.
</li
>
11273 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
11274 <a href=
"http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/
">Carlos
11275 Villegas
</a
>.
11277 <p
>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
11278 unstable yesterday. When we tested it, we were able to cut
6 seconds
11279 from the boot sequence. It depend on very correct dependency
11280 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
11281 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
11282 using this.
</p
>
11284 <p
>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
11285 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
11286 startup speed as well. Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
11287 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
11288 possible to run a of them in the same process. A quick way to test
11289 this would be to enable insserv and run
'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
11290 insserv
'. Will need to test if that work. :)
</p
>
11295 <title>Two projects that have improved the quality of free software a lot
</title>
11296 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Two_projects_that_have_improved_the_quality_of_free_software_a_lot.html
</link>
11297 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Two_projects_that_have_improved_the_quality_of_free_software_a_lot.html
</guid>
11298 <pubDate>Sat,
2 May
2009 15:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11299 <description><p
>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
11300 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
11301 do not yet know them.
</p
>
11303 <p
>The first one is
<a href=
"http://valgrind.org/
">valgrind
</a
>, a
11304 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
11305 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run
'valgrind program
',
11306 and it will report any problems on stdout. It is even better if the
11307 program include debug information. With debug information, it is able
11308 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
11309 occurs. It can report things like
'reading past memory block in file
11310 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M
', and
11311 'using uninitialised value in control logic
'. This tool has made it
11312 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
11313 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
11315 <p
>The second one is
11316 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity
">Coverity
</a
> which is
11317 a source code checker. It is able to process the source of a program
11318 and find problems in the logic without running the program. It
11319 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
11320 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel. It is now a commercial tool
11321 and the company behind it is running
11322 <a href=
"http://www.scan.coverity.com/
">a community service
</a
> for the
11323 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
11324 their source checked for free. Several thousand defects have been
11325 found and fixed so far. It can find errors like
'lock L taken in file
11326 X line N is never released if exiting in line M
', or
'the code in file
11327 Y lines O to P can never be executed
'. The projects included in the
11328 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
11329 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.
</p
>
11331 <p
>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
11332 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
11333 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
11334 surrounded by today.
</p
>
11339 <title>No patch is not better than a useless patch
</title>
11340 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/No_patch_is_not_better_than_a_useless_patch.html
</link>
11341 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/No_patch_is_not_better_than_a_useless_patch.html
</guid>
11342 <pubDate>Tue,
28 Apr
2009 09:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11343 <description><p
>Julien Blache
11344 <a href=
"http://blog.technologeek.org/
2009/
04/
12/
214">claim that no
11345 patch is better than a useless patch
</a
>. I completely disagree, as a
11346 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
11347 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
11348 time on fixing it. No patch do not provide any of these positive
11349 properties.
</p
>
11354 <title>Recording video from cron using VLC
</title>
11355 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Recording_video_from_cron_using_VLC.html
</link>
11356 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Recording_video_from_cron_using_VLC.html
</guid>
11357 <pubDate>Sun,
5 Apr
2009 10:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11358 <description><p
>One think I have wanted to figure out for a along time is how to
11359 run vlc from cron to do recording of video streams on the net. The
11360 task is trivial with mplayer, but I do not really trust the security
11361 of mplayer (it crashes too often on strange input), and thus prefer
11362 vlc. I finally found a way to do it today. I spent an hour or so
11363 searching the web for recipes and reading the documentation. The
11364 hardest part was to get rid of the GUI window, but after finding the
11365 dummy interface, the command line finally presented itself:
</p
>
11367 <blockquote
><pre
>URL=http://www.ping.uio.no/video/rms-oslo_2009.ogg
11369 DISPLAY= vlc -q $URL \
11370 --sout=
"#duplicate{dst=std{access=file,url=
'$SAVEFILE
'},dst=nodisplay}
" \
11371 --intf=dummy
</pre
></blockquote
>
11373 <p
>The command stream the URL and store it in the SAVEFILE by
11374 duplicating the output stream to
"nodisplay
" and the file, using the
11375 dummy interface. The dummy interface and the nodisplay output make
11376 sure no X interface is needed.
