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  13  <h1>
  14      <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/">Petter Reinholdtsen</a>
  15
  16  </h1>
  17
  18 </div>
  19
  20
  21     <h3>Entries tagged "debian".</h3>
  22
  23     <div class="entry">
  24       <div class="title">
  25         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Generating_3D_prints_in_Debian_using_Cura_and_Slic3r__prusa_.html">Generating 3D prints in Debian using Cura and Slic3r(-prusa)</a>
  26       </div>
  27       <div class="date">
  28          9th October 2017
  29       </div>
  30       <div class="body">
  31         <p>At my nearby maker space,
  32 <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Sonen</a>, I heard the story that it
  33 was easier to generate gcode files for theyr 3D printers (Ultimake 2+)
  34 on Windows and MacOS X than Linux, because the software involved had
  35 to be manually compiled and set up on Linux while premade packages
  36 worked out of the box on Windows and MacOS X.  I found this annoying,
  37 as the software involved,
  38 <a href="https://github.com/Ultimaker/Cura">Cura</a>, is free software
  39 and should be trivial to get up and running on Linux if someone took
  40 the time to package it for the relevant distributions.  I even found
  41 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/706656">a request for adding into
  42 Debian</a> from 2013, which had seem some activity over the years but
  43 never resulted in the software showing up in Debian.  So a few days
  44 ago I offered my help to try to improve the situation.</p>
  45
  46 <p>Now I am very happy to see that all the packages required by a
  47 working Cura in Debian are uploaded into Debian and waiting in the NEW
  48 queue for the ftpmasters to have a look.  You can track the progress
  49 on
  50 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?email=3dprinter-general%40lists.alioth.debian.org">the
  51 status page for the 3D printer team</a>.</p>
  52
  53 <p>The uploaded packages are a bit behind upstream, and was uploaded
  54 now to get slots in <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW
  55 queue</a> while we work up updating the packages to the latest
  56 upstream version.</p>
  57
  58 <p>On a related note, two competitors for Cura, which I found harder
  59 to use and was unable to configure correctly for Ultimaker 2+ in the
  60 short time I spent on it, are already in Debian.  If you are looking
  61 for 3D printer "slicers" and want something already available in
  62 Debian, check out
  63 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r">slic3r</a> and
  64 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r-prusa">slic3r-prusa</a>.
  65 The latter is a fork of the former.</p>
  66
  67       </div>
  68       <div class="tags">
  69
  70
  71         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
  72
  73
  74       </div>
  75     </div>
  76     <div class="padding"></div>
  77
  78     <div class="entry">
  79       <div class="title">
  80         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Visualizing_GSM_radio_chatter_using_gr_gsm_and_Hopglass.html">Visualizing GSM radio chatter using gr-gsm and Hopglass</a>
  81       </div>
  82       <div class="date">
  83         29th September 2017
  84       </div>
  85       <div class="body">
  86         <p>Every mobile phone announce its existence over radio to the nearby
  87 mobile cell towers.  And this radio chatter is available for anyone
  88 with a radio receiver capable of receiving them.  Details about the
  89 mobile phones with very good accuracy is of course collected by the
  90 phone companies, but this is not the topic of this blog post.  The
  91 mobile phone radio chatter make it possible to figure out when a cell
  92 phone is nearby, as it include the SIM card ID (IMSI).  By paying
  93 attention over time, one can see when a phone arrive and when it leave
  94 an area.  I believe it would be nice to make this information more
  95 available to the general public, to make more people aware of how
  96 their phones are announcing their whereabouts to anyone that care to
  97 listen.</p>
  98
  99 <p>I am very happy to report that we managed to get something
 100 visualizing this information up and running for
 101 <a href="http://norwaymakers.org/osf17">Oslo Skaperfestival 2017</a>
 102 (Oslo Makers Festival) taking place today and tomorrow at Deichmanske
 103 library.  The solution is based on the
 104 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Easier_recipe_to_observe_the_cell_phones_around_you.html">simple
 105 recipe for listening to GSM chatter</a> I posted a few days ago, and
 106 will show up at the stand of <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Åpen
 107 Sone from the Computer Science department of the University of
 108 Oslo</a>.  The presentation will show the nearby mobile phones (aka
 109 IMSIs) as dots in a web browser graph, with lines to the dot
 110 representing mobile base station it is talking to. It was working in
 111 the lab yesterday, and was moved into place this morning.</p>
 112
 113 <p>We set up a fairly powerful desktop machine using Debian
 114 Buster/Testing with several (five, I believe) RTL2838 DVB-T receivers
 115 connected and visualize the visible cell phone towers using an
 116 <a href="https://github.com/marlow925/hopglass">English version of
 117 Hopglass</a>.  A fairly powerfull machine is needed as the
 118 grgsm_livemon_headless processes from
 119 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a> converting
 120 the radio signal to data packages is quite CPU intensive.</p>
 121
 122 <p>The frequencies to listen to, are identified using a slightly
 123 patched scan-and-livemon (to set the --args values for each receiver),
 124 and the Hopglass data is generated using the
 125 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/IMSI-catcher/tree/meshviewer-output">patches
 126 in my meshviewer-output branch</a>.  For some reason we could not get
 127 more than four SDRs working.  There is also a geographical map trying
 128 to show the location of the base stations, but I believe their
 129 coordinates are hardcoded to some random location in Germany, I
 130 believe.  The code should be replaced with code to look up location in
 131 a text file, a sqlite database or one of the online databases
 132 mentioned in
 133 <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher/issues/14">the github
 134 issue for the topic</a>.
 135
 136 <p>If this sound interesting, visit the stand at the festival!</p>
 137
 138       </div>
 139       <div class="tags">
 140
 141
 142         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
 143
 144
 145       </div>
 146     </div>
 147     <div class="padding"></div>
 148
 149     <div class="entry">
 150       <div class="title">
 151         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Easier_recipe_to_observe_the_cell_phones_around_you.html">Easier recipe to observe the cell phones around you</a>
 152       </div>
 153       <div class="date">
 154         24th September 2017
 155       </div>
 156       <div class="body">
 157         <p>A little more than a month ago I wrote
 158 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simpler_recipe_on_how_to_make_a_simple__7_IMSI_Catcher_using_Debian.html">how
 159 to observe the SIM card ID (aka IMSI number) of mobile phones talking
 160 to nearby mobile phone base stations using Debian GNU/Linux and a
 161 cheap USB software defined radio</a>, and thus being able to pinpoint
 162 the location of people and equipment (like cars and trains) with an
 163 accuracy of a few kilometer.  Since then we have worked to make the
 164 procedure even simpler, and it is now possible to do this without any
 165 manual frequency tuning and without building your own packages.</p>
 166
 167 <p>The <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a>
 168 package is now included in Debian testing and unstable, and the
 169 IMSI-catcher code no longer require root access to fetch and decode
 170 the GSM data collected using gr-gsm.</p>
 171
 172 <p>Here is an updated recipe, using packages built by Debian and a git
 173 clone of two python scripts:</p>
 174
 175 <ol>
 176
 177 <li>Start with a Debian machine running the Buster version (aka
 178   testing).</li>
 179
 180 <li>Run '<tt>apt install gr-gsm python-numpy python-scipy
 181   python-scapy</tt>' as root to install required packages.</li>
 182
 183 <li>Fetch the code decoding GSM packages using '<tt>git clone
 184   github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher.git</tt>'.</li>
 185
 186 <li>Insert USB software defined radio supported by GNU Radio.</li>
 187
 188 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
 189   scan-and-livemon</tt>' to locate the frequency of nearby base
 190   stations and start listening for GSM packages on one of them.</li>
 191
 192 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
 193   simple_IMSI-catcher.py</tt>' to display the collected information.</li>
 194
 195 </ol>
 196
 197 <p>Note, due to a bug somewhere the scan-and-livemon program (actually
 198 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/issues/336">its underlying
 199 program grgsm_scanner</a>) do not work with the HackRF radio.  It does
 200 work with RTL 8232 and other similar USB radio receivers you can get
 201 very cheaply
 202 (<a href="https://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=rtl+2832">for example
 203 from ebay</a>), so for now the solution is to scan using the RTL radio
 204 and only use HackRF for fetching GSM data.</p>
 205
 206 <p>As far as I can tell, a cell phone only show up on one of the
 207 frequencies at the time, so if you are going to track and count every
 208 cell phone around you, you need to listen to all the frequencies used.
 209 To listen to several frequencies, use the --numrecv argument to
 210 scan-and-livemon to use several receivers.  Further, I am not sure if
 211 phones using 3G or 4G will show as talking GSM to base stations, so
 212 this approach might not see all phones around you.  I typically see
 213 0-400 IMSI numbers an hour when looking around where I live.</p>
 214
 215 <p>I've tried to run the scanner on a
 216 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi 2 and 3
 217 running Debian Buster</a>, but the grgsm_livemon_headless process seem
 218 to be too CPU intensive to keep up.  When GNU Radio print 'O' to
 219 stdout, I am told there it is caused by a buffer overflow between the
 220 radio and GNU Radio, caused by the program being unable to read the
 221 GSM data fast enough.  If you see a stream of 'O's from the terminal
 222 where you started scan-and-livemon, you need a give the process more
 223 CPU power.  Perhaps someone are able to optimize the code to a point
 224 where it become possible to set up RPi3 based GSM sniffers?  I tried
 225 using Raspbian instead of Debian, but there seem to be something wrong
 226 with GNU Radio on raspbian, causing glibc to abort().</p>
 227
 228       </div>
 229       <div class="tags">
 230
 231
 232         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
 233
 234
 235       </div>
 236     </div>
 237     <div class="padding"></div>
 238
 239     <div class="entry">
 240       <div class="title">
 241         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simpler_recipe_on_how_to_make_a_simple__7_IMSI_Catcher_using_Debian.html">Simpler recipe on how to make a simple $7 IMSI Catcher using Debian</a>
 242       </div>
 243       <div class="date">
 244          9th August 2017
 245       </div>
 246       <div class="body">
 247         <p>On friday, I came across an interesting article in the Norwegian
 248 web based ICT news magazine digi.no on
 249 <a href="https://www.digi.no/artikler/sikkerhetsforsker-lagde-enkel-imsi-catcher-for-60-kroner-na-kan-mobiler-kartlegges-av-alle/398588">how
 250 to collect the IMSI numbers of nearby cell phones</a> using the cheap
 251 DVB-T software defined radios.  The article refered to instructions
 252 and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjwgNd_as30">a recipe by
 253 Keld Norman on Youtube on how to make a simple $7 IMSI Catcher</a>, and I decided to test them out.</p>
 254
 255 <p>The instructions said to use Ubuntu, install pip using apt (to
 256 bypass apt), use pip to install pybombs (to bypass both apt and pip),
 257 and the ask pybombs to fetch and build everything you need from
 258 scratch.  I wanted to see if I could do the same on the most recent
 259 Debian packages, but this did not work because pybombs tried to build
 260 stuff that no longer build with the most recent openssl library or
 261 some other version skew problem.  While trying to get this recipe
 262 working, I learned that the apt->pip->pybombs route was a long detour,
 263 and the only piece of software dependency missing in Debian was the
 264 gr-gsm package.  I also found out that the lead upstream developer of
 265 gr-gsm (the name stand for GNU Radio GSM) project already had a set of
 266 Debian packages provided in an Ubuntu PPA repository.  All I needed to
 267 do was to dget the Debian source package and built it.</p>
 268
 269 <p>The IMSI collector is a python script listening for packages on the
 270 loopback network device and printing to the terminal some specific GSM
 271 packages with IMSI numbers in them.  The code is fairly short and easy
 272 to understand.  The reason this work is because gr-gsm include a tool
 273 to read GSM data from a software defined radio like a DVB-T USB stick
 274 and other software defined radios, decode them and inject them into a
 275 network device on your Linux machine (using the loopback device by
 276 default).  This proved to work just fine, and I've been testing the
 277 collector for a few days now.</p>
 278
 279 <p>The updated and simpler recipe is thus to</p>
 280
 281 <ol>
 282
 283 <li>start with a Debian machine running Stretch or newer,</li>
 284
 285 <li>build and install the gr-gsm package available from
 286 <a href="http://ppa.launchpad.net/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/ubuntu/pool/main/g/gr-gsm/">http://ppa.launchpad.net/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/ubuntu/pool/main/g/gr-gsm/</a>,</li>
 287
 288 <li>clone the git repostory from <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher">https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher</a>,</li>
 289
 290 <li>run grgsm_livemon and adjust the frequency until the terminal
 291 where it was started is filled with a stream of text (meaning you
 292 found a GSM station).</li>
 293
 294 <li>go into the IMSI-catcher directory and run 'sudo python simple_IMSI-catcher.py' to extract the IMSI numbers.</li>
 295
 296 </ol>
 297
 298 <p>To make it even easier in the future to get this sniffer up and
 299 running, I decided to package
 300 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/">the gr-gsm project</a>
 301 for Debian (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/871055">WNPP
 302 #871055</a>), and the package was uploaded into the NEW queue today.
 303 Luckily the gnuradio maintainer has promised to help me, as I do not
 304 know much about gnuradio stuff yet.</p>
 305
 306 <p>I doubt this "IMSI cacher" is anywhere near as powerfull as
 307 commercial tools like
 308 <a href="https://www.thespyphone.com/portable-imsi-imei-catcher/">The
 309 Spy Phone Portable IMSI / IMEI Catcher</a> or the
 310 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_phone_tracker">Harris
 311 Stingray</a>, but I hope the existance of cheap alternatives can make
 312 more people realise how their whereabouts when carrying a cell phone
 313 is easily tracked.  Seeing the data flow on the screen, realizing that
 314 I live close to a police station and knowing that the police is also
 315 wearing cell phones, I wonder how hard it would be for criminals to
 316 track the position of the police officers to discover when there are
 317 police near by, or for foreign military forces to track the location
 318 of the Norwegian military forces, or for anyone to track the location
 319 of government officials...</p>
 320
 321 <p>It is worth noting that the data reported by the IMSI-catcher
 322 script mentioned above is only a fraction of the data broadcasted on
 323 the GSM network.  It will only collect one frequency at the time,
 324 while a typical phone will be using several frequencies, and not all
 325 phones will be using the frequencies tracked by the grgsm_livemod
 326 program.  Also, there is a lot of radio chatter being ignored by the
 327 simple_IMSI-catcher script, which would be collected by extending the
 328 parser code.  I wonder if gr-gsm can be set up to listen to more than
 329 one frequency?</p>
 330
 331       </div>
 332       <div class="tags">
 333
 334
 335         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
 336
 337
 338       </div>
 339     </div>
 340     <div class="padding"></div>
 341
 342     <div class="entry">
 343       <div class="title">
 344         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook_is_now_available.html">Norwegian Bokmål edition of Debian Administrator's Handbook is now available</a>
 345       </div>
 346       <div class="date">
 347         25th July 2017
 348       </div>
 349       <div class="body">
 350         <p align="center"><img align="center" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-07-25-debian-handbook-nb-testprint.png"/></p>
 351
 352 <p>I finally received a copy of the Norwegian Bokmål edition of
 353 "<a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian Administrator's
 354 Handbook</a>".  This test copy arrived in the mail a few days ago, and
 355 I am very happy to hold the result in my hand.   We spent around one and a half year translating it. This paperbook edition
 356 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/#norwegian">is available
 357 from lulu.com</a>.  If you buy it quickly, you save 25% on the list
 358 price.  The book is also available for download in electronic form as
 359 PDF, EPUB and Mobipocket, as can be
 360 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/browse/nb-NO/stable/">read online
 361 as a web page</a>.</p>
 362
 363 <p>This is the second book I publish (the first was the book
 364 "<a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a>" by Lawrence Lessig
 365 in
 366 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22440520.html">English</a>,
 367 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/culture-libre/paperback/product-22645082.html">French</a>
 368 and
 369 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/fri-kultur/paperback/product-22441576.html">Norwegian
 370 Bokmål</a>), and I am very excited to finally wrap up this
 371 project.  I hope
 372 "<a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/rapha%C3%ABl-hertzog-and-roland-mas/h%C3%A5ndbok-for-debian-administratoren/paperback/product-23262290.html">Håndbok
 373 for Debian-administratoren</a>" will be well received.</p>
 374
 375       </div>
 376       <div class="tags">
 377
 378
 379         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 380
 381
 382       </div>
 383     </div>
 384     <div class="padding"></div>
 385
 386     <div class="entry">
 387       <div class="title">
 388         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/N_r_nynorskoversettelsen_svikter_til_eksamen___.html">Når nynorskoversettelsen svikter til eksamen...</a>
 389       </div>
 390       <div class="date">
 391          3rd June 2017
 392       </div>
 393       <div class="body">
 394         <p><a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/norge/Krever-at-elever-ma-fa-annullert-eksamen-etter-rot-med-oppgavetekster-622459b.html">Aftenposten
 395 melder i dag</a> om feil i eksamensoppgavene for eksamen i politikk og
 396 menneskerettigheter, der teksten i bokmåls og nynorskutgaven ikke var
 397 like.  Oppgaveteksten er gjengitt i artikkelen, og jeg ble nysgjerring
 398 på om den fri oversetterløsningen
 399 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium</a> ville gjort en bedre
 400 jobb enn Utdanningsdirektoratet.  Det kan se slik ut.</p>
 401
 402 <p>Her er bokmålsoppgaven fra eksamenen:</p>
 403
 404 <blockquote>
 405 <p>Drøft utfordringene knyttet til nasjonalstatenes og andre aktørers
 406 rolle og muligheter til å håndtere internasjonale utfordringer, som
 407 for eksempel flykningekrisen.</p>
 408
 409 <p>Vedlegge er eksempler på tekster som kan gi relevante perspektiver
 410 på temaet:</p>
 411 <ol>
 412 <li>Flykningeregnskapet 2016, UNHCR og IDMC
 413 <li>«Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015
 414 </ol>
 415
 416 </blockquote>
 417
 418 <p>Dette oversetter Apertium slik:</p>
 419
 420 <blockquote>
 421 <p>Drøft utfordringane knytte til nasjonalstatane sine og rolla til
 422 andre aktørar og høve til å handtera internasjonale utfordringar, som
 423 til dømes *flykningekrisen.</p>
 424
 425 <p>Vedleggja er døme på tekster som kan gje relevante perspektiv på
 426 temaet:</p>
 427
 428 <ol>
 429 <li>*Flykningeregnskapet 2016, *UNHCR og *IDMC</li>
 430 <li>«*Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015</li>
 431 </ol>
 432
 433 </blockquote>
 434
 435 <p>Ord som ikke ble forstått er markert med stjerne (*), og trenger
 436 ekstra språksjekk.  Men ingen ord er forsvunnet, slik det var i
 437 oppgaven elevene fikk presentert på eksamen.  Jeg mistenker dog at
 438 "andre aktørers rolle og muligheter til ..." burde vært oversatt til
 439 "rolla til andre aktørar og deira høve til ..." eller noe slikt, men
 440 det er kanskje flisespikking.  Det understreker vel bare at det alltid
 441 trengs korrekturlesning etter automatisk oversettelse.</p>
 442
 443       </div>
 444       <div class="tags">
 445
 446
 447         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll</a>.
 448
 449
 450       </div>
 451     </div>
 452     <div class="padding"></div>
 453
 454     <div class="entry">
 455       <div class="title">
 456         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Detecting_NFS_hangs_on_Linux_without_hanging_yourself___.html">Detecting NFS hangs on Linux without hanging yourself...</a>
 457       </div>
 458       <div class="date">
 459          9th March 2017
 460       </div>
 461       <div class="body">
 462         <p>Over the years, administrating thousand of NFS mounting linux
 463 computers at the time, I often needed a way to detect if the machine
 464 was experiencing NFS hang.  If you try to use <tt>df</tt> or look at a
 465 file or directory affected by the hang, the process (and possibly the
 466 shell) will hang too.  So you want to be able to detect this without
 467 risking the detection process getting stuck too.  It has not been
 468 obvious how to do this.  When the hang has lasted a while, it is
 469 possible to find messages like these in dmesg:</p>
 470
 471 <p><blockquote>
 472 nfs: server nfsserver not responding, still trying
 473 <br>nfs: server nfsserver OK
 474 </blockquote></p>
 475
 476 <p>It is hard to know if the hang is still going on, and it is hard to
 477 be sure looking in dmesg is going to work.  If there are lots of other
 478 messages in dmesg the lines might have rotated out of site before they
 479 are noticed.</p>
 480
 481 <p>While reading through the nfs client implementation in linux kernel
 482 code, I came across some statistics that seem to give a way to detect
 483 it.  The om_timeouts sunrpc value in the kernel will increase every
 484 time the above log entry is inserted into dmesg.  And after digging a
 485 bit further, I discovered that this value show up in
 486 /proc/self/mountstats on Linux.</p>
 487
 488 <p>The mountstats content seem to be shared between files using the
 489 same file system context, so it is enough to check one of the
 490 mountstats files to get the state of the mount point for the machine.
 491 I assume this will not show lazy umounted NFS points, nor NFS mount
 492 points in a different process context (ie with a different filesystem
 493 view), but that does not worry me.</p>
 494
 495 <p>The content for a NFS mount point look similar to this:</p>
 496
 497 <p><blockquote><pre>
 498 [...]