</p
>
11378 <p
>The cron job then need to start this job with the appropriate URL
11379 and file name to save, sleep for the duration wanted, and then kill
11380 the vlc process with SIGTERM. Here is a complete script
11381 <tt
>vlc-record
</tt
> to use from
<tt
>at
</tt
> or
<tt
>cron
</tt
>:
</p
>
11383 <blockquote
><pre
>#!/bin/sh
11386 SAVEFILE=
"$
2"
11387 DURATION=
"$
3"
11388 DISPLAY= vlc -q
"$URL
" \
11389 --sout=
"#duplicate{dst=std{access=file,url=
'$SAVEFILE
'},dst=nodisplay}
" \
11390 --intf=dummy
< /dev/null
> /dev/null
2>&1 &
11394 wait $pid
</pre
></blockquote
>
11399 <title>Standardize on protocols and formats, not vendors and applications
</title>
11400 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html
</link>
11401 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html
</guid>
11402 <pubDate>Mon,
30 Mar
2009 11:
50:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11403 <description><p
>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
11404 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure. It is the
11405 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
11406 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
11407 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
11408 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
11409 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
11410 application.
</p
>
11412 <p
>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
11413 independently of the server applications. One can even allow users to
11414 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
11415 protocol and format. In the normal case, only one client application
11416 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
11417 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
11418 blocked from doing so.
</p
>
11420 <p
>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
11421 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
11422 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
11423 requirements change.
</p
>
11425 <p
>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
11426 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
11427 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.
</p
>
11432 <title>Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering
</title>
11433 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html
</link>
11434 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html
</guid>
11435 <pubDate>Sun,
29 Mar
2009 21:
00:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11436 <description><p
>I
'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
11437 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering. I got a bit done tuning the
11438 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
11439 implementation avahi. It look like it could be useful for us. Almost
11440 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
11441 get to know the Skolelinux system. Walter Bender, involved in the
11442 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
11443 also helped me improve my OLPC installation. He also showed me that
11444 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
11445 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian. As a
11446 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu. We also
11447 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
11448 proved to be too hard for us. The application seem to need more work
11449 before it is ready for me. I look forward to getting home and relax
11455 <title>Time for new LDAP schemas replacing RFC
2307?
</title>
11456 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html
</link>
11457 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html
</guid>
11458 <pubDate>Sun,
29 Mar
2009 20:
30:
00 +
0200</pubDate>
11459 <description><p
>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
11460 optimal. There is RFC
2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
11461 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC
2307bis, with
11462 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory. The RFC
11463 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
11464 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.
</p
>
11466 <p
>In
<a href=
"http://www.skolelinux.org/
">Debian Edu/Skolelinux
</a
>,
11467 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
11468 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
11469 and LTSP configuration in LDAP. These objects have a lot in common,
11470 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
11471 object per entity. For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
11472 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
11473 DNS information and another with DHCP information. The schemas
11474 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
11475 object. In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
11476 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
11477 It just do not scale. I believe it is time for a few RFC
11478 specifications to cleam up this mess.
</p
>
11480 <p
>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
11481 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
11482 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
11483 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.
</p
>
11485 <p
>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
11486 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.
</p
>
11488 <p
>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
11489 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up. Time to start a
11490 new IETF work group?
</p
>
11495 <title>Checking server hardware support status for Dell, HP and IBM servers
</title>
11496 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Checking_server_hardware_support_status_for_Dell__HP_and_IBM_servers.html
</link>
11497 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Checking_server_hardware_support_status_for_Dell__HP_and_IBM_servers.html
</guid>
11498 <pubDate>Sat,
28 Feb
2009 23:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11499 <description><p
>At work, we have a few hundred Linux servers, and with that amount
11500 of hardware it is important to keep track of when the hardware support
11501 contract expire for each server. We have a machine (and service)
11502 register, which until recently did not contain much useful besides the
11503 machine room location and contact information for the system owner for
11504 each machine. To make it easier for us to track support contract
11505 status, I
've recently spent time on extending the machine register to
11506 include information about when the support contract expire, and to tag
11507 machines with expired contracts to make it easy to get a list of such
11508 machines. I extended a perl script already being used to import
11509 information about machines into the register, to also do some screen
11510 scraping off the sites of Dell, HP and IBM (our majority of machines
11511 are from these vendors), and automatically check the support status
11512 for the relevant machines. This make the support status information
11513 easily available and I hope it will make it easier for the computer
11514 owner to know when to get new hardware or renew the support contract.