 499 device /dev/mapper/Debian-var mounted on /var with fstype ext3
 500 device nfsserver:/mnt/nfsserver/home0 mounted on /mnt/nfsserver/home0 with fstype nfs statvers=1.1
 501         opts:   rw,vers=3,rsize=65536,wsize=65536,namlen=255,acregmin=3,acregmax=60,acdirmin=30,acdirmax=60,soft,nolock,proto=tcp,timeo=600,retrans=2,sec=sys,mountaddr=129.240.3.145,mountvers=3,mountport=4048,mountproto=udp,local_lock=all
 502         age:    7863311
 503         caps:   caps=0x3fe7,wtmult=4096,dtsize=8192,bsize=0,namlen=255
 504         sec:    flavor=1,pseudoflavor=1
 505         events: 61063112 732346265 1028140 35486205 16220064 8162542 761447191 71714012 37189 3891185 45561809 110486139 4850138 420353 15449177 296502 52736725 13523379 0 52182 9016896 1231 0 0 0 0 0
 506         bytes:  166253035039 219519120027 0 0 40783504807 185466229638 11677877 45561809
 507         RPC iostats version: 1.0  p/v: 100003/3 (nfs)
 508         xprt:   tcp 925 1 6810 0 0 111505412 111480497 109 2672418560317 0 248 53869103 22481820
 509         per-op statistics
 510                 NULL: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
 511              GETATTR: 61063106 61063108 0 9621383060 6839064400 453650 77291321 78926132
 512              SETATTR: 463469 463470 0 92005440 66739536 63787 603235 687943
 513               LOOKUP: 17021657 17021657 0 3354097764 4013442928 57216 35125459 35566511
 514               ACCESS: 14281703 14290009 5 2318400592 1713803640 1709282 4865144 7130140
 515             READLINK: 125 125 0 20472 18620 0 1112 1118
 516                 READ: 4214236 4214237 0 715608524 41328653212 89884 22622768 22806693
 517                WRITE: 8479010 8494376 22 187695798568 1356087148 178264904 51506907 231671771
 518               CREATE: 171708 171708 0 38084748 46702272 873 1041833 1050398
 519                MKDIR: 3680 3680 0 773980 993920 26 23990 24245
 520              SYMLINK: 903 903 0 233428 245488 6 5865 5917
 521                MKNOD: 80 80 0 20148 21760 0 299 304
 522               REMOVE: 429921 429921 0 79796004 61908192 3313 2710416 2741636
 523                RMDIR: 3367 3367 0 645112 484848 22 5782 6002
 524               RENAME: 466201 466201 0 130026184 121212260 7075 5935207 5961288
 525                 LINK: 289155 289155 0 72775556 67083960 2199 2565060 2585579
 526              READDIR: 2933237 2933237 0 516506204 13973833412 10385 3190199 3297917
 527          READDIRPLUS: 1652839 1652839 0 298640972 6895997744 84735 14307895 14448937
 528               FSSTAT: 6144 6144 0 1010516 1032192 51 9654 10022
 529               FSINFO: 2 2 0 232 328 0 1 1
 530             PATHCONF: 1 1 0 116 140 0 0 0
 531               COMMIT: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
 532
 533 device binfmt_misc mounted on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc with fstype binfmt_misc
 534 [...]
 535 </pre></blockquote></p>
 536
 537 <p>The key number to look at is the third number in the per-op list.
 538 It is the number of NFS timeouts experiences per file system
 539 operation.  Here 22 write timeouts and 5 access timeouts.  If these
 540 numbers are increasing, I believe the machine is experiencing NFS
 541 hang.  Unfortunately the timeout value do not start to increase right
 542 away.  The NFS operations need to time out first, and this can take a
 543 while.  The exact timeout value depend on the setup.  For example the
 544 defaults for TCP and UDP mount points are quite different, and the
 545 timeout value is affected by the soft, hard, timeo and retrans NFS
 546 mount options.</p>
 547
 548 <p>The only way I have been able to get working on Debian and RedHat
 549 Enterprise Linux for getting the timeout count is to peek in /proc/.
 550 But according to
 551 <ahref="http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19253-01/816-4555/netmonitor-12/index.html">Solaris
 552 10 System Administration Guide: Network Services</a>, the 'nfsstat -c'
 553 command can be used to get these timeout values.  But this do not work
 554 on Linux, as far as I can tell.  I
 555 <ahref="http://bugs.debian.org/857043">asked Debian about this</a>,
 556 but have not seen any replies yet.</p>
 557
 558 <p>Is there a better way to figure out if a Linux NFS client is
 559 experiencing NFS hangs?  Is there a way to detect which processes are
 560 affected?  Is there a way to get the NFS mount going quickly once the
 561 network problem causing the NFS hang has been cleared?  I would very
 562 much welcome some clues, as we regularly run into NFS hangs.</p>
 563
 564       </div>
 565       <div class="tags">
 566
 567
 568         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin</a>.
 569
 570
 571       </div>
 572     </div>
 573     <div class="padding"></div>
 574
 575     <div class="entry">
 576       <div class="title">
 577         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Norwegian_Bokm_l_translation_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook_complete__proofreading_in_progress.html">Norwegian Bokmål translation of The Debian Administrator's Handbook complete, proofreading in progress</a>
 578       </div>
 579       <div class="date">
 580          3rd March 2017
 581       </div>
 582       <div class="body">
 583         <p>For almost a year now, we have been working on making a Norwegian
 584 Bokmål edition of <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian
 585 Administrator's Handbook</a>.  Now, thanks to the tireless effort of
 586 Ole-Erik, Ingrid and Andreas, the initial translation is complete, and
 587 we are working on the proof reading to ensure consistent language and
 588 use of correct computer science terms.  The plan is to make the book
 589 available on paper, as well as in electronic form.  For that to
 590 happen, the proof reading must be completed and all the figures need
 591 to be translated.  If you want to help out, get in touch.</p>
 592
 593 <p><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-handbook/debian-handbook-nb-NO.pdf">A
 594
 595 fresh PDF edition</a> in A4 format (the final book will have smaller
 596 pages) of the book created every morning is available for
 597 proofreading.  If you find any errors, please
 598 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">visit
 599 Weblate and correct the error</a>.  The
 600 <a href="http://l.github.io/debian-handbook/stat/nb-NO/index.html">state
 601 of the translation including figures</a> is a useful source for those
 602 provide Norwegian bokmål screen shots and figures.</p>
 603
 604       </div>
 605       <div class="tags">
 606
 607
 608         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 609
 610
 611       </div>
 612     </div>
 613     <div class="padding"></div>
 614
 615     <div class="entry">
 616       <div class="title">
 617         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlimited_randomness_with_the_ChaosKey_.html">Unlimited randomness with the ChaosKey?</a>
 618       </div>
 619       <div class="date">
 620          1st March 2017
 621       </div>
 622       <div class="body">
 623         <p>A few days ago I ordered a small batch of
 624 <a href="http://altusmetrum.org/ChaosKey/">the ChaosKey</a>, a small
 625 USB dongle for generating entropy created by Bdale Garbee and Keith
 626 Packard.  Yesterday it arrived, and I am very happy to report that it
 627 work great!  According to its designers, to get it to work out of the
 628 box, you need the Linux kernel version 4.1 or later.  I tested on a
 629 Debian Stretch machine (kernel version 4.9), and there it worked just
 630 fine, increasing the available entropy very quickly.  I wrote a small
 631 test oneliner to test.  It first print the current entropy level,
 632 drain /dev/random, and then print the entropy level for five seconds.
 633 Here is the situation without the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
 634
 635 <blockquote><pre>
 636 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 637   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
 638   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
 639      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 640      sleep 1; \
 641   done
 642 300
 643 0+1 oppføringer inn
 644 0+1 oppføringer ut
 645 28 byte kopiert, 0,000264565 s, 106 kB/s
 646 4
 647 8
 648 12
 649 17
 650 21
 651 %
 652 </pre></blockquote>
 653
 654 <p>The entropy level increases by 3-4 every second.  In such case any
 655 application requiring random bits (like a HTTPS enabled web server)
 656 will halt and wait for more entrpy.  And here is the situation with
 657 the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
 658
 659 <blockquote><pre>
 660 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 661   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
 662   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
 663      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 664      sleep 1; \
 665   done
 666 1079
 667 0+1 oppføringer inn
 668 0+1 oppføringer ut
 669 104 byte kopiert, 0,000487647 s, 213 kB/s
 670 433
 671 1028
 672 1031
 673 1035
 674 1038
 675 %
 676 </pre></blockquote>
 677
 678 <p>Quite the difference. :) I bought a few more than I need, in case
 679 someone want to buy one here in Norway. :)</p>
 680
 681 <p>Update: The dongle was presented at Debconf last year.  You might
 682 find <a href="https://debconf16.debconf.org/talks/94/">the talk
 683 recording illuminating</a>.  It explains exactly what the source of
 684 randomness is, if you are unable to spot it from the schema drawing
 685 available from the ChaosKey web site linked at the start of this blog
 686 post.</p>
 687
 688       </div>
 689       <div class="tags">
 690
 691
 692         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 693
 694
 695       </div>
 696     </div>
 697     <div class="padding"></div>
 698
 699     <div class="entry">
 700       <div class="title">
 701         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Where_did_that_package_go___mdash__geolocated_IP_traceroute.html">Where did that package go? &mdash; geolocated IP traceroute</a>
 702       </div>
 703       <div class="date">
 704          9th January 2017
 705       </div>
 706       <div class="body">
 707         <p>Did you ever wonder where the web trafic really flow to reach the
 708 web servers, and who own the network equipment it is flowing through?
 709 It is possible to get a glimpse of this from using traceroute, but it
 710 is hard to find all the details.  Many years ago, I wrote a system to
 711 map the Norwegian Internet (trying to figure out if our plans for a
 712 network game service would get low enough latency, and who we needed
 713 to talk to about setting up game servers close to the users.  Back
 714 then I used traceroute output from many locations (I asked my friends
 715 to run a script and send me their traceroute output) to create the
 716 graph and the map.  The output from traceroute typically look like
 717 this:
 718
 719 <p><pre>
 720 traceroute to www.stortinget.no (85.88.67.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
 721  1  uio-gw10.uio.no (129.240.202.1)  0.447 ms  0.486 ms  0.621 ms
 722  2  uio-gw8.uio.no (129.240.24.229)  0.467 ms  0.578 ms  0.675 ms
 723  3  oslo-gw1.uninett.no (128.39.65.17)  0.385 ms  0.373 ms  0.358 ms
 724  4  te3-1-2.br1.fn3.as2116.net (193.156.90.3)  1.174 ms  1.172 ms  1.153 ms
 725  5  he16-1-1.cr1.san110.as2116.net (195.0.244.234)  2.627 ms he16-1-1.cr2.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.244.48)  3.172 ms he16-1-1.cr1.san110.as2116.net (195.0.244.234)  2.857 ms
 726  6  ae1.ar8.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.242.39)  0.662 ms  0.637 ms ae0.ar8.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.242.23)  0.622 ms
 727  7  89.191.10.146 (89.191.10.146)  0.931 ms  0.917 ms  0.955 ms
 728  8  * * *
 729  9  * * *
 730 [...]
 731 </pre></p>
 732
 733 <p>This show the DNS names and IP addresses of (at least some of the)
 734 network equipment involved in getting the data traffic from me to the
 735 www.stortinget.no server, and how long it took in milliseconds for a
 736 package to reach the equipment and return to me.  Three packages are
 737 sent, and some times the packages do not follow the same path.  This
 738 is shown for hop 5, where three different IP addresses replied to the
 739 traceroute request.</p>
 740
 741 <p>There are many ways to measure trace routes.  Other good traceroute
 742 implementations I use are traceroute (using ICMP packages) mtr (can do
 743 both ICMP, UDP and TCP) and scapy (python library with ICMP, UDP, TCP
 744 traceroute and a lot of other capabilities).  All of them are easily
 745 available in <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>.</p>
 746
 747 <p>This time around, I wanted to know the geographic location of
 748 different route points, to visualize how visiting a web page spread
 749 information about the visit to a lot of servers around the globe.  The
 750 background is that a web site today often will ask the browser to get
 751 from many servers the parts (for example HTML, JSON, fonts,
 752 JavaScript, CSS, video) required to display the content.  This will
 753 leak information about the visit to those controlling these servers
 754 and anyone able to peek at the data traffic passing by (like your ISP,
 755 the ISPs backbone provider, FRA, GCHQ, NSA and others).</p>
 756
 757 <p>Lets pick an example, the Norwegian parliament web site
 758 www.stortinget.no.  It is read daily by all members of parliament and
 759 their staff, as well as political journalists, activits and many other
 760 citizens of Norway.  A visit to the www.stortinget.no web site will
 761 ask your browser to contact 8 other servers: ajax.googleapis.com,
 762 insights.hotjar.com, script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com,
 763 stats.g.doubleclick.net, www.google-analytics.com,
 764 www.googletagmanager.com and www.netigate.se.  I extracted this by
 765 asking <a href="http://phantomjs.org/">PhantomJS</a> to visit the
 766 Stortinget web page and tell me all the URLs PhantomJS downloaded to
 767 render the page (in HAR format using
 768 <a href="https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/blob/master/examples/netsniff.js">their
 769 netsniff example</a>.  I am very grateful to Gorm for showing me how
 770 to do this).  My goal is to visualize network traces to all IP
 771 addresses behind these DNS names, do show where visitors personal
 772 information is spread when visiting the page.</p>
 773
 774 <p align="center"><a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml"><img
 775 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geoip-small.png" alt="map of combined traces for URLs used by www.stortinget.no using GeoIP"/></a></p>
 776
 777 <p>When I had a look around for options, I could not find any good
 778 free software tools to do this, and decided I needed my own traceroute
 779 wrapper outputting KML based on locations looked up using GeoIP.  KML
 780 is easy to work with and easy to generate, and understood by several
 781 of the GIS tools I have available.  I got good help from by NUUG
 782 colleague Anders Einar with this, and the result can be seen in
 783 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/kmltraceroute">my
 784 kmltraceroute git repository</a>.  Unfortunately, the quality of the
 785 free GeoIP databases I could find (and the for-pay databases my
 786 friends had access to) is not up to the task.  The IP addresses of
 787 central Internet infrastructure would typically be placed near the
 788 controlling companies main office, and not where the router is really
 789 located, as you can see from <a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml">the
 790 KML file I created</a> using the GeoLite City dataset from MaxMind.
 791
 792 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg"><img
 793 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy-small.png" alt="scapy traceroute graph for URLs used by www.stortinget.no"/></a></p>
 794
 795 <p>I also had a look at the visual traceroute graph created by
 796 <a href="http://www.secdev.org/projects/scapy/">the scrapy project</a>,
 797 showing IP network ownership (aka AS owner) for the IP address in
 798 question.
 799 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg">The
 800 graph display a lot of useful information about the traceroute in SVG
 801 format</a>, and give a good indication on who control the network
 802 equipment involved, but it do not include geolocation.  This graph
 803 make it possible to see the information is made available at least for
 804 UNINETT, Catchcom, Stortinget, Nordunet, Google, Amazon, Telia, Level
 805 3 Communications and NetDNA.</p>
 806
 807 <p align="center"><a href="https://geotraceroute.com/index.php?node=4&host=www.stortinget.no"><img
 808 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-small.png" alt="example geotraceroute view for www.stortinget.no"/></a></p>
 809
 810 <p>In the process, I came across the
 811 <a href="https://geotraceroute.com/">web service GeoTraceroute</a> by
 812 Salim Gasmi.  Its methology of combining guesses based on DNS names,
 813 various location databases and finally use latecy times to rule out
 814 candidate locations seemed to do a very good job of guessing correct
 815 geolocation.  But it could only do one trace at the time, did not have
 816 a sensor in Norway and did not make the geolocations easily available
 817 for postprocessing.  So I contacted the developer and asked if he
 818 would be willing to share the code (he refused until he had time to
 819 clean it up), but he was interested in providing the geolocations in a
 820 machine readable format, and willing to set up a sensor in Norway.  So
 821 since yesterday, it is possible to run traces from Norway in this
 822 service thanks to a sensor node set up by
 823 <a href="https://www.nuug.no/">the NUUG assosiation</a>, and get the
 824 trace in KML format for further processing.</p>
 825
 826 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.kml"><img
 827 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.png" alt="map of combined traces for URLs used by www.stortinget.no using geotraceroute"/></a></p>
 828
 829 <p>Here we can see a lot of trafic passes Sweden on its way to
 830 Denmark, Germany, Holland and Ireland.  Plenty of places where the
 831 Snowden confirmations verified the traffic is read by various actors
 832 without your best interest as their top priority.</p>
 833
 834 <p>Combining KML files is trivial using a text editor, so I could loop
 835 over all the hosts behind the urls imported by www.stortinget.no and
 836 ask for the KML file from GeoTraceroute, and create a combined KML
 837 file with all the traces (unfortunately only one of the IP addresses
 838 behind the DNS name is traced this time.  To get them all, one would
 839 have to request traces using IP number instead of DNS names from
 840 GeoTraceroute).  That might be the next step in this project.</p>
 841
 842 <p>Armed with these tools, I find it a lot easier to figure out where
 843 the IP traffic moves and who control the boxes involved in moving it.
 844 And every time the link crosses for example the Swedish border, we can
 845 be sure Swedish Signal Intelligence (FRA) is listening, as GCHQ do in
 846 Britain and NSA in USA and cables around the globe.  (Hm, what should
 847 we tell them? :) Keep that in mind if you ever send anything
 848 unencrypted over the Internet.</p>
 849
 850 <p>PS: KML files are drawn using
 851 <a href="http://ivanrublev.me/kml/">the KML viewer from Ivan
 852 Rublev<a/>, as it was less cluttered than the local Linux application
 853 Marble.  There are heaps of other options too.</p>
 854
 855 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 856 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 857 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 858
 859       </div>
 860       <div class="tags">
 861
 862
 863         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
 864
 865
 866       </div>
 867     </div>
 868     <div class="padding"></div>
 869
 870     <div class="entry">
 871       <div class="title">
 872         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Appstream_just_learned_how_to_map_hardware_to_packages_too_.html">Appstream just learned how to map hardware to packages too!</a>
 873       </div>
 874       <div class="date">
 875         23rd December 2016
 876       </div>
 877       <div class="body">
 878         <p>I received a very nice Christmas present today.  As my regular
 879 readers probably know, I have been working on the
 880 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the Isenkram
 881 system</a> for many years.  The goal of the Isenkram system is to make
 882 it easier for users to figure out what to install to get a given piece
 883 of hardware to work in Debian, and a key part of this system is a way
 884 to map hardware to packages.  Isenkram have its own mapping database,
 885 and also uses data provided by each package using the AppStream
 886 metadata format.  And today,
 887 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/appstream">AppStream</a> in
 888 Debian learned to look up hardware the same way Isenkram is doing it,
 889 ie using fnmatch():</p>
 890
 891 <p><pre>
 892 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias \
 893   usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
 894 Identifier: pymissile [generic]
 895 Name: pymissile
 896 Summary: Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher
 897 Package: pymissile
 898 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias usb:v0694p0002d0000
 899 Identifier: libnxt [generic]
 900 Name: libnxt
 901 Summary: utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NXT brick
 902 Package: libnxt
 903 ---
 904 Identifier: t2n [generic]
 905 Name: t2n
 906 Summary: Simple command-line tool for Lego NXT
 907 Package: t2n
 908 ---
 909 Identifier: python-nxt [generic]
 910 Name: python-nxt
 911 Summary: Python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot
 912 Package: python-nxt
 913 ---
 914 Identifier: nbc [generic]
 915 Name: nbc
 916 Summary: C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks
 917 Package: nbc
 918 %
 919 </pre></p>
 920
 921 <p>A similar query can be done using the combined AppStream and
 922 Isenkram databases using the isenkram-lookup tool:</p>
 923
 924 <p><pre>
 925 % isenkram-lookup usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
 926 pymissile
 927 % isenkram-lookup usb:v0694p0002d0000
 928 libnxt
 929 nbc
 930 python-nxt
 931 t2n
 932 %
 933 </pre></p>
 934
 935 <p>You can find modalias values relevant for your machine using
 936 <tt>cat $(find /sys/devices/ -name modalias)</tt>.