11515 The result of this work documented that
27% of the machines in the
11516 registry is without a support contract, and made it very easy to find
11517 them.
27% might seem like a lot, but I see it more as the case of us
11518 using machines a bit longer than the
3 years a normal support contract
11519 last, to have test machines and a platform for less important
11520 services. After all, the machines without a contract are working fine
11521 at the moment and the lack of contract is only a problem if any of
11522 them break down. When that happen, we can either fix it using spare
11523 parts from other machines or move the service to another old
11526 <p
>I believe the code for screen scraping the Dell site was originally
11527 written by Trond Hasle Amundsen, and later adjusted by me and Morten
11528 Werner Forsbring. The HP scraping was written by me after reading a
11529 nice article in ;login: about how to use WWW::Mechanize, and the IBM
11530 scraping was written by me based on the Dell code. I know the HTML
11531 parsing could be done using nice libraries, but did not want to
11532 introduce more dependencies. This is the current incarnation:
</p
>
11537 use WWW::Mechanize;
11540 sub get_support_info {
11541 my ($machine, $model, $serial, $productnumber) = @_;
11544 if ( $model =~ m/^Dell / ) {
11545 # fetch website from Dell support
11546 my $url =
"http://support.euro.dell.com/support/topics/topic.aspx/emea/shared/support/my_systems_info/no/details?c=no
&amp;cs=nodhs1
&amp;l=no
&amp;s=dhs
&amp;ServiceTag=$serial
";
11547 my $webpage = get($url);
11548 return undef unless ($webpage);
11551 my @lines = split(/\n/, $webpage);
11552 foreach my $line (@lines) {
11553 next unless ($line =~ m/Beskrivelse/);
11554 $line =~ s/
&lt;[^
>]+?
>/;/gm;
11555 $line =~ s/^.+?;(Beskrivelse;)/$
1/;
11557 my @f = split(/\;/, $line);
11558 @f = @f[
13 .. $#f];
11559 my $lastend =
"";
11560 while ($f[
3] eq
"DELL
") {
11561 my ($type, $startstr, $endstr, $days) = @f[
0,
5,
7,
10];
11563 my $start = POSIX::strftime(
"%Y-%m-%d
",
11564 localtime(str2time($startstr)));
11565 my $end = POSIX::strftime(
"%Y-%m-%d
",
11566 localtime(str2time($endstr)));
11567 $str .=
"$type $start -
> $end
";
11568 @f = @f[
14 .. $#f];
11569 $lastend = $end if ($end gt $lastend);
11571 my $today = POSIX::strftime(
"%Y-%m-%d
", localtime(time));
11572 tag_machine_unsupported($machine)
11573 if ($lastend lt $today);
11575 } elsif ( $model =~ m/^HP / ) {
11576 my $mech = WWW::Mechanize-
>new();
11578 'http://www1.itrc.hp.com/service/ewarranty/warrantyInput.do
';
11579 $mech-
>get($url);
11581 'BODServiceID
' =
> 'NA
',
11582 'RegisteredPurchaseDate
' =
> '',
11583 'country
' =
> 'NO
',
11584 'productNumber
' =
> $productnumber,
11585 'serialNumber1
' =
> $serial,
11587 $mech-
>submit_form( form_number =
> 2,
11588 fields =
> $fields );
11589 # Next step is screen scraping
11590 my $content = $mech-
>content();
11592 $content =~ s/
&lt;[^
>]+?