 937
 938 <p>If you want to make this system a success and help Debian users
 939 make the most of the hardware they have, please
 940 help<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add
 941 AppStream metadata for your package following the guidelines</a>
 942 documented in the wiki.  So far only 11 packages provide such
 943 information, among the several hundred hardware specific packages in
 944 Debian. The Isenkram database on the other hand contain 101 packages,
 945 mostly related to USB dongles.  Most of the packages with hardware
 946 mapping in AppStream are LEGO Mindstorms related, because I have, as
 947 part of my involvement in
 948 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the Debian LEGO
 949 team</a> given priority to making sure LEGO users get proposed the
 950 complete set of packages in Debian for that particular hardware.  The
 951 team also got a nice Christmas present today.  The
 952 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/nxt-firmware">nxt-firmware
 953 package</a> made it into Debian.  With this package in place, it is
 954 now possible to use the LEGO Mindstorms NXT unit with only free
 955 software, as the nxt-firmware package contain the source and firmware
 956 binaries for the NXT brick.</p>
 957
 958 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 959 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 960 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 961
 962       </div>
 963       <div class="tags">
 964
 965
 966         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
 967
 968
 969       </div>
 970     </div>
 971     <div class="padding"></div>
 972
 973     <div class="entry">
 974       <div class="title">
 975         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram_updated_with_a_lot_more_hardware_package_mappings.html">Isenkram updated with a lot more hardware-package mappings</a>
 976       </div>
 977       <div class="date">
 978         20th December 2016
 979       </div>
 980       <div class="body">
 981         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
 982 system</a> I wrote two years ago to make it easier in Debian to find
 983 and install packages to get your hardware dongles to work, is still
 984 going strong.  It is a system to look up the hardware present on or
 985 connected to the current system, and map the hardware to Debian
 986 packages.  It can either be done using the tools in isenkram-cli or
 987 using the user space daemon in the isenkram package.  The latter will
 988 notify you, when inserting new hardware, about what packages to
 989 install to get the dongle working.  It will even provide a button to
 990 click on to ask packagekit to install the packages.</p>
 991
 992 <p>Here is an command line example from my Thinkpad laptop:</p>
 993
 994 <p><pre>
 995 % isenkram-lookup
 996 bluez
 997 cheese
 998 ethtool
 999 fprintd
1000 fprintd-demo
1001 gkrellm-thinkbat
1002 hdapsd
1003 libpam-fprintd
1004 pidgin-blinklight
1005 thinkfan
1006 tlp
1007 tp-smapi-dkms
1008 tp-smapi-source
1009 tpb
1010 %
1011 </pre></p>
1012
1013 <p>It can also list the firware package providing firmware requested
1014 by the load kernel modules, which in my case is an empty list because
1015 I have all the firmware my machine need:
1016
1017 <p><pre>
1018 % /usr/sbin/isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
1019 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
1020 %
1021 </pre></p>
1022
1023 <p>The last few days I had a look at several of the around 250
1024 packages in Debian with udev rules.  These seem like good candidates
1025 to install when a given hardware dongle is inserted, and I found
1026 several that should be proposed by isenkram.  I have not had time to
1027 check all of them, but am happy to report that now there are 97
1028 packages packages mapped to hardware by Isenkram.  11 of these
1029 packages provide hardware mapping using AppStream, while the rest are
1030 listed in the modaliases file provided in isenkram.</p>
1031
1032 <p>These are the packages with hardware mappings at the moment.  The
1033 <strong>marked packages</strong> are also announcing their hardware
1034 support using AppStream, for everyone to use:</p>
1035
1036 <p>air-quality-sensor, alsa-firmware-loaders, argyll,
1037 <strong>array-info</strong>, avarice, avrdude, b43-fwcutter,
1038 bit-babbler, bluez, bluez-firmware, <strong>brltty</strong>,
1039 <strong>broadcom-sta-dkms</strong>, calibre, cgminer, cheese, colord,
1040 <strong>colorhug-client</strong>, dahdi-firmware-nonfree, dahdi-linux,
1041 dfu-util, dolphin-emu, ekeyd, ethtool, firmware-ipw2x00, fprintd,
1042 fprintd-demo, <strong>galileo</strong>, gkrellm-thinkbat, gphoto2,
1043 gpsbabel, gpsbabel-gui, gpsman, gpstrans, gqrx-sdr, gr-fcdproplus,
1044 gr-osmosdr, gtkpod, hackrf, hdapsd, hdmi2usb-udev, hpijs-ppds, hplip,
1045 ipw3945-source, ipw3945d, kde-config-tablet, kinect-audio-setup,
1046 <strong>libnxt</strong>, libpam-fprintd, <strong>lomoco</strong>,
1047 madwimax, minidisc-utils, mkgmap, msi-keyboard, mtkbabel,
1048 <strong>nbc</strong>, <strong>nqc</strong>, nut-hal-drivers, ola,
1049 open-vm-toolbox, open-vm-tools, openambit, pcgminer, pcmciautils,
1050 pcscd, pidgin-blinklight, printer-driver-splix,
1051 <strong>pymissile</strong>, python-nxt, qlandkartegt,
1052 qlandkartegt-garmin, rosegarden, rt2x00-source, sispmctl,
1053 soapysdr-module-hackrf, solaar, squeak-plugins-scratch, sunxi-tools,
1054 <strong>t2n</strong>, thinkfan, thinkfinger-tools, tlp, tp-smapi-dkms,
1055 tp-smapi-source, tpb, tucnak, uhd-host, usbmuxd, viking,
1056 virtualbox-ose-guest-x11, w1retap, xawtv, xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse,
1057 xserver-xorg-input-wacom, xserver-xorg-video-qxl,
1058 xserver-xorg-video-vmware, yubikey-personalization and
1059 zd1211-firmware</p>
1060
1061 <p>If you know of other packages, please let me know with a wishlist
1062 bug report against the isenkram-cli package, and ask the package
1063 maintainer to
1064 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add AppStream
1065 metadata according to the guidelines</a> to provide the information
1066 for everyone.  In time, I hope to get rid of the isenkram specific
1067 hardware mapping and depend exclusively on AppStream.</p>
1068
1069 <p>Note, the AppStream metadata for broadcom-sta-dkms is matching too
1070 much hardware, and suggest that the package with with any ethernet
1071 card.  See <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/838735">bug #838735</a> for
1072 the details.  I hope the maintainer find time to address it soon.  In
1073 the mean time I provide an override in isenkram.</p>
1074
1075       </div>
1076       <div class="tags">
1077
1078
1079         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
1080
1081
1082       </div>
1083     </div>
1084     <div class="padding"></div>
1085
1086     <div class="entry">
1087       <div class="title">
1088         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Oolite__a_life_in_space_as_vagabond_and_mercenary___nice_free_software.html">Oolite, a life in space as vagabond and mercenary - nice free software</a>
1089       </div>
1090       <div class="date">
1091         11th December 2016
1092       </div>
1093       <div class="body">
1094         <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-12-11-nice-oolite.png"/></p>
1095
1096 <p>In my early years, I played
1097 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Classic_Elite">the epic game
1098 Elite</a> on my PC.  I spent many months trading and fighting in
1099 space, and reached the 'elite' fighting status before I moved on.  The
1100 original Elite game was available on Commodore 64 and the IBM PC
1101 edition I played had a 64 KB executable.  I am still impressed today
1102 that the authors managed to squeeze both a 3D engine and details about
1103 more than 2000 planet systems across 7 galaxies into a binary so
1104 small.</p>
1105
1106 <p>I have known about <a href="http://www.oolite.org/">the free
1107 software game Oolite inspired by Elite</a> for a while, but did not
1108 really have time to test it properly until a few days ago.  It was
1109 great to discover that my old knowledge about trading routes were
1110 still valid.  But my fighting and flying abilities were gone, so I had
1111 to retrain to be able to dock on a space station.  And I am still not
1112 able to make much resistance when I am attacked by pirates, so I
1113 bougth and mounted the most powerful laser in the rear to be able to
1114 put up at least some resistance while fleeing for my life. :)</p>
1115
1116 <p>When playing Elite in the late eighties, I had to discover
1117 everything on my own, and I had long lists of prices seen on different
1118 planets to be able to decide where to trade what.  This time I had the
1119 advantages of the
1120 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Main_Page">Elite wiki</a>,
1121 where information about each planet is easily available with common
1122 price ranges and suggested trading routes.  This improved my ability
1123 to earn money and I have been able to earn enough to buy a lot of
1124 useful equipent in a few days.  I believe I originally played for
1125 months before I could get a docking computer, while now I could get it
1126 after less then a week.</p>
1127
1128 <p>If you like science fiction and dreamed of a life as a vagabond in
1129 space, you should try out Oolite.  It is available for Linux, MacOSX
1130 and Windows, and is included in Debian and derivatives since 2011.</p>
1131
1132 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1133 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1134 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1135
1136       </div>
1137       <div class="tags">
1138
1139
1140         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
1141
1142
1143       </div>
1144     </div>
1145     <div class="padding"></div>
1146
1147     <div class="entry">
1148       <div class="title">
1149         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Quicker_Debian_installations_using_eatmydata.html">Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</a>
1150       </div>
1151       <div class="date">
1152         25th November 2016
1153       </div>
1154       <div class="body">
1155         <p>Two years ago, I did some experiments with eatmydata and the Debian
1156 installation system, observing how using
1157 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">eatmydata
1158 could speed up the installation</a> quite a bit.  My testing measured
1159 speedup around 20-40 percent for Debian Edu, where we install around
1160 1000 packages from within the installer.  The eatmydata package
1161 provide a way to disable/delay file system flushing.  This is a bit
1162 risky in the general case, as files that should be stored on disk will
1163 stay only in memory a bit longer than expected, causing problems if a
1164 machine crashes at an inconvenient time.  But for an installation, if
1165 the machine crashes during installation the process is normally
1166 restarted, and avoiding disk operations as much as possible to speed
1167 up the process make perfect sense.
1168
1169 <p>I added code in the Debian Edu specific installation code to enable
1170 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libeatmydata">eatmydata</a>,
1171 but did not have time to push it any further.  But a few months ago I
1172 picked it up again and worked with the libeatmydata package maintainer
1173 Mattia Rizzolo to make it easier for everyone to get this installation
1174 speedup in Debian.  Thanks to our cooperation There is now an
1175 eatmydata-udeb package in Debian testing and unstable, and simply
1176 enabling/installing it in debian-installer (d-i) is enough to get the
1177 quicker installations.  It can be enabled using preseeding.  The
1178 following untested kernel argument should do the trick:</p>
1179
1180 <blockquote><pre>
1181 preseed/early_command="anna-install eatmydata-udeb"
1182 </pre></blockquote>
1183
1184 <p>This should ask d-i to install the package inside the d-i
1185 environment early in the installation sequence.  Having it installed
1186 in d-i in turn will make sure the relevant scripts are called just
1187 after debootstrap filled /target/ with the freshly installed Debian
1188 system to configure apt to run dpkg with eatmydata.  This is enough to
1189 speed up the installation process.  There is a proposal to
1190 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/841153">extend the idea a bit further
1191 by using /etc/ld.so.preload instead of apt.conf</a>, but I have not
1192 tested its impact.</p>
1193
1194
1195       </div>
1196       <div class="tags">
1197
1198
1199         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1200
1201
1202       </div>
1203     </div>
1204     <div class="padding"></div>
1205
1206     <div class="entry">
1207       <div class="title">
1208         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Oversette_bokm_l_til_nynorsk__enklere_enn_du_tror_takket_v_re_Apertium.html">Oversette bokmål til nynorsk, enklere enn du tror takket være Apertium</a>
1209       </div>
1210       <div class="date">
1211         24th November 2016
1212       </div>
1213       <div class="body">
1214         <p>I Norge er det mange som trenger å skrive både bokmål og nynorsk.
1215 Eksamensoppgaver, offentlige brev og nyheter er eksempler på tekster
1216 der det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skoleoppgavene som
1217 elever over det ganske land skal levere inn hvert år.  Det mange ikke
1218 vet er at selv om de kommersielle alternativene
1219 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google Translate</a> og
1220 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing Translator</a> ikke kan
1221 bidra med å oversette mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finnes det et
1222 utmerket fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Oversetterverktøyet
1223 Apertium har støtte for en rekke språkkombinasjoner, og takket være
1224 den utrettelige innsatsen til blant annet Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
1225 en bruke webtjenesten til å fylle inn en tekst på bokmål eller
1226 nynorsk, og få den automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
1227 Resultatet er ikke perfekt, men et svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og til
1228 er resultatet så bra at det kan benyttes uten endringer.  Jeg vet
1229 f.eks. at store deler av Joomla ble oversatt til nynorsk ved hjelp
1230 Apertium.  Høres det ut som noe du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så fall
1231 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
1232 teksten din i webskjemaet der.
1233
1234 <p>Hvis du trenger maskinell tilgang til den bakenforliggende
1235 teknologien kan du enten installere pakken
1236 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">apertium-nno-nob</a>
1237 på en Debian-maskin eller bruke web-API-et tilgjengelig fra
1238 api.apertium.org.  Se
1239 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">API-dokumentasjonen</a>
1240 for detaljer om web-API-et.  Her kan du se hvordan resultatet blir for
1241 denne teksten som ble skrevet på bokmål over maskinoversatt til
1242 nynorsk.</p>
1243
1244 <hr/>
1245
1246 <p>I Noreg er det mange som treng å skriva både bokmål og nynorsk.
1247 Eksamensoppgåver, offentlege brev og nyhende er døme på tekster der
1248 det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skuleoppgåvene som
1249 elevar over det ganske land skal levera inn kvart år.  Det mange ikkje
1250 veit er at sjølv om dei kommersielle alternativa
1251 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google *Translate</a> og
1252 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing *Translator</a> ikkje
1253 kan bidra med å omsetja mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finst det eit
1254 utmerka fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Omsetjarverktøyet
1255 *Apertium har støtte for ei rekkje språkkombinasjonar, og takka vera
1256 den utrøyttelege innsatsen til blant anna Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
1257 ein bruka *webtjenesten til å fylla inn ei tekst på bokmål eller
1258 nynorsk, og få den *automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
1259 Resultatet er ikkje perfekt, men eit svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og
1260 til er resultatet så bra at det kan nyttast utan endringar.  Eg veit
1261 t.d. at store delar av *Joomla vart omsett til nynorsk ved hjelp
1262 *Apertium.  Høyrast det ut som noko du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så
1263 fall <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">*Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
1264 teksta di i *webskjemaet der.
1265
1266 <p>Viss du treng *maskinell tilgjenge til den *bakenforliggende
1267 teknologien kan du anten installera pakken
1268 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">*apertium-*nno-*nob</a>
1269 på ein *Debian-maskin eller bruka *web-*API-eit tilgjengeleg frå
1270 *api.*apertium.org.  Sjå
1271 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">*API-dokumentasjonen</a>
1272 for detaljar om *web-*API-eit.  Her kan du sjå korleis resultatet vert
1273 for denne teksta som vart skreva på bokmål over *maskinoversatt til
1274 nynorsk.</p>
1275
1276       </div>
1277       <div class="tags">
1278
1279
1280         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll</a>.
1281
1282
1283       </div>
1284     </div>
1285     <div class="padding"></div>
1286
1287     <div class="entry">
1288       <div class="title">
1289         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_profiler_for_multi_threaded_software_is_now_in_Debian.html">Coz profiler for multi-threaded software is now in Debian</a>
1290       </div>
1291       <div class="date">
1292         13th November 2016
1293       </div>
1294       <div class="body">
1295         <p><a href="http://coz-profiler.org/">The Coz profiler</a>, a nice
1296 profiler able to run benchmarking experiments on the instrumented
1297 multi-threaded program, finally
1298 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/coz-profiler">made it into
1299 Debian unstable yesterday</A>.  Lluís Vilanova and I have spent many
1300 months since
1301 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">I
1302 blogged about the coz tool</a> in August working with upstream to make
1303 it suitable for Debian.  There are still issues with clang
1304 compatibility, inline assembly only working x86 and minimized
1305 JavaScript libraries.</p>
1306
1307 <p>To test it, install 'coz-profiler' using apt and run it like this:</p>
1308
1309 <p><blockquote>
1310 <tt>coz run --- /path/to/binary-with-debug-info</tt>
1311 </blockquote></p>
1312
1313 <p>This will produce a profile.coz file in the current working
1314 directory with the profiling information.  This is then given to a
1315 JavaScript application provided in the package and available from
1316 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">a project web page</a>.
1317 To start the local copy, invoke it in a browser like this:</p>
1318
1319 <p><blockquote>
1320 <tt>sensible-browser /usr/share/coz-profiler/viewer/index.htm</tt>
1321 </blockquote></p>
1322
1323 <p>See the project home page and the
1324 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">USENIX
1325 ;login: article on Coz</a> for more information on how it is
1326 working.</p>
1327
1328       </div>
1329       <div class="tags">
1330
1331
1332         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1333
1334
1335       </div>
1336     </div>
1337     <div class="padding"></div>
1338
1339     <div class="entry">
1340       <div class="title">
1341         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_own_self_balancing_Lego_Segway.html">My own self balancing Lego Segway</a>
1342       </div>
1343       <div class="date">
1344          4th November 2016
1345       </div>
1346       <div class="body">
1347         <p>A while back I received a Gyro sensor for the NXT
1348 <a href="mindstorms.lego.com">Mindstorms</a> controller as a birthday
1349 present.  It had been on my wishlist for a while, because I wanted to
1350 build a Segway like balancing lego robot.  I had already built
1351 <a href="http://www.nxtprograms.com/NXT2/segway/">a simple balancing
1352 robot</a> with the kids, using the light/color sensor included in the
1353 NXT kit as the balance sensor, but it was not working very well.  It
1354 could balance for a while, but was very sensitive to the light
1355 condition in the room and the reflective properties of the surface and
1356 would fall over after a short while.  I wanted something more robust,
1357 and had
1358 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=NGY1044">the
1359 gyro sensor from HiTechnic</a> I believed would solve it on my
1360 wishlist for some years before it suddenly showed up as a gift from my
1361 loved ones. :)</p>
1362
1363 <p>Unfortunately I have not had time to sit down and play with it
1364 since then.  But that changed some days ago, when I was searching for
1365 lego segway information and came across a recipe from HiTechnic for
1366 building
1367 <a href="http://www.hitechnic.com/blog/gyro-sensor/htway/">the
1368 HTWay</a>, a segway like balancing robot.  Build instructions and
1369 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/upload/786-HTWayC.nxc">source
1370 code</a> was included, so it was just a question of putting it all
1371 together.  And thanks to the great work of many Debian developers, the
1372 compiler needed to build the source for the NXT is already included in
1373 Debian, so I was read to go in less than an hour.  The resulting robot
1374 do not look very impressive in its simplicity:</p>
1375
1376 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-robot.jpeg"></p>
1377
1378 <p>Because I lack the infrared sensor used to control the robot in the
1379 design from HiTechnic, I had to comment out the last task
1380 (taskControl).  I simply placed /* and */ around it get the program
1381 working without that sensor present.  Now it balances just fine until
1382 the battery status run low:</p>
1383
1384 <p align="center"><video width="70%" controls="true">
1385    <source src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-balancing.ogv" type="video/ogg">
1386 </video></p>
1387
1388 <p>Now we would like to teach it how to follow a line and take remote
1389 control instructions using the included Bluetooth receiver in the NXT.</p>
1390
1391 <p>If you, like me, love LEGO and want to make sure we find the tools
1392 they need to work with LEGO in Debian and all our derivative
1393 distributions like Ubuntu, check out
1394 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the LEGO designers
1395 project page</a> and join the Debian LEGO team.  Personally I own a
1396 RCX and NXT controller (no EV3), and would like to make sure the
1397 Debian tools needed to program the systems I own work as they
1398 should.</p>
1399
1400       </div>
1401       <div class="tags">
1402
1403
1404         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
1405
1406
1407       </div>
1408     </div>
1409     <div class="padding"></div>
1410
1411     <div class="entry">
1412       <div class="title">
1413         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile phone</a>
1414       </div>
1415       <div class="date">
1416         10th October 2016
1417       </div>
1418       <div class="body">
1419         <p>In July
1420 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_use_the_Signal_app_if_you_only_have_a_land_line__ie_no_mobile_phone_.html">I
1421 wrote how to get the Signal Chrome/Chromium app working</a> without
1422 the ability to receive SMS messages (aka without a cell phone).  It is
1423 time to share some experiences and provide an updated setup.</p>
1424
1425 <p>The Signal app have worked fine for several months now, and I use
1426 it regularly to chat with my loved ones.  I had a major snag at the
1427 end of my summer vacation, when the the app completely forgot my
1428 setup, identity and keys.  The reason behind this major mess was
1429 running out of disk space.  To avoid that ever happening again I have
1430 started storing everything in <tt>userdata/</tt> in git, to be able to
1431 roll back to an earlier version if the files are wiped by mistake.  I
1432 had to use it once after introducing the git backup.  When rolling
1433 back to an earlier version, one need to use the 'reset session' option
1434 in Signal to get going, and notify the people you talk with about the
1435 problem.  I assume there is some sequence number tracking in the
1436 protocol to detect rollback attacks.  The git repository is rather big
1437 (674 MiB so far), but I have not tried to figure out if some of the
1438 content can be added to a .gitignore file due to lack of spare
1439 time.</p>
1440
1441 <p>I've also hit the 90 days timeout blocking, and noticed that this
1442 make it impossible to send messages using Signal.  I could still
1443 receive them, but had to patch the code with a new timestamp to send.
1444 I believe the timeout is added by the developers to force people to
1445 upgrade to the latest version of the app, even when there is no
1446 protocol changes, to reduce the version skew among the user base and
1447 thus try to keep the number of support requests down.</p>
1448
1449 <p>Since my original recipe, the Signal source code changed slightly,
1450 making the old patch fail to apply cleanly.  Below is an updated
1451 patch, including the shell wrapper I use to start Signal.  The
1452 original version required a new user to locate the JavaScript console
1453 and call a function from there.  I got help from a friend with more
1454 JavaScript knowledge than me to modify the code to provide a GUI
1455 button instead.  This mean that to get started you just need to run
1456 the wrapper and click the 'Register without mobile phone' to get going
1457 now.  I've also modified the timeout code to always set it to 90 days
1458 in the future, to avoid having to patch the code regularly.</p>
1459
1460 <p>So, the updated recipe for Debian Jessie:</p>
1461
1462 <ol>
1463
1464 <li>First, install required packages to get the source code and the
1465 browser you need.  Signal only work with Chrome/Chromium, as far as I
1466 know, so you need to install it.
1467
1468 <pre>
1469 apt install git tor chromium
1470 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
1471 </pre></li>
1472
1473 <li>Modify the source code using command listed in the the patch
1474 block below.</li>
1475
1476 <li>Start Signal using the run-signal-app wrapper (for example using
1477 <tt>`pwd`/run-signal-app</tt>).