>/;/gm;
11593 $content =~ s/\s+/ /gm;
11594 $content =~ s/;\s*;/;;/gm;
11595 $content =~ s/;[\s;]+/;/gm;
11597 my $today = POSIX::strftime(
"%Y-%m-%d
", localtime(time));
11599 while ($content =~ m/;Warranty Type;/) {
11600 my ($type, $status, $startstr, $stopstr) = $content =~
11601 m/;Warranty Type;([^;]+);.+?;Status;(\w+);Start Date;([^;]+);End Date;([^;]+);/;
11602 $content =~ s/^.+?;Warranty Type;//;
11603 my $start = POSIX::strftime(
"%Y-%m-%d
",
11604 localtime(str2time($startstr)));
11605 my $end = POSIX::strftime(
"%Y-%m-%d
",
11606 localtime(str2time($stopstr)));
11608 $str .=
"$type ($status) $start -
> $end
";
11610 tag_machine_unsupported($machine)
11611 if ($end lt $today);
11613 } elsif ( $model =~ m/^IBM / ) {
11614 # This code ignore extended support contracts.
11615 my ($producttype) = $model =~ m/.*-\[(.{
4}).+\]-/;
11616 if ($producttype
&amp;
&amp; $serial) {
11618 get(
"http://www-
947.ibm.com/systems/support/supportsite.wss/warranty?action=warranty
&amp;brandind=
5000008&amp;Submit=Submit
&amp;type=$producttype
&amp;serial=$serial
");
11620 $content =~ s/
&lt;[^
>]+?
>/;/gm;
11621 $content =~ s/\s+/ /gm;
11622 $content =~ s/;\s*;/;;/gm;
11623 $content =~ s/;[\s;]+/;/gm;
11625 $content =~ s/^.+?;Warranty status;//;
11626 my ($status, $end) = $content =~ m/;Warranty status;([^;]+)\s*;Expiration date;(\S+) ;/;
11628 $str .=
"($status) -
> $end
";
11630 my $today = POSIX::strftime(
"%Y-%m-%d
", localtime(time));
11631 tag_machine_unsupported($machine)
11632 if ($end lt $today);
11640 <p
>Here are some examples on how to use the function, using fake
11641 serial numbers. The information passed in as arguments are fetched
11642 from dmidecode.
</p
>
11645 print get_support_info(
"hp.host
",
"HP ProLiant BL460c G1
",
"1234567890"
11646 "447707-B21
");
11647 print get_support_info(
"dell.host
",
"Dell Inc. PowerEdge
2950",
"1234567");
11648 print get_support_info(
"ibm.host
",
"IBM eserver xSeries
345 -[
867061X]-
",
11649 "1234567");
11652 <p
>I would recommend this approach for tracking support contracts for
11653 everyone with more than a few computers to administer. :)
</p
>
11655 <p
>Update
2009-
03-
06: The IBM page do not include extended support
11656 contracts, so it is useless in that case. The original Dell code do
11657 not handle extended support contracts either, but has been updated to
11663 <title>Using bar codes at a computing center
</title>
11664 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_bar_codes_at_a_computing_center.html
</link>
11665 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_bar_codes_at_a_computing_center.html
</guid>
11666 <pubDate>Fri,
20 Feb
2009 08:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11667 <description><p
>At work with the University of Oslo, we have several hundred computers
11668 in our computing center. This give us a challenge in tracking the
11669 location and cabling of the computers, when they are added, moved and
11670 removed. Some times the location register is not updated when a
11671 computer is inserted or moved and we then have to search the room for
11672 the
"missing
" computer.