1478
1479 <li>Click on the 'Register without mobile phone', will in a phone
1480 number you can receive calls to the next minute, receive the
1481 verification code and enter it into the form field and press
1482 'Register'.  Note, the phone number you use will be user Signal
1483 username, ie the way others can find you on Signal.</li>
1484
1485 <li>You can now use Signal to contact others.  Note, new contacts do
1486 not show up in the contact list until you restart Signal, and there is
1487 no way to assign names to Contacts.  There is also no way to create or
1488 update chat groups.  I suspect this is because the web app do not have
1489 a associated contact database.</li>
1490
1491 </ol>
1492
1493 <p>I am still a bit uneasy about using Signal, because of the way its
1494 main author moxie0 reject federation and accept dependencies to major
1495 corporations like Google (part of the code is fetched from Google) and
1496 Amazon (the central coordination point is owned by Amazon).  See for
1497 example
1498 <a href="https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37">the
1499 LibreSignal issue tracker</a> for a thread documenting the authors
1500 view on these issues.  But the network effect is strong in this case,
1501 and several of the people I want to communicate with already use
1502 Signal.  Perhaps we can all move to <a href="https://ring.cx/">Ring</a>
1503 once it <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/830265">work on my
1504 laptop</a>?  It already work on Windows and Android, and is included
1505 in <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/ring">Debian</a> and
1506 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ring">Ubuntu</a>, but not
1507 working on Debian Stable.</p>
1508
1509 <p>Anyway, this is the patch I apply to the Signal code to get it
1510 working.  It switch to the production servers, disable to timeout,
1511 make registration easier and add the shell wrapper:</p>
1512
1513 <pre>
1514 cd Signal-Desktop; cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p1
1515 diff --git a/js/background.js b/js/background.js
1516 index 24b4c1d..579345f 100644
1517 --- a/js/background.js
1518 +++ b/js/background.js
1519 @@ -33,9 +33,9 @@
1520          });
1521      });
1522
1523 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
1524 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org';
1525      var SERVER_PORTS = [80, 4433, 8443];
1526 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
1527 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
1528      var messageReceiver;
1529      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
1530          if (messageReceiver) {
1531 diff --git a/js/expire.js b/js/expire.js
1532 index 639aeae..beb91c3 100644
1533 --- a/js/expire.js
1534 +++ b/js/expire.js
1535 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
1536  ;(function() {
1537      'use strict';
1538 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
1539 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = Date.now() + (90 * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
1540
1541      window.extension = window.extension || {};
1542
1543 diff --git a/js/views/install_view.js b/js/views/install_view.js
1544 index 7816f4f..1d6233b 100644
1545 --- a/js/views/install_view.js
1546 +++ b/js/views/install_view.js
1547 @@ -38,7 +38,8 @@
1548              return {
1549                  'click .step1': this.selectStep.bind(this, 1),
1550                  'click .step2': this.selectStep.bind(this, 2),
1551 -                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3)
1552 +                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3),
1553 +                'click .callreg': function() { extension.install('standalone') },
1554              };
1555          },
1556          clearQR: function() {
1557 diff --git a/options.html b/options.html
1558 index dc0f28e..8d709f6 100644
1559 --- a/options.html
1560 +++ b/options.html
1561 @@ -14,7 +14,10 @@
1562          &lt;div class='nav'>
1563            &lt;h1>{{ installWelcome }}&lt;/h1>
1564            &lt;p>{{ installTagline }}&lt;/p>
1565 -          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a> &lt;/div>
1566 +          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a>
1567 +           &lt;br> &lt;a class="button callreg">Register without mobile phone&lt;/a>
1568 +
1569 +         &lt;/div>
1570            &lt;span class='dot step1 selected'>&lt;/span>
1571            &lt;span class='dot step2'>&lt;/span>
1572            &lt;span class='dot step3'>&lt;/span>
1573 --- /dev/null   2016-10-07 09:55:13.730181472 +0200
1574 +++ b/run-signal-app   2016-10-10 08:54:09.434172391 +0200
1575 @@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
1576 +#!/bin/sh
1577 +set -e
1578 +cd $(dirname $0)
1579 +mkdir -p userdata
1580 +userdata="`pwd`/userdata"
1581 +if [ -d "$userdata" ] && [ ! -d "$userdata/.git" ] ; then
1582 +    (cd $userdata && git init)
1583 +fi
1584 +(cd $userdata && git add . && git commit -m "Current status." || true)
1585 +exec chromium \
1586 +  --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
1587 +  --user-data-dir=$userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
1588 EOF
1589 chmod a+rx run-signal-app
1590 </pre>
1591
1592 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1593 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1594 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1595
1596       </div>
1597       <div class="tags">
1598
1599
1600         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
1601
1602
1603       </div>
1604     </div>
1605     <div class="padding"></div>
1606
1607     <div class="entry">
1608       <div class="title">
1609         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram__Appstream_and_udev_make_life_as_a_LEGO_builder_easier.html">Isenkram, Appstream and udev make life as a LEGO builder easier</a>
1610       </div>
1611       <div class="date">
1612          7th October 2016
1613       </div>
1614       <div class="body">
1615         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
1616 system</a> provide a practical and easy way to figure out which
1617 packages support the hardware in a given machine.  The command line
1618 tool <tt>isenkram-lookup</tt> and the tasksel options provide a
1619 convenient way to list and install packages relevant for the current
1620 hardware during system installation, both user space packages and
1621 firmware packages. The GUI background daemon on the other hand provide
1622 a pop-up proposing to install packages when a new dongle is inserted
1623 while using the computer.  For example, if you plug in a smart card
1624 reader, the system will ask if you want to install <tt>pcscd</tt> if
1625 that package isn't already installed, and if you plug in a USB video
1626 camera the system will ask if you want to install <tt>cheese</tt> if
1627 cheese is currently missing.  This already work just fine.</p>
1628
1629 <p>But Isenkram depend on a database mapping from hardware IDs to
1630 package names.  When I started no such database existed in Debian, so
1631 I made my own data set and included it with the isenkram package and
1632 made isenkram fetch the latest version of this database from git using
1633 http.  This way the isenkram users would get updated package proposals
1634 as soon as I learned more about hardware related packages.</p>
1635
1636 <p>The hardware is identified using modalias strings.  The modalias
1637 design is from the Linux kernel where most hardware descriptors are
1638 made available as a strings that can be matched using filename style
1639 globbing.  It handle USB, PCI, DMI and a lot of other hardware related
1640 identifiers.</p>
1641
1642 <p>The downside to the Isenkram specific database is that there is no
1643 information about relevant distribution / Debian version, making
1644 isenkram propose obsolete packages too.  But along came AppStream, a
1645 cross distribution mechanism to store and collect metadata about
1646 software packages.  When I heard about the proposal, I contacted the
1647 people involved and suggested to add a hardware matching rule using
1648 modalias strings in the specification, to be able to use AppStream for
1649 mapping hardware to packages.  This idea was accepted and AppStream is
1650 now a great way for a package to announce the hardware it support in a
1651 distribution neutral way.  I wrote
1652 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">a
1653 recipe on how to add such meta-information</a> in a blog post last
1654 December.  If you have a hardware related package in Debian, please
1655 announce the relevant hardware IDs using AppStream.</p>
1656
1657 <p>In Debian, almost all packages that can talk to a LEGO Mindestorms
1658 RCX or NXT unit, announce this support using AppStream.  The effect is
1659 that when you insert such LEGO robot controller into your Debian
1660 machine, Isenkram will propose to install the packages needed to get
1661 it working.  The intention is that this should allow the local user to
1662 start programming his robot controller right away without having to
1663 guess what packages to use or which permissions to fix.</p>
1664
1665 <p>But when I sat down with my son the other day to program our NXT
1666 unit using his Debian Stretch computer, I discovered something
1667 annoying.  The local console user (ie my son) did not get access to
1668 the USB device for programming the unit.  This used to work, but no
1669 longer in Jessie and Stretch.  After some investigation and asking
1670 around on #debian-devel, I discovered that this was because udev had
1671 changed the mechanism used to grant access to local devices.  The
1672 ConsoleKit mechanism from <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>
1673 no longer applied, because LDAP users no longer was added to the
1674 plugdev group during login.  Michael Biebl told me that this method
1675 was obsolete and the new method used ACLs instead.  This was good
1676 news, as the plugdev mechanism is a mess when using a remote user
1677 directory like LDAP.  Using ACLs would make sure a user lost device
1678 access when she logged out, even if the user left behind a background
1679 process which would retain the plugdev membership with the ConsoleKit
1680 setup.  Armed with this knowledge I moved on to fix the access problem
1681 for the LEGO Mindstorms related packages.</p>
1682
1683 <p>The new system uses a udev tag, 'uaccess'.  It can either be
1684 applied directly for a device, or is applied in
1685 /lib/udev/rules.d/70-uaccess.rules for classes of devices.  As the
1686 LEGO Mindstorms udev rules did not have a class, I decided to add the
1687 tag directly in the udev rules files included in the packages.  Here
1688 is one example.  For the nqc C compiler for the RCX, the
1689 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/60-nqc.rules</tt> file now look like this:
1690
1691 <p><pre>
1692 SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ACTION=="add", ATTR{idVendor}=="0694", ATTR{idProduct}=="0001", \
1693     SYMLINK+="rcx-%k", TAG+="uaccess"
1694 </pre></p>
1695
1696 <p>The key part is the 'TAG+="uaccess"' at the end.  I suspect all
1697 packages using plugdev in their /lib/udev/rules.d/ files should be
1698 changed to use this tag (either directly or indirectly via
1699 <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>).  Perhaps a lintian check should be created
1700 to detect this?</p>
1701
1702 <p>I've been unable to find good documentation on the uaccess feature.
1703 It is unclear to me if the uaccess tag is an internal implementation
1704 detail like the udev-acl tag used by
1705 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>.  If it is, I guess the
1706 indirect method is the preferred way.  Michael
1707 <a href="https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/4288">asked for more
1708 documentation from the systemd project</a> and I hope it will make
1709 this clearer.  For now I use the generic classes when they exist and
1710 is already handled by <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>, and add the tag
1711 directly if no such class exist.</p>
1712
1713 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
1714 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
1715 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
1716
1717 <p>To help out making life for LEGO constructors in Debian easier,
1718 please join us on our IRC channel
1719 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> and join
1720 the <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/debian-lego/">Debian
1721 LEGO team</a> in the Alioth project we created yesterday.  A mailing
1722 list is not yet created, but we are working on it. :)</p>
1723
1724 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1725 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1726 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1727
1728       </div>
1729       <div class="tags">
1730
1731
1732         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
1733
1734
1735       </div>
1736     </div>
1737     <div class="padding"></div>
1738
1739     <div class="entry">
1740       <div class="title">
1741         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_draft_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook_now_public.html">First draft Norwegian Bokmål edition of The Debian Administrator's Handbook now public</a>
1742       </div>
1743       <div class="date">
1744         30th August 2016
1745       </div>
1746       <div class="body">
1747         <p>In April we
1748 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">started
1749 to work</a> on a Norwegian Bokmål edition of the "open access" book on
1750 how to set up and administrate a Debian system.  Today I am happy to
1751 report that the first draft is now publicly available.  You can find
1752 it on <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/">get the Debian
1753 Administrator's Handbook page</a> (under Other languages).  The first
1754 eight chapters have a first draft translation, and we are working on
1755 proofreading the content.  If you want to help out, please start
1756 contributing using
1757 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
1758 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
1759 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
1760 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
1761 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
1762 contributors</a>.  A good way to contribute is to proofread the text
1763 and update weblate if you find errors.</p>
1764
1765 <p>Our goal is still to make the Norwegian book available on paper as well as
1766 electronic form.</p>
1767
1768       </div>
1769       <div class="tags">
1770
1771
1772         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1773
1774
1775       </div>
1776     </div>
1777     <div class="padding"></div>
1778
1779     <div class="entry">
1780       <div class="title">
1781         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">Coz can help you find bottlenecks in multi-threaded software - nice free software</a>
1782       </div>
1783       <div class="date">
1784         11th August 2016
1785       </div>
1786       <div class="body">
1787         <p>This summer, I read a great article
1788 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">coz:
1789 This Is the Profiler You're Looking For</a>" in USENIX ;login: about
1790 how to profile multi-threaded programs.  It presented a system for
1791 profiling software by running experiences in the running program,
1792 testing how run time performance is affected by "speeding up" parts of
1793 the code to various degrees compared to a normal run.  It does this by
1794 slowing down parallel threads while the "faster up" code is running
1795 and measure how this affect processing time.  The processing time is
1796 measured using probes inserted into the code, either using progress
1797 counters (COZ_PROGRESS) or as latency meters (COZ_BEGIN/COZ_END).  It
1798 can also measure unmodified code by measuring complete the program
1799 runtime and running the program several times instead.</p>
1800
1801 <p>The project and presentation was so inspiring that I would like to
1802 get the system into Debian.  I
1803 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=830708">created
1804 a WNPP request for it</a> and contacted upstream to try to make the
1805 system ready for Debian by sending patches.  The build process need to
1806 be changed a bit to avoid running 'git clone' to get dependencies, and
1807 to include the JavaScript web page used to visualize the collected
1808 profiling information included in the source package.
1809 But I expect that should work out fairly soon.</p>
1810
1811 <p>The way the system work is fairly simple.  To run an coz experiment
1812 on a binary with debug symbols available, start the program like this:
1813
1814 <p><blockquote><pre>
1815 coz run --- program-to-run
1816 </pre></blockquote></p>
1817
1818 <p>This will create a text file profile.coz with the instrumentation
1819 information.  To show what part of the code affect the performance
1820 most, use a web browser and either point it to
1821 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/</a>
1822 or use the copy from git (in the gh-pages branch).  Check out this web
1823 site to have a look at several example profiling runs and get an idea what the end result from the profile runs look like.  To make the
1824 profiling more useful you include &lt;coz.h&gt; and insert the
1825 COZ_PROGRESS or COZ_BEGIN and COZ_END at appropriate places in the
1826 code, rebuild and run the profiler.  This allow coz to do more
1827 targeted experiments.</p>
1828
1829 <p>A video published by ACM
1830 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE0V-p1odPg">presenting the
1831 Coz profiler</a> is available from Youtube.  There is also a paper
1832 from the 25th Symposium on Operating Systems Principles available
1833 titled
1834 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/conference/atc16/technical-sessions/presentation/curtsinger">Coz:
1835 finding code that counts with causal profiling</a>.</p>
1836
1837 <p><a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz">The source code</a>
1838 for Coz is available from github.  It will only build with clang
1839 because it uses a
1840 <a href="https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=55606">C++
1841 feature missing in GCC</a>, but I've submitted
1842 <a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz/pull/67">a patch to solve
1843 it</a> and hope it will be included in the upstream source soon.</p>
1844
1845 <p>Please get in touch if you, like me, would like to see this piece
1846 of software in Debian.  I would very much like some help with the
1847 packaging effort, as I lack the in depth knowledge on how to package
1848 C++ libraries.</p>
1849
1850       </div>
1851       <div class="tags">
1852
1853
1854         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
1855
1856
1857       </div>
1858     </div>
1859     <div class="padding"></div>
1860
1861     <div class="entry">
1862       <div class="title">
1863         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlocking_HTC_Desire_HD_on_Linux_using_unruu_and_fastboot.html">Unlocking HTC Desire HD on Linux using unruu and fastboot</a>
1864       </div>
1865       <div class="date">
1866          7th July 2016
1867       </div>
1868       <div class="body">
1869         <p>Yesterday, I tried to unlock a HTC Desire HD phone, and it proved
1870 to be a slight challenge.  Here is the recipe if I ever need to do it
1871 again.  It all started by me wanting to try the recipe to set up
1872 <a href="https://blog.torproject.org/blog/mission-impossible-hardening-android-security-and-privacy">an
1873 hardened Android installation</a> from the Tor project blog on a
1874 device I had access to.  It is a old mobile phone with a broken
1875 microphone The initial idea had been to just
1876 <a href="http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Install_CM_for_ace">install
1877 CyanogenMod on it</a>, but did not quite find time to start on it
1878 until a few days ago.</p>
1879
1880 <p>The unlock process is supposed to be simple: (1) Boot into the boot
1881 loader (press volume down and power at the same time), (2) select
1882 'fastboot' before (3) connecting the device via USB to a Linux
1883 machine, (4) request the device identifier token by running 'fastboot
1884 oem get_identifier_token', (5) request the device unlocking key using
1885 the <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader/">HTC developer web
1886 site</a> and unlock the phone using the key file emailed to you.</p>
1887
1888 <p>Unfortunately, this only work fi you have hboot version 2.00.0029
1889 or newer, and the device I was working on had 2.00.0027.  This
1890 apparently can be easily fixed by downloading a Windows program and
1891 running it on your Windows machine, if you accept the terms Microsoft
1892 require you to accept to use Windows - which I do not.  So I had to
1893 come up with a different approach.  I got a lot of help from AndyCap
1894 on #nuug, and would not have been able to get this working without
1895 him.</p>
1896
1897 <p>First I needed to extract the hboot firmware from
1898 <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/ruu/PD9810000_Ace_Sense30_S_hboot_2.00.0029.exe">the
1899 windows binary for HTC Desire HD</a> downloaded as 'the RUU' from HTC.
1900 For this there is is <a href="https://github.com/kmdm/unruu/">a github
1901 project named unruu</a> using libunshield.  The unshield tool did not
1902 recognise the file format, but unruu worked and extracted rom.zip,
1903 containing the new hboot firmware and a text file describing which
1904 devices it would work for.</p>
1905
1906 <p>Next, I needed to get the new firmware into the device.  For this I
1907 followed some instructions
1908 <a href="http://www.htc1guru.com/2013/09/new-ruu-zips-posted/">available
1909 from HTC1Guru.com</a>, and ran these commands as root on a Linux
1910 machine with Debian testing:</p>
1911
1912 <p><pre>
1913 adb reboot-bootloader
1914 fastboot oem rebootRUU
1915 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
1916 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
1917 fastboot reboot
1918 </pre></p>
1919
1920 <p>The flash command apparently need to be done twice to take effect,
1921 as the first is just preparations and the second one do the flashing.
1922 The adb command is just to get to the boot loader menu, so turning the
1923 device on while holding volume down and the power button should work
1924 too.</p>
1925
1926 <p>With the new hboot version in place I could start following the
1927 instructions on the HTC developer web site.  I got the device token
1928 like this:</p>
1929
1930 <p><pre>
1931 fastboot oem get_identifier_token 2>&1 | sed 's/(bootloader) //'
1932 </pre>
1933
1934 <p>And once I got the unlock code via email, I could use it like
1935 this:</p>
1936
1937 <p><pre>
1938 fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin
1939 </pre></p>
1940
1941 <p>And with that final step in place, the phone was unlocked and I
1942 could start stuffing the software of my own choosing into the device.
1943 So far I only inserted a replacement recovery image to wipe the phone
1944 before I start.  We will see what happen next.  Perhaps I should
1945 install <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> on it. :)</p>
1946
1947       </div>
1948       <div class="tags">
1949
1950
1951         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
1952
1953
1954       </div>
1955     </div>
1956     <div class="padding"></div>
1957
1958     <div class="entry">
1959       <div class="title">
1960         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_use_the_Signal_app_if_you_only_have_a_land_line__ie_no_mobile_phone_.html">How to use the Signal app if you only have a land line (ie no mobile phone)</a>
1961       </div>
1962       <div class="date">
1963          3rd July 2016
1964       </div>
1965       <div class="body">
1966         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to test
1967 <a href="https://whispersystems.org/">the Signal app</a>, as it is
1968 said to provide end to end encrypted communication and several of my
1969 friends and family are already using it.  As I by choice do not own a
1970 mobile phone, this proved to be harder than expected.  And I wanted to
1971 have the source of the client and know that it was the code used on my
1972 machine.  But yesterday I managed to get it working.  I used the
1973 Github source, compared it to the source in
1974 <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/signal-private-messenger/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk?hl=en-US">the
1975 Signal Chrome app</a> available from the Chrome web store, applied
1976 patches to use the production Signal servers, started the app and
1977 asked for the hidden "register without a smart phone" form.  Here is
1978 the recipe how I did it.</p>
1979
1980 <p>First, I fetched the Signal desktop source from Github, using
1981
1982 <pre>
1983 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
1984 </pre>
1985
1986 <p>Next, I patched the source to use the production servers, to be
1987 able to talk to other Signal users:</p>
1988
1989 <pre>
1990 cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p0
1991 diff -ur ./js/background.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js
1992 --- ./js/background.js  2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
1993 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js    2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
1994 @@ -47,8 +47,8 @@
1995          });
1996      });
1997
1998 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
1999 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
2000 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org:4433';
2001 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
2002      var messageReceiver;
2003      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
2004          if (messageReceiver) {
2005 diff -ur ./js/expire.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js
2006 --- ./js/expire.js      2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
2007 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
2008 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
2009  ;(function() {
2010      'use strict';
2011 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
2012 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 1474492690000;
2013
2014      window.extension = window.extension || {};
2015
2016 EOF
2017 </pre>
2018
2019 <p>The first part is changing the servers, and the second is updating
2020 an expiration timestamp.  This timestamp need to be updated regularly.
2021 It is set 90 days in the future by the build process (Gruntfile.js).
2022 The value is seconds since 1970 times 1000, as far as I can tell.</p>
2023
2024 <p>Based on a tip and good help from the #nuug IRC channel, I wrote a
2025 script to launch Signal in Chromium.</p>
2026
2027 <pre>
2028 #!/bin/sh
2029 cd $(dirname $0)
2030 mkdir -p userdata
2031 exec chromium \
2032   --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
2033   --user-data-dir=`pwd`/userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
2034 </pre>
2035
2036 <p> The script start the app and configure Chromium to use the Tor
2037 SOCKS5 proxy to make sure those controlling the Signal servers (today
2038 Amazon and Whisper Systems) as well as those listening on the lines
2039 will have a harder time location my laptop based on the Signal
2040 connections if they use source IP address.</p>
2041
2042 <p>When the script starts, one need to follow the instructions under
2043 "Standalone Registration" in the CONTRIBUTING.md file in the git
2044 repository.  I right clicked on the Signal window to get up the
2045 Chromium debugging tool, visited the 'Console' tab and wrote
2046 'extension.install("standalone")' on the console prompt to get the
2047 registration form.  Then I entered by land line phone number and
2048 pressed 'Call'.  5 seconds later the phone rang and a robot voice
2049 repeated the verification code three times.  After entering the number
2050 into the verification code field in the form, I could start using
2051 Signal from my laptop.
2052
2053 <p>As far as I can tell, The Signal app will leak who is talking to
2054 whom and thus who know who to those controlling the central server,
2055 but such leakage is hard to avoid with a centrally controlled server
2056 setup.  It is something to keep in mind when using Signal - the
2057 content of your chats are harder to intercept, but the meta data
2058 exposing your contact network is available to people you do not know.