</p
>
11674 <p
>In the last issue of Linux Journal, I came across a project
11675 <a href=
"http://www.libdmtx.org/
">libdmtx
</a
> to write and read bar
11676 code blocks as defined in the
11677 <a href=
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Matrix
">The Data Matrix
11678 Standard
</a
>. This is bar codes that can be read with a normal
11679 digital camera, for example that on a cell phone, and several such bar
11680 codes can be read by libdmtx from one picture. The bar code standard
11681 allow up to
2 KiB to be written in the tag. There is another project
11682 with
<a href=
"http://www.terryburton.co.uk/barcodewriter/
">a bar code
11683 writer written in postscript
</a
> capable of creating such bar codes,
11684 but this was the first time I found a tool to read these bar
11687 <p
>It occurred to me that this could be used to tag and track the
11688 machines in our computing center. If both racks and computers are
11689 tagged this way, we can use a picture of the rack and all its
11690 computers to detect the rack location of any computer in that rack.
11691 If we do this regularly for the entire room, we will find all
11692 locations, and can detect movements and removals.
</p
>
11694 <p
>I decided to test if this would work in practice, and picked a
11695 random rack and tagged all the machines with their names. Next, I
11696 took pictures with my digital camera, and gave the dmtxread program
11697 these JPEG pictures to see how many tags it could read. This worked
11698 fairly well. If the pictures was well focused and not taken from the
11699 side, all tags in the image could be read. Because of limited space
11700 between the racks, I was unable to get a good picture of the entire
11701 rack, but could without problem read all tags from a picture covering
11702 about half the rack. I had to limit the search time used by dmtxread
11703 to
60000 ms to make sure it terminated in a reasonable time frame.
</p
>
11705 <p
>My conclusion is that this could work, and we should probably look
11706 at adjusting our computer tagging procedures to use bar codes for
11707 easier automatic tracking of computers.
</p
>
11712 <title>When web browser developers make a video player...
</title>
11713 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/When_web_browser_developers_make_a_video_player___.html
</link>
11714 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/When_web_browser_developers_make_a_video_player___.html
</guid>
11715 <pubDate>Sat,
17 Jan
2009 18:
50:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11716 <description><p
>As part of the work we do in
<a href=
"http://www.nuug.no
">NUUG
</a
>
11717 to publish video recordings of our monthly presentations, we provide a
11718 page with embedded video for easy access to the recording. Putting a
11719 good set of HTML tags together to get working embedded video in all
11720 browsers and across all operating systems is not easy. I hope this
11721 will become easier when the
&lt;video
&gt; tag is implemented in all
11722 browsers, but I am not sure. We provide the recordings in several
11723 formats, MPEG1, Ogg Theora, H
.264 and Quicktime, and want the
11724 browser/media plugin to pick one it support and use it to play the
11725 recording, using whatever embed mechanism the browser understand.
11726 There is at least four different tags to use for this, the new HTML5
11727 &lt;video
&gt; tag, the
&lt;object
&gt; tag, the
&lt;embed
&gt; tag and
11728 the
&lt;applet
&gt; tag. All of these take a lot of options, and
11729 finding the best options is a major challenge.
</p
>
11731 <p
>I just tested the experimental Opera browser available from
<a
11732 href=
"http://labs.opera.com
">labs.opera.com
</a
>, to see how it handled
11733 a
&lt;video
&gt; tag with a few video sources and no extra attributes.
11734 I was not very impressed. The browser start by fetching a picture
11735 from the video stream. Not sure if it is the first frame, but it is
11736 definitely very early in the recording. So far, so good. Next,
11737 instead of streaming the
76 MiB video file, it start to download all
11738 of it, but do not start to play the video. This mean I have to wait
11739 for several minutes for the downloading to finish. When the download
11740 is done, the playing of the video do not start! Waiting for the
11741 download, but I do not get to see the video? Some testing later, I
11742 discover that I have to add the controls=
"true
" attribute to be able
11743 to get a play button to pres to start the video. Adding
11744 autoplay=
"true
" did not help. I sure hope this is a misfeature of the
11745 test version of Opera, and that future implementations of the
11746 &lt;video
&gt; tag will stream recordings by default, or at least start
11747 playing when the download is done.