2059 So better than many options, but not great.  And sadly the usage is
2060 connected to my land line, thus allowing those controlling the server
2061 to associate it to my home and person.  I would prefer it if only
2062 those I knew could tell who I was on Signal.  There are options
2063 avoiding such information leakage, but most of my friends are not
2064 using them, so I am stuck with Signal for now.</p>
2065
2066 <p><strong>Update 2017-01-10</strong>: There is an updated blog post
2067 on this topic in
2068 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience
2069 and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile
2070 phone</a>.</p>
2071
2072       </div>
2073       <div class="tags">
2074
2075
2076         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
2077
2078
2079       </div>
2080     </div>
2081     <div class="padding"></div>
2082
2083     <div class="entry">
2084       <div class="title">
2085         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_new__best__multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?</a>
2086       </div>
2087       <div class="date">
2088          6th June 2016
2089       </div>
2090       <div class="body">
2091         <p>When I set out a few weeks ago to figure out
2092 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">which
2093 multimedia player in Debian claimed to support most file formats /
2094 MIME types</a>, I was a bit surprised how varied the sets of MIME types
2095 the various players claimed support for.  The range was from 55 to 130
2096 MIME types.  I suspect most media formats are supported by all
2097 players, but this is not really reflected in the MimeTypes values in
2098 their desktop files.  There are probably also some bogus MIME types
2099 listed, but it is hard to identify which one this is.</p>
2100
2101 <p>Anyway, in the mean time I got in touch with upstream for some of
2102 the players suggesting to add more MIME types to their desktop files,
2103 and decided to spend some time myself improving the situation for my
2104 favorite media player VLC.  The fixes for VLC entered Debian unstable
2105 yesterday. The complete list of MIME types can be seen on the
2106 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">Multimedia
2107 player MIME type support status</a> Debian wiki page.</p>
2108
2109 <p>The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?  It is VLC, followed by
2110 totem, parole, kplayer, gnome-mpv, mpv, smplayer, mplayer-gui and
2111 kmplayer.  I am sure some of the other players desktop files support
2112 several of the formats currently listed as working only with vlc,
2113 toten and parole.</p>
2114
2115 <p>A sad observation is that only 14 MIME types are listed as
2116 supported by all the tested multimedia players in Debian in their
2117 desktop files: audio/mpeg, audio/vnd.rn-realaudio, audio/x-mpegurl,
2118 audio/x-ms-wma, audio/x-scpls, audio/x-wav, video/mp4, video/mpeg,
2119 video/quicktime, video/vnd.rn-realvideo, video/x-matroska,
2120 video/x-ms-asf, video/x-ms-wmv and video/x-msvideo.  Personally I find
2121 it sad that video/ogg and video/webm is not supported by all the media
2122 players in Debian.  As far as I can tell, all of them can handle both
2123 formats.</p>
2124
2125       </div>
2126       <div class="tags">
2127
2128
2129         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
2130
2131
2132       </div>
2133     </div>
2134     <div class="padding"></div>
2135
2136     <div class="entry">
2137       <div class="title">
2138         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_program_should_be_able_to_open_its_own_files_on_Linux.html">A program should be able to open its own files on Linux</a>
2139       </div>
2140       <div class="date">
2141          5th June 2016
2142       </div>
2143       <div class="body">
2144         <p>Many years ago, when koffice was fresh and with few users, I
2145 decided to test its presentation tool when making the slides for a
2146 talk I was giving for NUUG on Japhar, a free Java virtual machine.  I
2147 wrote the first draft of the slides, saved the result and went to bed
2148 the day before I would give the talk.  The next day I took a plane to
2149 the location where the meeting should take place, and on the plane I
2150 started up koffice again to polish the talk a bit, only to discover
2151 that kpresenter refused to load its own data file.  I cursed a bit and
2152 started making the slides again from memory, to have something to
2153 present when I arrived.  I tested that the saved files could be
2154 loaded, and the day seemed to be rescued.  I continued to polish the
2155 slides until I suddenly discovered that the saved file could no longer
2156 be loaded into kpresenter.  In the end I had to rewrite the slides
2157 three times, condensing the content until the talk became shorter and
2158 shorter.  After the talk I was able to pinpoint the problem &ndash;
2159 kpresenter wrote inline images in a way itself could not understand.
2160 Eventually that bug was fixed and kpresenter ended up being a great
2161 program to make slides.  The point I'm trying to make is that we
2162 expect a program to be able to load its own data files, and it is
2163 embarrassing to its developers if it can't.</p>
2164
2165 <p>Did you ever experience a program failing to load its own data
2166 files from the desktop file browser?  It is not a uncommon problem.  A
2167 while back I discovered that the screencast recorder
2168 gtk-recordmydesktop would save an Ogg Theora video file the KDE file
2169 browser would refuse to open.  No video player claimed to understand
2170 such file.  I tracked down the cause being <tt>file --mime-type</tt>
2171 returning the application/ogg MIME type, which no video player I had
2172 installed listed as a MIME type they would understand.  I asked for
2173 <a href="http://bugs.gw.com/view.php?id=382">file to change its
2174 behavour</a> and use the MIME type video/ogg instead.  I also asked
2175 several video players to add video/ogg to their desktop files, to give
2176 the file browser an idea what to do about Ogg Theora files.  After a
2177 while, the desktop file browsers in Debian started to handle the
2178 output from gtk-recordmydesktop properly.</p>
2179
2180 <p>But history repeats itself.  A few days ago I tested the music
2181 system Rosegarden again, and I discovered that the KDE and xfce file
2182 browsers did not know what to do with the Rosegarden project files
2183 (*.rg).  I've reported <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/825993">the
2184 rosegarden problem to BTS</a> and a fix is commited to git and will be
2185 included in the next upload.  To increase the chance of me remembering
2186 how to fix the problem next time some program fail to load its files
2187 from the file browser, here are some notes on how to fix it.</p>
2188
2189 <p>The file browsers in Debian in general operates on MIME types.
2190 There are two sources for the MIME type of a given file.  The output from
2191 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> mentioned above, and the content of the
2192 shared MIME type registry (under /usr/share/mime/).  The file MIME
2193 type is mapped to programs supporting the MIME type, and this
2194 information is collected from
2195 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/desktop-entry-spec/">the
2196 desktop files</a> available in /usr/share/applications/.  If there is
2197 one desktop file claiming support for the MIME type of the file, it is
2198 activated when asking to open a given file.  If there are more, one
2199 can normally select which one to use by right-clicking on the file and
2200 selecting the wanted one using 'Open with' or similar.  In general
2201 this work well.  But it depend on each program picking a good MIME
2202 type (preferably
2203 <a href="http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">a
2204 MIME type registered with IANA</a>), file and/or the shared MIME
2205 registry recognizing the file and the desktop file to list the MIME
2206 type in its list of supported MIME types.</p>
2207
2208 <p>The <tt>/usr/share/mime/packages/rosegarden.xml</tt> entry for
2209 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/shared-mime-info-spec">the
2210 Shared MIME database</a> look like this:</p>
2211
2212 <p><blockquote><pre>
2213 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
2214 &lt;mime-info xmlns="http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info"&gt;
2215   &lt;mime-type type="audio/x-rosegarden"&gt;
2216     &lt;sub-class-of type="application/x-gzip"/&gt;
2217     &lt;comment&gt;Rosegarden project file&lt;/comment&gt;
2218     &lt;glob pattern="*.rg"/&gt;
2219   &lt;/mime-type&gt;
2220 &lt;/mime-info&gt;
2221 </pre></blockquote></p>
2222
2223 <p>This states that audio/x-rosegarden is a kind of application/x-gzip
2224 (it is a gzipped XML file).  Note, it is much better to use an
2225 official MIME type registered with IANA than it is to make up ones own
2226 unofficial ones like the x-rosegarden type used by rosegarden.</p>
2227
2228 <p>The desktop file of the rosegarden program failed to list
2229 audio/x-rosegarden in its list of supported MIME types, causing the
2230 file browsers to have no idea what to do with *.rg files:</p>
2231
2232 <p><blockquote><pre>
2233 % grep Mime /usr/share/applications/rosegarden.desktop
2234 MimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition;audio/x-rosegarden-device;audio/x-rosegarden-project;audio/x-rosegarden-template;audio/midi;
2235 X-KDE-NativeMimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition
2236 %
2237 </pre></blockquote></p>
2238
2239 <p>The fix was to add "audio/x-rosegarden;" at the end of the
2240 MimeType= line.</p>
2241
2242 <p>If you run into a file which fail to open the correct program when
2243 selected from the file browser, please check out the output from
2244 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> for the file, ensure the file ending and
2245 MIME type is registered somewhere under /usr/share/mime/ and check
2246 that some desktop file under /usr/share/applications/ is claiming
2247 support for this MIME type.  If not, please report a bug to have it
2248 fixed. :)</p>
2249
2250       </div>
2251       <div class="tags">
2252
2253
2254         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2255
2256
2257       </div>
2258     </div>
2259     <div class="padding"></div>
2260
2261     <div class="entry">
2262       <div class="title">
2263         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram_with_PackageKit_support___new_version_0_23_available_in_Debian_unstable.html">Isenkram with PackageKit support - new version 0.23 available in Debian unstable</a>
2264       </div>
2265       <div class="date">
2266         25th May 2016
2267       </div>
2268       <div class="body">
2269         <p><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">The isenkram
2270 system</a> is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware
2271 related packages.  The idea is to have a database of mappings between
2272 hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to
2273 install the packages to use a given hardware dongle.  Some use cases
2274 are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software
2275 needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it
2276 proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader;
2277 and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to
2278 install the driver for it.  The system work well, and even have a few
2279 command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the
2280 hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).</p>
2281
2282 <p>The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found
2283 good documentation and example code on how to use it.  But aptdaemon
2284 is going away and is generally being replaced by
2285 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/">PackageKit</a>,
2286 so Isenkram needed a rewrite.  And today, thanks to the great patch
2287 from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the
2288 rewrite finally took place.  I've just uploaded a new version of
2289 Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default
2290 for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit.  To check it out,
2291 install the <tt>isenkram</tt> package and insert some hardware dongle
2292 and see if it is recognised.</p>
2293
2294 <p>If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for
2295 the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup
2296 program.  This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:</p>
2297
2298 <p><blockquote><pre>
2299 % isenkram-lookup
2300 bluez
2301 cheese
2302 fprintd
2303 fprintd-demo
2304 gkrellm-thinkbat
2305 hdapsd
2306 libpam-fprintd
2307 pidgin-blinklight
2308 thinkfan
2309 tleds
2310 tp-smapi-dkms
2311 tp-smapi-source
2312 tpb
2313 %p
2314 </pre></blockquote></p>
2315
2316 <p>The hardware mappings come from several places.  The preferred way
2317 is for packages to announce their hardware support using
2318 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
2319 cross distribution appstream system</a>.
2320 See
2321 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">previous
2322 blog posts about isenkram</a> to learn how to do that.</p>
2323
2324       </div>
2325       <div class="tags">
2326
2327
2328         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
2329
2330
2331       </div>
2332     </div>
2333     <div class="padding"></div>
2334
2335     <div class="entry">
2336       <div class="title">
2337         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Discharge_rate_estimate_in_new_battery_statistics_collector_for_Debian.html">Discharge rate estimate in new battery statistics collector for Debian</a>
2338       </div>
2339       <div class="date">
2340         23rd May 2016
2341       </div>
2342       <div class="body">
2343         <p>Yesterday I updated the
2344 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats
2345 package in Debian</a> with a few patches sent to me by skilled and
2346 enterprising users.  There were some nice user and visible changes.
2347 First of all, both desktop menu entries now work.  A design flaw in
2348 one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was
2349 dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available.
2350 The script worked when called from the command line, but not when
2351 called from the desktop menu.  I changed this to look for a DISPLAY
2352 variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the
2353 graph window pop up as expected.</p>
2354
2355 <p>The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the
2356 graphs (the one showing the last few hours).  New is also the user of
2357 colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red.  The percentages
2358 of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design
2359 capacity.</p>
2360
2361 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-rate.png"/></p>
2362
2363 <p>The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery
2364 statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to
2365 visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time.  The red
2366 line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent:
2367
2368 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-history.png"/></p>
2369
2370 <p>In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80
2371 percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is
2372 shrinking. :(</p>
2373
2374 <p>The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle
2375 more hardware models.  On some hardware, Linux power supply
2376 information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the
2377 collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/.  Now
2378 both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the
2379 machine.</p>
2380
2381 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
2382 check out the
2383 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
2384 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
2385 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from <a
2386 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2387 Patches are very welcome.</p>
2388
2389 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2390 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2391 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2392
2393       </div>
2394       <div class="tags">
2395
2396
2397         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2398
2399
2400       </div>
2401     </div>
2402     <div class="padding"></div>
2403
2404     <div class="entry">
2405       <div class="title">
2406         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_with_ZFS_on_Linux_included.html">Debian now with ZFS on Linux included</a>
2407       </div>
2408       <div class="date">
2409         12th May 2016
2410       </div>
2411       <div class="body">
2412         <p>Today, after many years of hard work from many people,
2413 <a href="http://zfsonlinux.org/">ZFS for Linux</a> finally entered
2414 Debian.  The package status can be seen on
2415 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/zfs-linux">the package tracker
2416 for zfs-linux</a>.  and
2417 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
2418 team status page</a>. If you want to help out, please join us.
2419 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">The
2420 source code</a> is available via git on Alioth.  It would also be
2421 great if you could help out with
2422 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/dkms">the dkms package</a>, as
2423 it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.</p>
2424
2425       </div>
2426       <div class="tags">
2427
2428
2429         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2430
2431
2432       </div>
2433     </div>
2434     <div class="padding"></div>
2435
2436     <div class="entry">
2437       <div class="title">
2438         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">What is the best multimedia player in Debian?</a>
2439       </div>
2440       <div class="date">
2441          8th May 2016
2442       </div>
2443       <div class="body">
2444         <p><strong>Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in
2445 Debian claim support for most file formats.</strong></p>
2446
2447 <p>A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser
2448 plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian
2449 Edu.  I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types
2450 for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser
2451 plugin supported most file formats / media types.
2452 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">The
2453 result</a> can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have
2454 not been updated for a while.  But browser plugins are less relevant
2455 these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone
2456 players.</p>
2457
2458 <p>A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable
2459 player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National
2460 Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why.  The cause is a
2461 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/822245">missing MIME type in the VLC
2462 desktop file</a>.  In the process I wrote a script to compare the set
2463 of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin,
2464 only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the
2465 two for VLC.  This discovery made me dig up the script I used to
2466 compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files
2467 instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian
2468 support most file formats.</p>
2469
2470 <p>The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as
2471 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">a
2472 table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included
2473 in the table</a>, with the package supporting most MIME types being
2474 listed first in the table.</p>
2475
2476 </p>The best multimedia player in Debian?  It is totem, followed by
2477 parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and
2478 kmplayer.  Time for the other players to update their announced MIME
2479 support?</p>
2480
2481       </div>
2482       <div class="tags">
2483
2484
2485         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
2486
2487
2488       </div>
2489     </div>
2490     <div class="padding"></div>
2491
2492     <div class="entry">
2493       <div class="title">
2494         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Pyra___handheld_computer_with_Debian_preinstalled.html">The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled</a>
2495       </div>
2496       <div class="date">
2497          4th May 2016
2498       </div>
2499       <div class="body">
2500         A friend of mine made me aware of
2501 <a href="https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/">The Pyra</a>, a
2502 handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled.  I
2503 would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)</p>
2504
2505 <p>The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB
2506 plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5"
2507 LCD touch screen.  The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole
2508 day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests
2509 confirming this.  The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the
2510 last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before
2511 production started.</p>
2512
2513 <p>As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with
2514 Debian.  Please let me know if you know of any others.  Is it the
2515 first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?</p>
2516
2517       </div>
2518       <div class="tags">
2519
2520
2521         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2522
2523
2524       </div>
2525     </div>
2526     <div class="padding"></div>
2527
2528     <div class="entry">
2529       <div class="title">
2530         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">Lets make a Norwegian Bokmål edition of The Debian Administrator's Handbook</a>
2531       </div>
2532       <div class="date">
2533         10th April 2016
2534       </div>
2535       <div class="body">
2536         <p>During this weekends
2537 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Oslo__Takk_for_feilfiksingsfesten.shtml">bug
2538 squashing party and developer gathering</a>, we decided to do our part
2539 to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian
2540 Bokmål, and got in touch with the people behind the
2541 <a href="http://debian-handbook.info/">Debian Administrator's Handbook
2542 project</a> to get started.  If you want to help out, please start
2543 contributing using
2544 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
2545 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
2546 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
2547 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
2548 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
2549 contributors</a>.</p>
2550
2551 <p>The book is already available on paper in English, French and
2552 Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian
2553 Bokmål too.  In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and
2554 Mobi versions available.  And there are incomplete translations
2555 available for many more languages.</p>
2556
2557       </div>
2558       <div class="tags">
2559
2560
2561         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2562
2563
2564       </div>
2565     </div>
2566     <div class="padding"></div>
2567
2568     <div class="entry">
2569       <div class="title">
2570         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/One_in_two_hundred_Debian_users_using_ZFS_on_Linux_.html">One in two hundred Debian users using ZFS on Linux?</a>
2571       </div>
2572       <div class="date">
2573          7th April 2016
2574       </div>
2575       <div class="body">
2576         <p>Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related
2577 packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found.  I use
2578 ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so.
2579 But I might be wrong.</p>
2580
2581 <p>According to
2582 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=spl-linux">the popcon
2583 results for spl-linux</a>, there are 1019 Debian installations, or
2584 0.53% of the population, with the package installed.  As far as I know
2585 the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS
2586 on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS
2587 installation on Linux in Debian.  In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian
2588 the ZFS feature is already available, and there
2589 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=zfsutils">the popcon
2590 results for zfsutils</a> show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of
2591 the population.  So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.</p>
2592
2593 <p>But even though the Debian project leader Lucas Nussbaum
2594 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2015/04/msg00006.html">announced
2595 in April 2015</a> that the legal obstacles blocking ZFS on Debian were
2596 cleared, the package is still not in Debian.  The package is again in
2597 the NEW queue.  Several uploads have been rejected so far because the
2598 debian/copyright file was incomplete or wrong, but there is no reason
2599 to give up.  The current status can be seen on
2600 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
2601 team status page</a>, and
2602 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">the
2603 source code</a> is available on Alioth.</p>
2604
2605 <p>As I want ZFS to be included in next version of Debian to make sure
2606 my home server can function in the future using only official Debian
2607 packages, and the current blocker is to get the debian/copyright file
2608 accepted by the FTP masters in Debian, I decided a while back to try
2609 to help out the team.  This was the background for my blog post about
2610 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">creating,
2611 updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>, and I
2612 used the techniques I explored there to try to find any errors in the
2613 copyright file.  It is not very easy to check every one of the around
2614 2000 files in the source package, but I hope we this time got it
2615 right.  If you want to help out, check out the git source and try to
2616 find missing entries in the debian/copyright file.</p>
2617
2618       </div>
2619       <div class="tags">
2620
2621
2622         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2623
2624
2625       </div>
2626     </div>
2627     <div class="padding"></div>
2628
2629     <div class="entry">
2630       <div class="title">
2631         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Full_battery_stats_collector_is_now_available_in_Debian.html">Full battery stats collector is now available in Debian</a>
2632       </div>
2633       <div class="date">
2634         23rd March 2016
2635       </div>
2636       <div class="body">
2637         <p>Since this morning, the battery-stats package in Debian include an
2638 extended collector that will collect the complete battery history for
2639 later processing and graphing.  The original collector store the
2640 battery level as percentage of last full level, while the new
2641 collector also record battery vendor, model, serial number, design
2642 full level, last full level and current battery level.  This make it
2643 possible to predict the lifetime of the battery as well as visualise
2644 the energy flow when the battery is charging or discharging.</p>
2645
2646 <p>The new tools are available in <tt>/usr/share/battery-stats/</tt>
2647 in the version 0.5.1 package in unstable.  Get the new battery level graph
2648 and lifetime prediction by running:
2649
2650 <p><pre>
2651 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph /var/log/battery-stats.csv
2652 </pre></p>
2653
2654 <p>Or select the 'Battery Level Graph' from your application menu.</p>
2655
2656 <p>The flow in/out of the battery can be seen by running (no menu
2657 entry yet):</p>
2658
2659 <p><pre>
2660 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph-flow
2661 </pre></p>
2662
2663 <p>I'm not quite happy with the way the data is visualised, at least
2664 when there are few data points.  The graphs look a bit better with a
2665 few years of data.</p>
2666
2667 <p>A while back one important feature I use in the battery stats
2668 collector broke in Debian.  The scripts in
2669 <tt>/usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/</tt> were no longer executed.  I
2670 suspect it happened when Jessie started using systemd, but I do not
2671 know.  The issue is reported as
2672 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/818649">bug #818649</a> against
2673 pm-utils.  I managed to work around it by adding an udev rule to call
2674 the collector script every time the power connector is connected and
2675 disconnected.  With this fix in place it was finally time to make a
2676 new release of the package, and get it into Debian.</p>
2677
2678 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
2679 check out the
2680 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
2681 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
2682 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from
2683 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2684 As always, patches are very welcome.</p>
2685
2686       </div>
2687       <div class="tags">
2688
2689
2690         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2691
2692
2693       </div>
2694     </div>
2695     <div class="padding"></div>
2696
2697     <div class="entry">
2698       <div class="title">
2699         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Making_battery_measurements_a_little_easier_in_Debian.html">Making battery measurements a little easier in Debian</a>
2700       </div>
2701       <div class="date">
2702         15th March 2016
2703       </div>
2704       <div class="body">
2705         <p>Back in September, I blogged about
2706 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">the
2707 system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery</a>, and
2708 how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced).  I
2709 created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing,
2710 but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already
2711 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">a battery-stats
2712 package in Debian</a> that should do the same thing, and I did not see
2713 a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be
2714 fixed instead.  I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and
2715 hoped someone would step in and fix it.  But no-one did.</p>
2716
2717 <p>I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own
2718 hands.  The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of
2719 battery stats (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">available from github</a>) and part of the team maintaining
2720 battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally
2721 able to collect battery status using the <tt>/sys/class/power_supply/</tt>
2722 information provided by the Linux kernel.  If you install the
2723 battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a
2724 graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the
2725 status of the battery.  The source package build and work just fine in
2726 Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not
2727 tested).  The default graph you get for that system look like this:</p>
2728
2729 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-03-15-battery-stats-graph-example.png" width="70%" align="center"></p>
2730
2731 <p>My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the
2732 battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details
2733 about the battery.  The scripts are merged into the upstream
2734 battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work
2735 yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way.  Will have to test a
2736 bit more before I make a new release.</p>
2737
2738 <p>I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I
2739 suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it
2740 impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing
2741 and graphing.</p>
2742
2743 <p>If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop
2744 battery, check out the battery-stats package in
2745 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">Debian</a> and
2746 on
2747 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2748 I would love some help to improve the system further.</p>
2749
2750       </div>
2751       <div class="tags">
2752
2753
2754         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2755
2756
2757       </div>
2758     </div>
2759     <div class="padding"></div>
2760
2761     <div class="entry">
2762       <div class="title">
2763         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">Creating, updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>
2764       </div>
2765       <div class="date">
2766         19th February 2016
2767       </div>
2768       <div class="body">
2769         <p>Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to
2770 details.  And one of the details is the content of the
2771 debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by
2772 the code in the package in question, preferably in
2773 <a href="https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/">machine
2774 readable DEP5 format</a>.</p>
2775
2776 <p>For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write
2777 and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the
2778 package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters.  So getting it right
2779 the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save
2780 both you and the ftpmasters some work..  Today, while trying to figure
2781 out what was wrong with
2782 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=686447">the
2783 zfsonlinux copyright file</a>, I decided to spend some time on
2784 figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least
2785 semi-automatically.</p>
2786
2787 <p>Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the
2788 file based on the code in the source package,
2789 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/debmake">debmake</a></tt>
2790 and <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cme">cme</a></tt>.  I'm
2791 not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to
2792 create a sensible draft file.  As far as I can tell, none of them can
2793 be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be
2794 polished a bit before the file is OK to upload.  I found the debmake
2795 option in
2796 <a href="http://goofying-with-debian.blogspot.com/2014/07/debmake-checking-source-against-dep-5.html">a
2797 blog posts from 2014</a>.
2798
2799 <p>To generate using debmake, use the -cc option:
2800
2801 <p><pre>
2802 debmake -cc > debian/copyright
2803 </pre></p>
2804
2805 <p>Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so
2806 this might not be the best option.</p>
2807
2808 <p>The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found
2809 this approach in
2810 <a href="https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2015/04/05/improving-creation-of-debian-copyright-file/">a
2811 blog post from 2015</a>.  To generate using cme, use the 'update
2812 dpkg-copyright' option:
2813
2814 <p><pre>
2815 cme update dpkg-copyright
2816 </pre></p>
2817
2818 <p>This will create or update debian/copyright.  The cme tool seem to
2819 handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.</p>
2820
2821 <p>When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to
2822 check if the file is correct.  For this I found two good options,
2823 <tt>debmake -k</tt> and <tt>license-reconcile</tt>.  The former seem
2824 to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect
2825 ineffective blocks in the copyright file.  The latter reports missing
2826 copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license
2827 names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0).  I suspect it is good to use both and
2828 fix all issues reported by them before uploading.  But I do not know
2829 if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a
2830 copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.</p>
2831
2832 <p>The devscripts tool <tt>licensecheck</tt> deserve mentioning.  It
2833 will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements.
2834 It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but
2835 can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.</p>
2836
2837 <p>Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update
2838 debian/copyright file.  Please let me know, or blog about it on
2839 planet.debian.org.</p>
2840
2841 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2842 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2843 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2844
2845 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-20</strong>: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel
2846 on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file
2847
2848 <p><pre>
2849 licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
2850   /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
2851 </pre></p>
2852
2853 <p>He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the
2854 version control system to make it easier to discover license and
2855 copyright changes in the upstream source.  I will try to do the same
2856 with my packages in the future.</p>
2857
2858 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-21</strong>: The cme author recommended
2859 against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed
2860 command line.</p>
2861
2862       </div>
2863       <div class="tags">
2864
2865
2866         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2867
2868
2869       </div>
2870     </div>
2871     <div class="padding"></div>
2872
2873     <div class="entry">
2874       <div class="title">
2875         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_in_Debian_to_locate_packages_with_firmware_and_mime_type_support.html">Using appstream in Debian to locate packages with firmware and mime type support</a>
2876       </div>
2877       <div class="date">
2878          4th February 2016
2879       </div>
2880       <div class="body">
2881         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">appstream system</a>
2882 is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very
2883 convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given
2884 firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it.  This can
2885 be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog
2886 about. :)</p>
2887
2888 <p>Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware
2889 file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly
2890 picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian
2891 unstable.  In general you would be looking for the firmware requested
2892 by the kernel during kernel module loading.  To find the package
2893 providing the example file, do like this:</p>
2894
2895 <blockquote><pre>
2896 % apt install appstream
2897 [...]
2898 % apt update
2899 [...]
2900 % appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
2901   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
2902 firmware-qlogic
2903 %
2904 </pre></blockquote>
2905
2906 <p>See <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">the
2907 appstream wiki</a> page to learn how to embed the package metadata in
2908 a way appstream can use.</p>
2909
2910 <p>This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a
2911 given MIME type.  This is very useful when you get a file you do not
2912 know how to handle.  First find the mime type using <tt>file
2913 --mime-type</tt>, and next look up the package providing support for
2914 it.  Lets say you got an SVG file.  Its MIME type is image/svg+xml,
2915 and you can find all packages handling this type like this:</p>
2916
2917 <blockquote><pre>
2918 % apt install appstream
2919 [...]
2920 % apt update
2921 [...]
2922 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
2923   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
2924 bkchem
2925 phototonic
2926 inkscape
2927 shutter
2928 tetzle
2929 geeqie
2930 xia
2931 pinta
2932 gthumb
2933 karbon
2934 comix
2935 mirage
2936 viewnior
2937 postr
2938 ristretto
2939 kolourpaint4
2940 eog
2941 eom
2942 gimagereader
2943 midori
2944 %
2945 </pre></blockquote>
2946
2947 <p>I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for
2948 packages providing appstream metadata.</p>
2949
2950       </div>
2951       <div class="tags">
2952
2953
2954         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2955
2956
2957       </div>
2958     </div>
2959     <div class="padding"></div>
2960
2961     <div class="entry">
2962       <div class="title">
2963         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creepy__visualise_geotagged_social_media_information___nice_free_software.html">Creepy, visualise geotagged social media information - nice free software</a>
2964       </div>
2965       <div class="date">
2966         24th January 2016
2967       </div>
2968       <div class="body">
2969         <p>Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around
2970 with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their
2971 position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long
2972 time (like every time a SMS is received or sent).  And if their
2973 computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called
2974 mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often
2975 also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access
2976 during installation).  And when these programs send out information to
2977 central collection points, the location is often included, unless
2978 extra care is taken to not send the location.  The provided
2979 information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is
2980 good and bad, depend on your point of view).  What is certain, is that
2981 the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and
2982 perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way,
2983 when they share their whereabouts with private and public
2984 entities.</p>
2985
2986 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-01-24-nice-creepy-desktop-window.png"></p>
2987
2988 <p>The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out
2989 when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing.  It is
2990 unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government
2991 officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from
2992 unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information.  But the
2993 public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software
2994 tool to do so is called
2995 <a href="http://www.geocreepy.com/">Creepy or Cree.py</a>.  I
2996 discovered it when I read
2997 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Slik-kan-du-bli-overvaket-pa-Twitter-og-Instagram-uten-a-ane-det-7787884.html">an
2998 article about Creepy</a> in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i
2999 November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian.
3000 The python program was in Debian, but
3001 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/creepy">the version in
3002 Debian</a> was completely broken and practically unmaintained.  I
3003 uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not
3004 have time to fix it then.  This Christmas I decided to finally try to
3005 get Creepy operational in Debian.  Now a fixed version is available in
3006 Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches
3007 are now included
3008 <a href="https://github.com/jkakavas/creepy">upstream</a>.</p>
3009
3010 <p>The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from
3011 Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a
3012 complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a
3013 given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all
3014 these services.  Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at
3015 least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these
3016 days it is impossible.  This mean that to use Creepy, you need to
3017 configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide
3018 information to them about your search interests.  This should be taken
3019 into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information
3020 about yourself with the services.</p>
3021
3022 <p>The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least
3023 geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital
3024 of Norway.  One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at
3025 information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the
3026 information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area.
3027 I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in
3028 twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a
3029 Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time,
3030 making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other
3031 things.  A similar technique have been
3032 <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl">used
3033 to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine</a>, and it is both a powerful
3034 tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people
3035 understand the value of the private information they provide to the
3036 public.</p>
3037
3038 <p>The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as
3039 it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at
3040 least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and
3041 python-requests-toolbelt).</p>
3042
3043 <p>(I have uploaded
3044 <a href="https://screenshots.debian.net/package/creepy">the image to
3045 screenshots.debian.net</a> and licensed it under the same terms as the
3046 Creepy program in Debian.)</p>
3047
3048       </div>
3049       <div class="tags">
3050
3051
3052         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
3053
3054
3055       </div>
3056     </div>
3057     <div class="padding"></div>
3058
3059     <div class="entry">
3060       <div class="title">
3061         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Always_download_Debian_packages_using_Tor___the_simple_recipe.html">Always download Debian packages using Tor - the simple recipe</a>
3062       </div>
3063       <div class="date">
3064         15th January 2016
3065       </div>
3066       <div class="body">
3067         <p>During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum
3068 <a href="https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/meeting/331/what-is-to-be-done/">observed
3069 that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to
3070 believe a computer have a given security hole</a> if it download a
3071 security fix from a Debian mirror.  This is a good reason to always
3072 use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those
3073 listening do not know which IP address to attack.  In August, Richard
3074 Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible
3075 to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that
3076 download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and
3077 <a href="http://richardhartmann.de/blog/posts/2015/08/24-Tor-enabled_Debian_mirror/">proposed
3078 to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror</a>.  He
3079 was not the first to propose this, as the
3080 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/apt-transport-tor">apt-transport-tor</a></tt>
3081 package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt
3082 to use <a href="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</a>, but I was not
3083 aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.</p>
3084
3085 <p>Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian
3086 sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central
3087 Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making
3088 it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes,
3089 making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.</p>
3090
3091 <p>Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by
3092 installing <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> and replacing http and https
3093 urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead
3094 of the official Debian mirror site.  I recommend installing
3095 <tt>etckeeper</tt> before you start to have a history of the changes
3096 done in /etc/.</p>
3097
3098 <blockquote><pre>
3099 apt install apt-transport-tor
3100 sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
3101 sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
3102 </pre></blockquote>
3103
3104 <p>If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run
3105 the sed commands for these too.  The sed command is assuming your are
3106 using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror.  Adjust the command (or just
3107 edit the file manually) to match your mirror.</p>
3108
3109 <p>This work in Debian Jessie and later.  Note that tools like
3110 <tt>apt-file</tt> only recently started using the apt transport
3111 system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs.  For
3112 <tt>apt-file</tt> you need the version currently in experimental,
3113 which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable.  So if you
3114 need a working <tt>apt-file</tt>, this is not for you.</p>
3115
3116 <p>Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start
3117 using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you
3118 update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus
3119 masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine.  Using Tor will
3120 become normal for the machine in question.</p>
3121
3122 <p>On <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox</a>, APT
3123 is set up by default to use <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> when Tor is
3124 enabled.  It would be great if it was the default on any Debian
3125 system.</p>
3126
3127       </div>
3128       <div class="tags">
3129
3130
3131         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
3132
3133
3134       </div>
3135     </div>
3136     <div class="padding"></div>
3137
3138     <div class="entry">
3139       <div class="title">
3140         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenALPR__find_car_license_plates_in_video_streams___nice_free_software.html">OpenALPR, find car license plates in video streams - nice free software</a>
3141       </div>
3142       <div class="date">
3143         23rd December 2015
3144       </div>
3145       <div class="body">
3146         <p>When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to
3147 call the car license plate numbers in those days.  I would write the
3148 numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids
3149 to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some
3150 exotic or special region codes and numbers.  It was a fun game to pass
3151 time, as we kids have plenty of it.</p>
3152
3153 <p>A few days I came across
3154 <a href="https://github.com/openalpr/openalpr">the OpenALPR
3155 project</a>, a free software project to automatically discover and
3156 report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the
3157 "car numbers" in a machine readable format.  I've been looking for
3158 such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the
3159 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition">automatic
3160 number plate recognition</a> tool only is available in the hands of
3161 the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to
3162 even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance.  I
3163 discovered the developer
3164 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/747509">wanted to get the tool into
3165 Debian</a>, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to
3166 help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian
3167 archive.</p>
3168
3169 <p>Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded
3170 it into Debian, where it currently
3171 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org//new/openalpr_2.2.1-1.html">waits
3172 in the NEW queue</a> for review by the Debian ftpmasters.</p>
3173
3174 <p>I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful
3175 for the common folks, ie those not running a large government
3176 surveillance system?  Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike
3177 and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified
3178 when number plates on my watch list are discovered.  Another use case
3179 was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home
3180 to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his
3181 car.  When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone
3182 capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to
3183 open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway.  I
3184 guess for such use case it make sense.  I am sure there are other use
3185 cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.</p>
3186
3187 <p>If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check
3188 out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/
3189 before running "debuild" to build the source.  Or wait a bit until the
3190 package show up in unstable.</p>
3191
3192       </div>
3193       <div class="tags">
3194
3195
3196         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
3197
3198
3199       </div>
3200     </div>
3201     <div class="padding"></div>
3202
3203     <div class="entry">
3204       <div class="title">
3205         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">Using appstream with isenkram to install hardware related packages in Debian</a>
3206       </div>
3207       <div class="date">
3208         20th December 2015
3209       </div>
3210       <div class="body">
3211         <p>Around three years ago, I created
3212 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the isenkram
3213 system</a> to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing
3214 hardware related packages.  A GUI system in the isenkram package will
3215 present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by
3216 relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine.  The same
3217 lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line
3218 tools in the isenkram-cli package.  In addition to mapping hardware,
3219 it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to
3220 install needed firmware packages automatically.  The key for this
3221 system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other
3222 words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work
3223 with.</p>
3224
3225 <p>I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and
3226 adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run
3227 time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available.
3228 I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in
3229 the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I
3230 was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings,
3231 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
3232 appstream system</a> was announced.  I got in touch and suggested to
3233 add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use
3234 appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the
3235 Debian version of appstream.</p>
3236
3237 <p>A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible,
3238 and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for
3239 appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages.  The only
3240 package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my
3241 pymissile package.  I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out
3242 how do add the required
3243 <a href="https://appstream.debian.org/html/sid/main/metainfo/pymissile.html">metadata
3244 in pymissile</a>.  I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with
3245 this content:</p>
3246
3247 <blockquote><pre>
3248 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
3249 &lt;component&gt;
3250   &lt;id&gt;pymissile&lt;/id&gt;
3251   &lt;metadata_license&gt;MIT&lt;/metadata_license&gt;
3252   &lt;name&gt;pymissile&lt;/name&gt;
3253   &lt;summary&gt;Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher&lt;/summary&gt;
3254   &lt;description&gt;
3255     &lt;p&gt;
3256       Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
3257       Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
3258       motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
3259       launcher.
3260     &lt;/p&gt;
3261   &lt;/description&gt;
3262   &lt;provides&gt;
3263     &lt;modalias&gt;usb:v1130p0202d*&lt;/modalias&gt;
3264   &lt;/provides&gt;
3265 &lt;/component&gt;
3266 </pre></blockquote>
3267
3268 <p>The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value,
3269 which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings
3270 (modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel.  In this case, it
3271 will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code
3272 0202.</p>
3273
3274 <p>Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files
3275 are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide
3276 appstream files.  Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for
3277 these files.  A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as
3278 it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions
3279 (in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use).  But
3280 it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as
3281 upstream for this project is dormant.</p>
3282
3283 <p>To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the
3284 mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the
3285 appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary
3286 package under /usr/share/appdata/.  I did this by adding the following
3287 line to debian/pymissile.install:</p>
3288
3289 <blockquote><pre>
3290 debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
3291 </pre></blockquote>
3292
3293 <p>With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list
3294 all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI
3295 pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already
3296 installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in
3297 question.</p>
3298
3299 <p>Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the
3300 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a> proposal.</p>
3301
3302 <p>To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine,
3303 try running this command on the command line:</p>
3304
3305 <blockquote><pre>
3306 cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
3307 </pre></blockquote>
3308
3309 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
3310 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
3311 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
3312
3313       </div>
3314       <div class="tags">
3315
3316
3317         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
3318
3319
3320       </div>
3321     </div>
3322     <div class="padding"></div>
3323
3324     <div class="entry">
3325       <div class="title">
3326         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_GNU_General_Public_License_is_not_magic_pixie_dust.html">The GNU General Public License is not magic pixie dust</a>
3327       </div>
3328       <div class="date">
3329         30th November 2015
3330       </div>
3331       <div class="body">
3332         <p>A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled
3333 "<a href="http://bonedaddy.net/pabs3/log/2015/11/27/sfc-supporter/">The
3334 GPL is not magic pixie dust</a>" explain the importance of making sure
3335 the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GPL</a> is enforced.
3336 I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:<p>
3337
3338 <blockquote>
3339
3340 <p><a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/"><img src="https://sfconservancy.org/img/supporter-badge.png" width="194" height="90" alt="Become a Software Freedom Conservancy Supporter!" align="right" border="0" /></a></p>
3341
3342 <blockquote>
3343 The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.<br/>
3344
3345 The first step is to choose a
3346 <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft</a> license for your
3347 code.<br/>
3348
3349 The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license,
3350 <b>it must be enforced</b><br/>
3351
3352 and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of
3353 work<br/>
3354
3355 is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do.
3356 </blockquote>
3357
3358 <p><small>-- <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/">Bradley Kuhn</a>, in
3359 <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in Freedom">FaiF</a>
3360 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode
3361 0x57</a></small></p>
3362
3363 <p>As the Debian Website
3364 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/794116">used</a>
3365 <a href="https://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/webwml/webwml/english/intro/free.wml?r1=1.24&amp;r2=1.25">to</a>
3366 imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to
3367 the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful
3368 software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or
3369 software products.  Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created
3370 to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but
3371 such licenses are not enough.  With the ongoing adoption of Free
3372 Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's
3373 expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of
3374 ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always.  As Karen
3375 and Bradley explained in <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in
3376 Freedom">FaiF</a>
3377 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode 0x57</a>,
3378 copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court
3379 to protect it.  The reality of today's world is that legal
3380 representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming.  With
3381 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/">gpl-violations.org</a> in hiatus
3382 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/news/20151027-homepage-recovers/">until</a>
3383 some time in 2016, the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software
3384 Freedom Conservancy</a> (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender
3385 of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations.
3386 In March the SFC supported a
3387 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">lawsuit
3388 by Christoph Hellwig</a> against VMware for refusing to
3389 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/vmware-lawsuit-faq.html">comply
3390 with the GPL</a> in relation to their use of parts of the Linux
3391 kernel.  Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and
3392 conferences
3393 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">blocked
3394 or cancelled their talks</a>.  As a result they have decided to rely
3395 less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of
3396 individuals who support Free Software and copyleft.  So the SFC has
3397 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/23/2015fundraiser/">launched</a>
3398 a <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">campaign</a> to create
3399 a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by
3400 supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free
3401 Software.</p>
3402
3403 <p>If you support Free Software,
3404 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/26/like-what-I-do/">like</a>
3405 what the SFC do, agree with their
3406 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">compliance
3407 principles</a>, are happy about their
3408 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">successes</a> in 2015,
3409 work on a project that is an SFC
3410 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/members/current/">member</a> and or
3411 just want to stand up for copyleft, please join
3412 <a href="https://identi.ca/cwebber/image/JQGPA4qbTyyp3-MY8QpvuA">Christopher
3413 Allan Webber</a>,
3414 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">Carol
3415 Smith</a>,
3416 <a href="http://www.jonobacon.org/2015/11/25/supporting-software-freedom-conservancy/">Jono
3417 Bacon</a>, myself and
3418 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/sponsors/#supporters">others</a> in
3419 becoming a
3420 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">supporter</a>.  For the
3421 next week your donation will be
3422 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/27/black-friday/">matched</a>
3423 by an anonymous donor.  Please also consider asking your employer to
3424 match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC.  Don't forget to
3425 spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or
3426 social media accounts.</p>
3427
3428 </blockquote>
3429
3430 <p>I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter
3431 of Software Freedom Conservancy myself.  Perhaps you should be a
3432 supporter too?</p>
3433
3434       </div>
3435       <div class="tags">
3436
3437
3438         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
3439
3440
3441       </div>
3442     </div>
3443     <div class="padding"></div>
3444
3445     <div class="entry">
3446       <div class="title">
3447         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/PGP_key_transition_statement_for_key_EE4E02F9.html">PGP key transition statement for key EE4E02F9</a>
3448       </div>
3449       <div class="date">
3450         17th November 2015
3451       </div>
3452       <div class="body">
3453         <p>I've needed a new OpenPGP key for a while, but have not had time to
3454 set it up properly.  I wanted to generate it offline and have it
3455 available on <a href="http://shop.kernelconcepts.de/#openpgp">a OpenPGP
3456 smart card</a> for daily use, and learning how to do it and finding
3457 time to sit down with an offline machine almost took forever.  But
3458 finally I've been able to complete the process, and have now moved
3459 from my old GPG key to a new GPG key.  See
3460 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-11-17-new-gpg-key-transition.txt">the
3461 full transition statement, signed with both my old and new key</a> for
3462 the details.  This is my new key:</p>
3463
3464 <pre>
3465 pub   3936R/<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/111D6B29EE4E02F9.html">111D6B29EE4E02F9</a> 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-14]
3466       Key fingerprint = 3AC7 B2E3 ACA5 DF87 78F1  D827 111D 6B29 EE4E 02F9
3467 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
3468 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@debian.org&gt;
3469 sub   4096R/87BAFB0E 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
3470 sub   4096R/F91E6DE9 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
3471 sub   4096R/A0439BAB 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
3472 </pre>
3473
3474 <p>The key can be downloaded from the OpenPGP key servers, signed by
3475 my old key.</p>
3476
3477 <p>If you signed my old key
3478 (<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/DB4CCC4B2A30D729.html">DB4CCC4B2A30D729</a>),
3479 I'd very much appreciate a signature on my new key, details and
3480 instructions in the transition statement. I m happy to reciprocate if
3481 you have a similarly signed transition statement to present.</p>
3482
3483       </div>
3484       <div class="tags">
3485
3486
3487         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
3488
3489
3490       </div>
3491     </div>
3492     <div class="padding"></div>
3493
3494     <div class="entry">
3495       <div class="title">
3496         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">The life and death of a laptop battery</a>
3497       </div>
3498       <div class="date">
3499         24th September 2015
3500       </div>
3501       <div class="body">
3502         <p>When I get a new laptop, the battery life time at the start is OK.