</p
>
11749 <p
>The test page I used (since changed to add more attributes) is
11750 <a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/
20090113-foredrag-om-foredrag/
">available
11751 from the nuug site
</a
>. Will have to test it with the new Firefox
11754 <p
>In the test process, I discovered a missing feature. I was unable
11755 to find a way to get the URL of the playing video out of Opera, so I
11756 am not quite sure it picked the Ogg Theora version of the video. I
11757 sure hope it was using the announced Ogg Theora support. :)
</p
>
11762 <title>Software video mixer on a USB stick
</title>
11763 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_video_mixer_on_a_USB_stick.html
</link>
11764 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_video_mixer_on_a_USB_stick.html
</guid>
11765 <pubDate>Sun,
28 Dec
2008 15:
40:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11766 <description><p
>The
<a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/
">Norwegian Unix User Group
</a
> is
11767 recording our montly presentation on video, and recently we have
11768 worked on improving the quality of the recordings by mixing the slides
11769 directly with the video stream. For this, we use the
11770 <a href=
"http://dvswitch.alioth.debian.org/
">dvswitch
</a
> package from
11771 the Debian video team. As this require quite one computer per video
11772 source, and NUUG do not have enough laptops available, we need to
11773 borrow laptops. And to avoid having to install extra software on
11774 these borrwed laptops, I have wrapped up all the programs needed on a
11775 bootable USB stick. The software required is dvswitch with assosiated
11776 source, sink and mixer applications and
11777 <a href=
"http://www.kinodv.org/
">dvgrab
</a
>. To allow this setup to
11778 work without any configuration, I
've patched dvswitch to use
11779 <a href=
"http://www.avahi.org/
">avahi
</a
> to connect the various parts
11780 together. And to allow us to use laptops without firewire plugs, I
11781 upgraded dvgrab to the one from Debian/unstable to get one that work
11782 with USB sources. We have not yet tested this setup in a production
11783 setup, but I hope it will work properly, and allow us to set up a
11784 video mixer in a very short time frame. We will need it for
11785 <a href=
"http://www.goopen.no/
">Go Open
2009</a
>.
</p
>
11787 <p
><a href=
"http://www.nuug.no/pub/video/bin/usbstick-dvswitch.img.gz
">The
11788 USB image
</a
> is for a
1 GB memory stick, but can be used on any
11789 larger stick as well.
</p
>
11794 <title>Devcamp brought us closer to the Lenny based Debian Edu release
</title>
11795 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Devcamp_brought_us_closer_to_the_Lenny_based_Debian_Edu_release.html
</link>
11796 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Devcamp_brought_us_closer_to_the_Lenny_based_Debian_Edu_release.html
</guid>
11797 <pubDate>Sun,
7 Dec
2008 12:
00:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11798 <description><p
>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
11799 Oslo. Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
11800 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
11801 LTSP installation. LTSP now work out of the box on the
10-network.
11802 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
11803 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box. Was working on getting the
11804 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
11805 finish it before the weekend was up.
</p
>
11807 <p
>Did not find time to look at the
4 VGA cards in one box we got from
11808 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
11809 development gathering. Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
11810 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
11811 of these cards.
</p
>
11816 <title>The sorry state of multimedia browser plugins in Debian
</title>
11817 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_sorry_state_of_multimedia_browser_plugins_in_Debian.html
</link>
11818 <guid isPermaLink=
"true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_sorry_state_of_multimedia_browser_plugins_in_Debian.html
</guid>
11819 <pubDate>Tue,
25 Nov
2008 00:
10:
00 +
0100</pubDate>
11820 <description><p
>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
11821 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
11822 default in Debian Edu. We need an embedded video playing plugin with
11823 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
11824 all the multimedia content available on the web. The test results and
11825 notes are available on
11826 <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia
">the
11827 Debian wiki
</a
>. I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
11828 fill this need. My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
11829 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages. A lot of the MIME
11830 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
11831 video/ogg), just do not work. And simple formats like the
11832 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn
't supported by the
11833 totem and vlc plugins. I hope the situation will improve soon. No
11834 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.
</p
>
11836 <p
>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin. It seem to
11837 be the only one fitting our needs. :/
</p
>
projects / homepage.git / blob