3503 But this do not last.  The last few laptops gave me a feeling that
3504 within a year, the life time is just a fraction of what it used to be,
3505 and it slowly become painful to use the laptop without power connected
3506 all the time.  Because of this, when I got a new Thinkpad X230 laptop
3507 about two years ago, I decided to monitor its battery state to have
3508 more hard facts when the battery started to fail.</p>
3509
3510 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-24-laptop-battery-graph.png"/>
3511
3512 <p>First I tried to find a sensible Debian package to record the
3513 battery status, assuming that this must be a problem already handled
3514 by someone else.  I found
3515 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>,
3516 which collects statistics from the battery, but it was completely
3517 broken.  I sent a few suggestions to the maintainer, but decided to
3518 write my own collector as a shell script while I waited for feedback
3519 from him.  Via
3520 <a href="http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html">a
3521 blog post about the battery development on a MacBook Air</a> I also
3522 discovered
3523 <a href="https://github.com/jradavenport/batlog.git">batlog</a>, not
3524 available in Debian.</p>
3525
3526 <p>I started my collector 2013-07-15, and it has been collecting
3527 battery stats ever since. Now my
3528 /var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log file contain around 115,000
3529 measurements, from the time the battery was working great until now,
3530 when it is unable to charge above 7% of original capacity.  My
3531 collector shell script is quite simple and look like this:</p>
3532
3533 <pre>
3534 #!/bin/sh
3535 # Inspired by
3536 # http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html
3537 # See also
3538 # http://blog.sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/01/02/debian-how-to-monitor-battery-capacity/
3539 logfile=/var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log
3540
3541 files="manufacturer model_name technology serial_number \
3542     energy_full energy_full_design energy_now cycle_count status"
3543
3544 if [ ! -e "$logfile" ] ; then
3545     (
3546         printf "timestamp,"
3547         for f in $files; do
3548             printf "%s," $f
3549         done
3550         echo
3551     ) > "$logfile"
3552 fi
3553
3554 log_battery() {
3555     # Print complete message in one echo call, to avoid race condition
3556     # when several log processes run in parallel.
3557     msg=$(printf "%s," $(date +%s); \
3558         for f in $files; do \
3559             printf "%s," $(cat $f); \
3560         done)
3561     echo "$msg"
3562 }
3563
3564 cd /sys/class/power_supply
3565
3566 for bat in BAT*; do
3567     (cd $bat && log_battery >> "$logfile")
3568 done
3569 </pre>
3570
3571 <p>The script is called when the power management system detect a
3572 change in the power status (power plug in or out), and when going into
3573 and out of hibernation and suspend.  In addition, it collect a value
3574 every 10 minutes.  This make it possible for me know when the battery
3575 is discharging, charging and how the maximum charge change over time.
3576 The code for the Debian package
3577 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-status">is now
3578 available on github</a>.</p>
3579
3580 <p>The collected log file look like this:</p>
3581
3582 <pre>
3583 timestamp,manufacturer,model_name,technology,serial_number,energy_full,energy_full_design,energy_now,cycle_count,status,
3584 1376591133,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,62800000,62160000,39050000,0,Discharging,
3585 [...]
3586 1443090528,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
3587 1443090601,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
3588 </pre>
3589
3590 <p>I wrote a small script to create a graph of the charge development
3591 over time.  This graph depicted above show the slow death of my laptop
3592 battery.</p>
3593
3594 <p>But why is this happening?  Why are my laptop batteries always
3595 dying in a year or two, while the batteries of space probes and
3596 satellites keep working year after year.  If we are to believe
3597 <a href="http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries">Battery
3598 University</a>, the cause is me charging the battery whenever I have a
3599 chance, and the fix is to not charge the Lithium-ion batteries to 100%
3600 all the time, but to stay below 90% of full charge most of the time.
3601 I've been told that the Tesla electric cars
3602 <a href="http://my.teslamotors.com/de_CH/forum/forums/battery-charge-limit">limit
3603 the charge of their batteries to 80%</a>, with the option to charge to
3604 100% when preparing for a longer trip (not that I would want a car
3605 like Tesla where rights to privacy is abandoned, but that is another
3606 story), which I guess is the option we should have for laptops on
3607 Linux too.</p>
3608
3609 <p>Is there a good and generic way with Linux to tell the battery to
3610 stop charging at 80%, unless requested to charge to 100% once in
3611 preparation for a longer trip?  I found
3612 <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/34452/how-can-i-limit-battery-charging-to-80-capacity">one
3613 recipe on askubuntu for Ubuntu to limit charging on Thinkpad to
3614 80%</a>, but could not get it to work (kernel module refused to
3615 load).</p>
3616
3617 <p>I wonder why the battery capacity was reported to be more than 100%
3618 at the start.  I also wonder why the "full capacity" increases some
3619 times, and if it is possible to repeat the process to get the battery
3620 back to design capacity.  And I wonder if the discharge and charge
3621 speed change over time, or if this stay the same.  I did not yet try
3622 to write a tool to calculate the derivative values of the battery
3623 level, but suspect some interesting insights might be learned from
3624 those.</p>
3625
3626 <p>Update 2015-09-24: I got a tip to install the packages
3627 acpi-call-dkms and tlp (unfortunately missing in Debian stable)
3628 packages instead of the tp-smapi-dkms package I had tried to use
3629 initially, and use 'tlp setcharge 40 80' to change when charging start
3630 and stop.  I've done so now, but expect my existing battery is toast
3631 and need to be replaced.  The proposal is unfortunately Thinkpad
3632 specific.</p>
3633
3634       </div>
3635       <div class="tags">
3636
3637
3638         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3639
3640
3641       </div>
3642     </div>
3643     <div class="padding"></div>
3644
3645     <div class="entry">
3646       <div class="title">
3647         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_laptop___some_more_clues_and_ideas_based_on_feedback.html">New laptop - some more clues and ideas based on feedback</a>
3648       </div>
3649       <div class="date">
3650          5th July 2015
3651       </div>
3652       <div class="body">
3653         <p>Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my
3654 need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback.  I wish to
3655 thank every one of these.  Several pointed me to the possibility of
3656 fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to
3657 do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the
3658 machine.  But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it
3659 with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live
3660 for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement.  If I did
3661 not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts
3662 using <a href="http://www.francecrans.com/">FrancEcrans</a>, but it
3663 might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.</p>
3664
3665 <p>One tip I got was to use the
3666 <a href="https://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=nb">Skinflint</a> web service to
3667 compare laptop models.  It seem to have more models available than
3668 prisjakt.no.  Another tip I got from someone I know have similar
3669 keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not
3670 very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook
3671 keyboards I tested.  Because of this, I will not consider it any further.
3672
3673 <p>When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the
3674 newest Thinkpad X model.  The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons
3675 (which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with
3676 Debian Sid/Unstable according to
3677 <a href="http://www.corsac.net/X250/">Corsac.net</a>.  The reports I
3678 got on the keyboard quality are not consistent.  Some say the keyboard
3679 is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good.
3680 Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250
3681 keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I
3682 keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to
3683 replace it.  I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk
3684 activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230.  I'm
3685 also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit
3686 noisy.  In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian
3687 Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.</p>
3688
3689 <p>I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was
3690 <a href="http://pro-star.com">Pro-Star</a>, another was
3691 <a href="http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/product/libreboot-x200/">Libreboot</a>.
3692 The latter look very attractive to me.</p>
3693
3694 <p>Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback.  It help a lot
3695 as I keep looking for a replacement.</p>
3696
3697 <p>Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the
3698 <a href="">lapstore.de</a> web shop for used laptops.  They got several
3699 different
3700 <a href="http://www.lapstore.de/f.php/shop/lapstore/f/411/lang/x/kw/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X_Serie/">old
3701 thinkpad X models</a>, and provide one year warranty.</p>
3702
3703       </div>
3704       <div class="tags">
3705
3706
3707         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3708
3709
3710       </div>
3711     </div>
3712     <div class="padding"></div>
3713
3714     <div class="entry">
3715       <div class="title">
3716         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_to_find_a_new_laptop__as_the_old_one_is_broken_after_only_two_years.html">Time to find a new laptop, as the old one is broken after only two years</a>
3717       </div>
3718       <div class="date">
3719          3rd July 2015
3720       </div>
3721       <div class="body">
3722         <p>My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a
3723 replacement soon.  The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230
3724 started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken
3725 cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the
3726 flickering.</p>
3727
3728 <p>My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is
3729 still as
3730 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">I
3731 described them in 2013</a>.  The last time I bought a laptop, I had
3732 good help from
3733 <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/category.php?k=353">prisjakt.no</a>
3734 where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin,
3735 wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually.  Three button mouse
3736 and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three
3737 laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and
3738 G2) lack three mouse buttons).  It is also unclear to me how good the
3739 keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are.  I hope Lenovo have not messed up
3740 the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have
3741 deteriorated since X41.</p>
3742
3743 <p>I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options
3744 seem sensible to me?  Are there better services around to search the
3745 set of available laptops for features?  Please send me an email if you
3746 have suggestions.</p>
3747
3748 <p>Update 2015-07-23: I got a suggestion to check out the FSF
3749 <a href="http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom">list
3750 of endorsed hardware</a>, which is useful background information.</p>
3751
3752       </div>
3753       <div class="tags">
3754
3755
3756         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3757
3758
3759       </div>
3760     </div>
3761     <div class="padding"></div>
3762
3763     <div class="entry">
3764       <div class="title">
3765         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_stay_with_sysvinit_in_Debian_Jessie.html">How to stay with sysvinit in Debian Jessie</a>
3766       </div>
3767       <div class="date">
3768         22nd November 2014
3769       </div>
3770       <div class="body">
3771         <p>By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
3772 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
3773 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
3774 courtesy of
3775 <a href="http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html">Erich
3776 Schubert</a> and
3777 <a href="http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/">Simon
3778 McVittie</a>.
3779
3780 <p>If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
3781 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
3782 <tt>/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit</tt> with this content before
3783 you upgrade:</p>
3784
3785 <p><blockquote><pre>
3786 Package: systemd-sysv
3787 Pin: release o=Debian
3788 Pin-Priority: -1
3789 </pre></blockquote><p>
3790
3791 <p>This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
3792 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
3793 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
3794 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
3795 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.</p>
3796
3797 <p>If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
3798 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
3799 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
3800 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
3801 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
3802 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
3803
3804 <p><blockquote><pre>
3805 preseed/late_command="in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core"
3806 </pre></blockquote><p>
3807
3808 <p>Next, the line to use in a preseed file:</p>
3809
3810 <p><blockquote><pre>
3811 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
3812 </pre></blockquote><p>
3813
3814 <p>One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
3815 the sysvinit-core package.</p>
3816
3817 <p>I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
3818 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
3819 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
3820 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
3821 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
3822 Jessie is released.</p>
3823
3824 <p>Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
3825 <ahref="https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg">a
3826 blog post by Torsten Glaser</a>, added --purge to the preseed
3827 line.</p>
3828
3829       </div>
3830       <div class="tags">
3831
3832
3833         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3834
3835
3836       </div>
3837     </div>
3838     <div class="padding"></div>
3839
3840     <div class="entry">
3841       <div class="title">
3842         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Debian_package_for_SMTP_via_Tor__aka_SMTorP__using_exim4.html">A Debian package for SMTP via Tor (aka SMTorP) using exim4</a>
3843       </div>
3844       <div class="date">
3845         10th November 2014
3846       </div>
3847       <div class="body">
3848         <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
3849 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
3850 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.</p>
3851
3852 <p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
3853 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
3854 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
3855 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
3856 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
3857 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
3858 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
3859 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed
3860 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a
3861 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
3862 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
3863 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
3864 <a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the
3865 Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems
3866 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p>
3867
3868 <p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
3869 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
3870 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
3871 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
3872 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
3873 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
3874 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
3875 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
3876 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
3877 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
3878 were fairly easy, and
3879 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the
3880 source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github.  I
3881 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
3882 useful approach.</p>
3883
3884 <p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
3885 mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to
3886 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
3887 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
3888 <tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow
3889 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
3890 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
3891 this:</p>
3892
3893 <p><blockquote><pre>
3894 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
3895   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
3896 </pre></blockquote></p>
3897
3898 <p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
3899 address with your own address to test your server. :)</p>
3900
3901 <p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
3902 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
3903 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
3904 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
3905 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
3906 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
3907 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
3908 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
3909 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
3910 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
3911 system.</p>
3912
3913 <p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
3914 <tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over
3915 SMTorP. :)</p>
3916
3917       </div>
3918       <div class="tags">
3919
3920
3921         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
3922
3923
3924       </div>
3925     </div>
3926     <div class="padding"></div>
3927
3928     <div class="entry">
3929       <div class="title">
3930         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/listadmin__the_quick_way_to_moderate_mailman_lists___nice_free_software.html">listadmin, the quick way to moderate mailman lists - nice free software</a>
3931       </div>
3932       <div class="date">
3933         22nd October 2014
3934       </div>
3935       <div class="body">
3936         <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
3937 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
3938 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
3939 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
3940 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
3941 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
3942 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
3943 <a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the
3944 listadmin program</a>.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
3945 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
3946 lists I recently took over:</p>
3947
3948 <p><blockquote><pre>
3949 % time listadmin xiph
3950 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
3951 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
3952
3953 real    0m1.709s
3954 user    0m0.232s
3955 sys     0m0.012s
3956 %
3957 </pre></blockquote></p>
3958
3959 <p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
3960 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
3961 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
3962 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
3963 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
3964 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
3965 program.</p>
3966
3967 <p>If you install
3968 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin
3969 package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt>
3970 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p>
3971
3972 <p><blockquote><pre>
3973 username username@example.org
3974 spamlevel 23
3975 default discard
3976 discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
3977
3978 password secret
3979 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
3980 mailman-list@lists.example.com
3981
3982 password hidden
3983 other-list@otherserver.example.org
3984 </pre></blockquote></p>
3985
3986 <p>There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
3987 learn the details.</p>
3988
3989 <p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
3990 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
3991 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
3992 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p>
3993
3994 <p><blockquote><pre>
3995 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
3996 </pre></blockquote></p>
3997
3998 <p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
3999 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
4000 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
4001 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
4002 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
4003 email.</p>
4004
4005 <p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
4006 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
4007 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
4008 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
4009 software.</p>
4010
4011 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
4012 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
4013 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
4014
4015 <p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in
4016 configuration example.  Also, I've been told that the
4017 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
4018 sure why.</p>
4019
4020       </div>
4021       <div class="tags">
4022
4023
4024         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
4025
4026
4027       </div>
4028     </div>
4029     <div class="padding"></div>
4030
4031     <div class="entry">
4032       <div class="title">
4033         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html">Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</a>
4034       </div>
4035       <div class="date">
4036         17th October 2014
4037       </div>
4038       <div class="body">
4039         <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
4040 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
4041 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
4042 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
4043 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram
4044 package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
4045 to do this using simple preseeding.</p>
4046
4047 <p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
4048 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
4049 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
4050 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
4051 of this story.)</p>
4052
4053 <p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
4054 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
4055 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
4056 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
4057 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
4058 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
4059 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
4060 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
4061 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
4062 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p>
4063
4064 <p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
4065 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
4066 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
4067 hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p>
4068
4069 <p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
4070 firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p>
4071
4072 <p><blockquote><pre>
4073 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
4074 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
4075 </pre></blockquote></p>
4076
4077 <p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
4078 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
4079 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
4080 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
4081 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
4082 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
4083 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
4084 implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p>
4085
4086 <p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
4087 this recipe work for you. :)</p>
4088
4089 <p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
4090 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
4091 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
4092 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
4093 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p>
4094
4095 <p><blockquote><pre>
4096 Task: isenkram-packages
4097 Section: hardware
4098 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4099  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
4100  proposed.
4101 Test-new-install: show show
4102 Relevance: 8
4103 Packages: for-current-hardware
4104
4105 Task: isenkram-firmware
4106 Section: hardware
4107 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4108  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
4109  packages are proposed.
4110 Test-new-install: mark show
4111 Relevance: 8
4112 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
4113 </pre></blockquote></p>
4114
4115 <p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
4116 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
4117 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
4118 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
4119 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
4120
4121 <p><blockquote><pre>
4122 #!/bin/sh
4123 #
4124 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
4125 export PATH
4126 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
4127 </pre></blockquote></p>
4128
4129 <p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
4130 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p>
4131
4132 <p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
4133 installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
4134 --new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would
4135 install.</p>
4136
4137 <p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be
4138 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
4139 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p>
4140
4141       </div>
4142       <div class="tags">
4143
4144
4145         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin</a>.
4146
4147
4148       </div>
4149     </div>
4150     <div class="padding"></div>
4151
4152     <div class="entry">
4153       <div class="title">
4154         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ubuntu_used_to_show_the_bread_prizes_at_ICA_Storo.html">Ubuntu used to show the bread prizes at ICA Storo</a>
4155       </div>
4156       <div class="date">
4157          4th October 2014
4158       </div>
4159       <div class="body">
4160         <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
4161 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
4162 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
4163 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p>
4164
4165 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p>
4166
4167 <p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
4168 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
4169 <a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p>
4170
4171       </div>
4172       <div class="tags">
4173
4174
4175         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4176
4177
4178       </div>
4179     </div>
4180     <div class="padding"></div>
4181
4182     <div class="entry">
4183       <div class="title">
4184         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_lsdvd_release_version_0_17_is_ready.html">New lsdvd release version 0.17 is ready</a>
4185       </div>
4186       <div class="date">
4187          4th October 2014
4188       </div>
4189       <div class="body">
4190         <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a>
4191 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
4192 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
4193 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
4194 Dibb.</p>
4195
4196 <p>I just wrapped up
4197 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a
4198 new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from
4199 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the
4200 download page</a>.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
4201 0.17.</p>
4202
4203 <ul>
4204
4205  <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li>
4206  <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
4207    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li>
4208  <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li>
4209  <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li>
4210  <li>Fix include orders</li>
4211  <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li>
4212  <li>Fix the chapter count</li>
4213  <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
4214    the palette size is the same.</li>
4215  <li>Fix array printing.</li>
4216  <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li>
4217  <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li>
4218  <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
4219    with more GCC compiler warnings.</li>
4220
4221 </ul>
4222
4223 <p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
4224 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
4225 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)</p>
4226
4227       </div>
4228       <div class="tags">
4229
4230
4231         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
4232
4233
4234       </div>
4235     </div>
4236     <div class="padding"></div>
4237
4238     <div class="entry">
4239       <div class="title">
4240         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_Debian_Edu_Jessie_despite_some_fatal_problems_with_the_installer.html">How to test Debian Edu Jessie despite some fatal problems with the installer</a>
4241       </div>
4242       <div class="date">
4243         26th September 2014
4244       </div>
4245       <div class="body">
4246         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4247 project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
4248 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
4249 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
4250 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
4251 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
4252 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
4253 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
4254 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
4255 future.  The
4256 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current
4257 status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
4258 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
4259 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
4260 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p>
4261
4262 <p>First, download the test ISO via
4263 <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>,
4264 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a>
4265 or rsync (use
4266 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
4267 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
4268 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
4269 install with some tweaking.</p>
4270
4271 <p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
4272 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p>
4273
4274 <p><blockquote><pre>
4275 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
4276 </pre></blockquote></p>
4277
4278 <p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
4279 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
4280 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
4281 due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p>
4282
4283 <p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
4284 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
4285 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
4286 your need.</p>
4287
4288 <p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
4289 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
4290 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
4291 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
4292 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
4293 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
4294 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
4295 days.</p>
4296
4297 <p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
4298 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
4299 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
4300 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
4301 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
4302 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
4303 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
4304 provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>.
4305 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p>
4306
4307 <p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
4308 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
4309 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p>
4310
4311       </div>
4312       <div class="tags">
4313
4314
4315         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4316
4317
4318       </div>
4319     </div>
4320     <div class="padding"></div>
4321
4322     <div class="entry">
4323       <div class="title">
4324         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Suddenly_I_am_the_new_upstream_of_the_lsdvd_command_line_tool.html">Suddenly I am the new upstream of the lsdvd command line tool</a>
4325       </div>
4326       <div class="date">
4327         25th September 2014
4328       </div>
4329       <div class="body">
4330         <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a>
4331 to handle my fairly large DVD collection.  It is a nice command line
4332 tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length,
4333 etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format.  But lsdvd have not seen
4334 any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting
4335 its use with some DVDs.  Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I
4336 sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the
4337 project, without any reply.  But I use it regularly and would like to
4338 get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version
4339 into Debian</a>.  So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with
4340 the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that
4341 he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take
4342 over.  And yesterday, I became project admin.</p>
4343
4344 <p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian
4345 maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream
4346 project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly,
4347 collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place.
4348 I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git
4349 repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too.  If you got
4350 a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out
4351 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join
4352 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing
4353 list</a>. :)</p>
4354
4355       </div>
4356       <div class="tags">
4357
4358
4359         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
4360
4361
4362       </div>
4363     </div>
4364     <div class="padding"></div>
4365
4366     <div class="entry">
4367       <div class="title">
4368         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">Speeding up the Debian installer using eatmydata and dpkg-divert</a>
4369       </div>
4370       <div class="date">
4371         16th September 2014
4372       </div>
4373       <div class="body">
4374         <p>The <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> installer could be
4375 a lot quicker.  When we install more than 2000 packages in
4376 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> using
4377 tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever.
4378 A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in
4379 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/613428">bug #613428</a> about too
4380 much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package
4381 responsible for unpacking the binary packages.  Other parts (like code
4382 executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during
4383 installation.  All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to
4384 me.  If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try
4385 to salvage the half installed system.  So the failure sync-ing is
4386 supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really
4387 relevant while the installer is running.</p>
4388
4389 <p>A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file
4390 system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to
4391 change the code in several packages.  The idea is not new, but I have
4392 not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before.  It
4393 depend on the small and clever package
4394 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/eatmydata">eatmydata</a>, which
4395 uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to
4396 disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live
4397 dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly.  Instead of
4398 modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the
4399 packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages),
4400 it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace
4401 them with a simple shell wrapper calling
4402 "eatmydata&nbsp;$program&nbsp;$@", to get the same effect.
4403 Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple
4404 implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.</p>
4405
4406 <p>The effect was stunning.  In my first test it reduced the running
4407 time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44
4408 minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell
4409 Latitude D505 machine.  I am not quite sure what the optimised time
4410 would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf
4411 priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during
4412 installation.  As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation
4413 along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the
4414 installation.  I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie,
4415 and got these results.  The time measured is the time stamp in
4416 /var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the
4417 "pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement
4418 yourself.  In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the
4419 timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel
4420 dialog.</p>
4421
4422 <p><table>
4423
4424 <tr>
4425 <th>Machine/setup</th>
4426 <th>Original tasksel</th>
4427 <th>Optimised tasksel</th>
4428 <th>Reduction</th>
4429 </tr>
4430
4431 <tr>
4432 <td>Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE</td>
4433 <td>64 min (07:46-08:50)</td>
4434 <td><44 min (11:27-12:11)</td>
4435 <td>>20 min 18%</td>
4436 </tr>
4437
4438 <tr>
4439 <td>Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE</td>
4440 <td>57 min (08:48-09:45)</td>
4441 <td>34 min (07:43-08:17)</td>
4442 <td>23 min 40%</td>
4443 </tr>
4444
4445 <tr>
4446 <td>Latitude D505 Minimal</td>
4447 <td>22 min (10:37-10:59)</td>
4448 <td>11 min (11:16-11:27)</td>
4449 <td>11 min 50%</td>
4450 </tr>
4451
4452 <tr>
4453 <td>Thinkpad X200 Minimal</td>
4454 <td>6 min (08:19-08:25)</td>
4455 <td>4 min (08:04-08:08)</td>
4456 <td>2 min 33%</td>
4457 </tr>
4458
4459 <tr>
4460 <td>Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE</td>
4461 <td>19 min (09:21-09:40)</td>
4462 <td>15 min (10:25-10:40)</td>
4463 <td>4 min 21%</td>
4464 </tr>
4465
4466 </table></p>
4467
4468 <p>The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the
4469 time is spent downloading packages.  The connection to the Internet
4470 was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a
4471 significant factor in the measurement.  Download typically took a few
4472 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being
4473 installed.</p>
4474
4475 <p>The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in
4476 <a href="https://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/">Debian
4477 Installer</a>, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the
4478 finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the
4479 installation.  I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the
4480 post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the
4481 eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in
4482 Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO.  The
4483 negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this
4484 optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i.  If the code is
4485 moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger
4486 for the entire installation.</p>
4487
4488 <p>I've implemented this in the
4489 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-install">debian-edu-install</a>
4490 git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the
4491 Debian Edu installation.  If you want to test this yourself, you can
4492 create two files in the installer (or in an udeb).  One shell script
4493 need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:</p>
4494
4495 <p><blockquote><pre>
4496 #!/bin/sh
4497 set -e
4498 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
4499 info() {
4500     logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
4501 }
4502 error() {
4503     logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
4504 }
4505 override_install() {
4506     apt-install eatmydata || true
4507     if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
4508         for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
4509             file=/usr/bin/$bin
4510             # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
4511             if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
4512                 info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
4513                 printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
4514                     > /target$file.edu
4515                 chmod 755 /target$file.edu
4516                 in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
4517                     --rename --quiet --add $file
4518                 ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
4519             else
4520                 error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
4521             fi
4522         done
4523     else
4524         error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
4525     fi
4526 }
4527
4528 override_install
4529 </pre></blockquote></p>
4530
4531 <p>To clean up, another shell script should go into
4532 /usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this:
4533
4534 <p><blockquote><pre>
4535 #! /bin/sh -e
4536 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
4537 error() {
4538     logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
4539 }
4540 remove_install_override() {
4541     for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
4542         file=/usr/bin/$bin
4543         if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
4544             rm /target$file
4545             in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
4546                 --rename --quiet --remove $file
4547             rm /target$file.edu
4548         else
4549             error "Missing divert for $file."
4550         fi
4551     done
4552     sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
4553 }
4554
4555 remove_install_override
4556 </pre></blockquote></p>
4557
4558 <p>In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script
4559 edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and
4560 finish-install.d scripts.</p>
4561
4562 <p>By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal
4563 Debian installer too?  I suspect it should, but am not sure the
4564 current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough.  It also
4565 depend on the side effects of the change.  I'm not aware of any, but I
4566 guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing.
4567 Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and
4568 fsync() having effect?  Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to
4569 allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting
4570 everyone.</p>
4571
4572 <p>Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization
4573 will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of
4574 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">bug #702711</a>.  An updated
4575 eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.</p>
4576
4577 <p>Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and
4578 the optimization work again.  And I have discovered that the
4579 dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly
4580 simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package.  See
4581 tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.</p>
4582
4583 <p>Update 2014-11-11: Unfortunately, a new
4584 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/765738">bug #765738</a> in eatmydata only
4585 triggering on i386 made it into testing, and broke this installation
4586 optimization again.  If <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/768893">unblock
4587 request 768893</a> is accepted, it should be working again.</p>
4588
4589       </div>
4590       <div class="tags">
4591
4592
4593         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4594
4595
4596       </div>
4597     </div>
4598     <div class="padding"></div>
4599
4600     <div class="entry">
4601       <div class="title">
4602         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Good_bye_subkeys_pgp_net__welcome_pool_sks_keyservers_net.html">Good bye subkeys.pgp.net, welcome pool.sks-keyservers.net</a>
4603       </div>
4604       <div class="date">
4605         10th September 2014
4606       </div>
4607       <div class="body">
4608         <p>Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk with the
4609 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> about
4610 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20140909-sks-keyservers/">the
4611 OpenPGP keyserver pool sks-keyservers.net</a>, and was very happy to
4612 learn that there is a large set of publicly available key servers to
4613 use when looking for peoples public key.  So far I have used
4614 subkeys.pgp.net, and some times wwwkeys.nl.pgp.net when the former
4615 were misbehaving, but those days are ended.  The servers I have used
4616 up until yesterday have been slow and some times unavailable.  I hope
4617 those problems are gone now.</p>
4618
4619 <p>Behind the round robin DNS entry of the
4620 <a href="https://sks-keyservers.net/">sks-keyservers.net</a> service
4621 there is a pool of more than 100 keyservers which are checked every
4622 day to ensure they are well connected and up to date.  It must be
4623 better than what I have used so far. :)</p>
4624
4625 <p>Yesterdays speaker told me that the service is the default
4626 keyserver provided by the default configuration in GnuPG, but this do
4627 not seem to be used in Debian.  Perhaps it should?</p>
4628
4629 <p>Anyway, I've updated my ~/.gnupg/options file to now include this
4630 line:</p>
4631
4632 <p><blockquote><pre>
4633 keyserver pool.sks-keyservers.net
4634 </pre></blockquote></p>
4635
4636 <p>With GnuPG version 2 one can also locate the keyserver using SRV
4637 entries in DNS.  Just for fun, I did just that at work, so now every
4638 user of GnuPG at the University of Oslo should find a OpenGPG
4639 keyserver automatically should their need it:</p>
4640
4641 <p><blockquote><pre>
4642 % host -t srv _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no
4643 _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no has SRV record 0 100 11371 pool.sks-keyservers.net.
4644 %
4645 </pre></blockquote></p>
4646
4647 <p>Now if only
4648 <a href="http://ietfreport.isoc.org/idref/draft-shaw-openpgp-hkp/">the
4649 HKP lookup protocol</a> supported finding signature paths, I would be
4650 very happy.  It can look up a given key or search for a user ID, but I
4651 normally do not want that, but to find a trust path from my key to
4652 another key.  Given a user ID or key ID, I would like to find (and
4653 download) the keys representing a signature path from my key to the
4654 key in question, to be able to get a trust path between the two keys.
4655 This is as far as I can tell not possible today.  Perhaps something
4656 for a future version of the protocol?</p>
4657
4658       </div>
4659       <div class="tags">
4660
4661
4662         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
4663
4664
4665       </div>
4666     </div>
4667     <div class="padding"></div>
4668
4669     <div class="entry">
4670       <div class="title">
4671         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/From_English_wiki_to_translated_PDF_and_epub_via_Docbook.html">From English wiki to translated PDF and epub via Docbook</a>
4672       </div>
4673       <div class="date">
4674         17th June 2014
4675       </div>
4676       <div class="body">
4677         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4678 project</a> provide an instruction manual for teachers, system
4679 administrators and other users that contain useful tips for setting up
4680 and maintaining a Debian Edu installation.  This text is about how the
4681 text processing of this manual is handled in the project.</p>
4682
4683 <p>One goal of the project is to provide information in the native
4684 language of its users, and for this we need to handle translations.
4685 But we also want to make sure each language contain the same
4686 information, so for this we need a good way to keep the translations
4687 in sync.  And we want it to be easy for our users to improve the
4688 documentation, avoiding the need to learn special formats or tools to
4689 contribute, and the obvious way to do this is to make it possible to
4690 edit the documentation using a web browser.  We also want it to be
4691 easy for translators to keep the translation up to date, and give them
4692 help in figuring out what need to be translated. Here is the list of
4693 tools and the process we have found trying to reach all these
4694 goals.</p>
4695
4696 <p>We maintain the authoritative source of our manual in the
4697 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">Debian
4698 wiki</a>, as several wiki pages written in English.  It consist of one
4699 front page with references to the different chapters, several pages
4700 for each chapter, and finally one "collection page" gluing all the
4701 chapters together into one large web page (aka
4702 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/AllInOne">the
4703 AllInOne page</a>).  The AllInOne page is the one used for further
4704 processing and translations.  Thanks to the fact that the
4705 <a href="http://moinmo.in/">MoinMoin</a> installation on
4706 wiki.debian.org support exporting pages in
4707 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">the Docbook format</a>, we can fetch
4708 the list of pages to export using the raw version of the AllInOne
4709 page, loop over each of them to generate a Docbook XML version of the
4710 manual.  This process also download images and transform image
4711 references to use the locally downloaded images.  The generated
4712 Docbook XML files are slightly broken, so some post-processing is done
4713 using the <tt>documentation/scripts/get_manual</tt> program, and the
4714 result is a nice Docbook XML file (debian-edu-wheezy-manual.xml) and
4715 a handfull of images.  The XML file can now be used to generate PDF, HTML
4716 and epub versions of the English manual.  This is the basic step of
4717 our process, making PDF (using dblatex), HTML (using xsltproc) and
4718 epub (using dbtoepub) version from Docbook XML, and the resulting files
4719 are placed in the debian-edu-doc-en binary package.</p>
4720
4721 <p>But English documentation is not enough for us.  We want translated
4722 documentation too, and we want to make it easy for translators to
4723 track the English original.  For this we use the
4724 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/poxml.html">poxml</a> package,
4725 which allow us to transform the English Docbook XML file into a
4726 translation file (a .pot file), usable with the normal gettext based
4727 translation tools used by those translating free software.  The pot
4728 file is used to create and maintain translation files (several .po
4729 files), which the translations update with the native language
4730 translations of all titles, paragraphs and blocks of text in the
4731 original.  The next step is combining the original English Docbook XML
4732 and the translation file (say debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.po), to
4733 create a translated Docbook XML file (in this case
4734 debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.xml).  This translated (or partly
4735 translated, if the translation is not complete) Docbook XML file can
4736 then be used like the original to create a PDF, HTML and epub version
4737 of the documentation.</p>
4738
4739 <p>The translators use different tools to edit the .po files.  We
4740 recommend using
4741 <a href="http://www.kde.org/applications/development/lokalize/">lokalize</a>,
4742 while some use emacs and vi, others can use web based editors like
4743 <a href="http://pootle.translatehouse.org/">Poodle</a> or
4744 <a href="https://www.transifex.com/">Transifex</a>.  All we care about
4745 is where the .po file end up, in our git repository.  Updated
4746 translations can either be committed directly to git, or submitted as
4747 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/src:debian-edu-doc">bug reports
4748 against the debian-edu-doc package</a>.</p>
4749
4750 <p>One challenge is images, which both might need to be translated (if
4751 they show translated user applications), and are needed in different
4752 formats when creating PDF and HTML versions (epub is a HTML version in
4753 this regard).  For this we transform the original PNG images to the
4754 needed density and format during build, and have a way to provide
4755 translated images by storing translated versions in
4756 images/$LANGUAGECODE/.  I am a bit unsure about the details here.  The
4757 package maintainers know more.</p>
4758
4759 <p>If you wonder what the result look like, we provide
4760 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">the content
4761 of the documentation packages on the web</a>.  See for example the
4762 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/it/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.pdf">Italian
4763 PDF version</a> or the
4764 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/de/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.html">German
4765 HTML version</a>.  We do not yet build the epub version by default,
4766 but perhaps it will be done in the future.</p>
4767
4768 <p>To learn more, check out
4769 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-edu-doc.html">the
4770 debian-edu-doc package</a>,
4771 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">the
4772 manual on the wiki</a> and
4773 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/Translations">the
4774 translation instructions</a> in the manual.</p>
4775
4776       </div>
4777       <div class="tags">
4778
4779
4780         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4781
4782
4783       </div>
4784     </div>
4785     <div class="padding"></div>
4786
4787     <div class="entry">
4788       <div class="title">
4789         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Install_hardware_dependent_packages_using_tasksel__Isenkram_0_7_.html">Install hardware dependent packages using tasksel (Isenkram 0.7)</a>
4790       </div>
4791       <div class="date">
4792         23rd April 2014
4793       </div>
4794       <div class="body">
4795         <p>It would be nice if it was easier in Debian to get all the hardware
4796 related packages relevant for the computer installed automatically.
4797 So I implemented one, using
4798 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">my Isenkram
4799 package</a>.  To use it, install the tasksel and isenkram packages and
4800 run tasksel as user root.  You should be presented with a new option,
4801 "Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)".  When you
4802 select it, tasksel will install the packages isenkram claim is fit for
4803 the current hardware, hot pluggable or not.<p>
4804
4805 <p>The implementation is in two files, one is the tasksel menu entry
4806 description, and the other is the script used to extract the list of
4807 packages to install.  The first part is in
4808 <tt>/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc</tt> and look like
4809 this:</p>
4810
4811 <p><blockquote><pre>
4812 Task: isenkram
4813 Section: hardware
4814 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4815  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
4816  proposed.
4817 Test-new-install: mark show
4818 Relevance: 8
4819 Packages: for-current-hardware
4820 </pre></blockquote></p>
4821
4822 <p>The second part is in
4823 <tt>/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/for-current-hardware</tt> and look like
4824 this:</p>
4825
4826 <p><blockquote><pre>
4827 #!/bin/sh
4828 #
4829 (
4830     isenkram-lookup
4831     isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
4832 ) | sort -u
4833 </pre></blockquote></p>
4834
4835 <p>All in all, a very short and simple implementation making it
4836 trivial to install the hardware dependent package we all may want to
4837 have installed on our machines.  I've not been able to find a way to
4838 get tasksel to tell you exactly which packages it plan to install
4839 before doing the installation.  So if you are curious or careful,
4840 check the output from the isenkram-* command line tools first.</p>
4841
4842 <p>The information about which packages are handling which hardware is
4843 fetched either from the isenkram package itself in
4844 /usr/share/isenkram/, from git.debian.org or from the APT package
4845 database (using the Modaliases header).  The APT package database
4846 parsing have caused a nasty resource leak in the isenkram daemon (bugs
4847 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/719837">#719837</a> and
4848 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/730704">#730704</a>).  The cause is in
4849 the python-apt code (bug
4850 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/745487">#745487</a>), but using a
4851 workaround I was able to get rid of the file descriptor leak and
4852 reduce the memory leak from ~30 MiB per hardware detection down to
4853 around 2 MiB per hardware detection.  It should make the desktop
4854 daemon a lot more useful.  The fix is in version 0.7 uploaded to
4855 unstable today.</p>
4856
4857 <p>I believe the current way of mapping hardware to packages in
4858 Isenkram is is a good draft, but in the future I expect isenkram to
4859 use the AppStream data source for this.  A proposal for getting proper
4860 AppStream support into Debian is floating around as
4861 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a>, and
4862 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2014/Projects#SummerOfCode2014.2FProjects.2FAppStreamDEP11Implementation.AppStream.2FDEP-11_for_the_Debian_Archive">GSoC
4863 project</a> will take place this summer to improve the situation.  I
4864 look forward to seeing the result, and welcome patches for isenkram to
4865 start using the information when it is ready.</p>
4866
4867 <p>If you want your package to map to some specific hardware, either
4868 add a "Xb-Modaliases" header to your control file like I did in
4869 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">the pymissile
4870 package</a> or submit a bug report with the details to the isenkram
4871 package.  See also
4872 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">all my
4873 blog posts tagged isenkram</a> for details on the notation.  I expect
4874 the information will be migrated to AppStream eventually, but for the
4875 moment I got no better place to store it.</p>
4876
4877       </div>
4878       <div class="tags">
4879
4880
4881         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
4882
4883
4884       </div>
4885     </div>
4886     <div class="padding"></div>
4887
4888     <div class="entry">
4889       <div class="title">
4890         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/FreedomBox_milestone___all_packages_now_in_Debian_Sid.html">FreedomBox milestone - all packages now in Debian Sid</a>
4891       </div>
4892       <div class="date">
4893         15th April 2014
4894       </div>
4895       <div class="body">
4896         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
4897 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware to make
4898 it easy for non-technical people to host their data and communication
4899 at home, and being able to communicate with their friends and family
4900 encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It is still going strong, and
4901 today a major mile stone was reached.</p>
4902
4903 <p>Today, the last of the packages currently used by the project to
4904 created the system images were accepted into Debian Unstable.  It was
4905 the freedombox-setup package, which is used to configure the images
4906 during build and on the first boot.  Now all one need to get going is
4907 the build code from the freedom-maker git repository and packages from
4908 Debian.  And once the freedombox-setup package enter testing, we can
4909 build everything directly from Debian. :)</p>
4910
4911 <p>Some key packages used by Freedombox are
4912 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>,
4913 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/plinth">plinth</a>,
4914 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pagekite">pagekite</a>,
4915 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/tor">tor</a>,
4916 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>,
4917 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/owncloud">owncloud</a> and
4918 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/dnsmasq">dnsmasq</a>.  There
4919 are plans to integrate more packages into the setup.  User
4920 documentation is maintained on the Debian wiki.  Please
4921 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Manual/Jessie">check out
4922 the manual</a> and help us improve it.</p>
4923
4924 <p>To test for yourself and create boot images with the FreedomBox
4925 setup, run this on a Debian machine using a user with sudo rights to
4926 become root:</p>
4927
4928 <p><pre>
4929 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
4930   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
4931   u-boot-tools
4932 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
4933   freedom-maker
4934 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
4935 </pre></p>
4936
4937 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
4938 devices.  See the README in the freedom-maker git repo for more
4939 details on the build.  If you do not want all three images, trim the
4940 make line.  Note that the virtualbox-image target is not really
4941 virtualbox specific.  It create a x86 image usable in kvm, qemu,
4942 vmware and any other x86 virtual machine environment.  You might need
4943 the version of vmdebootstrap in Jessie to get the build working, as it
4944 include fixes for a race condition with kpartx.</p>
4945
4946 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
4947 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
4948 the preseed values:</p>
4949
4950 <p><pre>
4951 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
4952 </pre></p>
4953
4954 <p>I have not tested it myself the last few weeks, so I do not know if
4955 it still work.</p>
4956
4957 <p>If you wonder how to help, one task you could look at is using
4958 systemd as the boot system.  It will become the default for Linux in
4959 Jessie, so we need to make sure it is usable on the Freedombox.  I did
4960 a simple test a few weeks ago, and noticed dnsmasq failed to start
4961 during boot when using systemd.  I suspect there are other problems
4962 too. :) To detect problems, there is a test suite included, which can
4963 be run from the plinth web interface.</p>
4964
4965 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
4966 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
4967 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
4968 irc.debian.org)</a> and
4969 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
4970 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
4971
4972       </div>
4973       <div class="tags">
4974
4975
4976         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
4977
4978
4979       </div>
4980     </div>
4981     <div class="padding"></div>
4982
4983     <div class="entry">
4984       <div class="title">
4985         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/S3QL__a_locally_mounted_cloud_file_system___nice_free_software.html">S3QL, a locally mounted cloud file system - nice free software</a>
4986       </div>
4987       <div class="date">
4988          9th April 2014
4989       </div>
4990       <div class="body">
4991         <p>For a while now, I have been looking for a sensible offsite backup
4992 solution for use at home.  My requirements are simple, it must be
4993 cheap and locally encrypted (in other words, I keep the encryption
4994 keys, the storage provider do not have access to my private files).
4995 One idea me and my friends had many years ago, before the cloud
4996 storage providers showed up, was to use Google mail as storage,
4997 writing a Linux block device storing blocks as emails in the mail
4998 service provided by Google, and thus get heaps of free space.  On top
4999 of this one can add encryption, RAID and volume management to have
5000 lots of (fairly slow, I admit that) cheap and encrypted storage.  But
5001 I never found time to implement such system.  But the last few weeks I
5002 have looked at a system called
5003 <a href="https://bitbucket.org/nikratio/s3ql/">S3QL</a>, a locally
5004 mounted network backed file system with the features I need.</p>
5005
5006 <p>S3QL is a fuse file system with a local cache and cloud storage,
5007 handling several different storage providers, any with Amazon S3,
5008 Google Drive or OpenStack API.  There are heaps of such storage
5009 providers.  S3QL can also use a local directory as storage, which
5010 combined with sshfs allow for file storage on any ssh server.  S3QL
5011 include support for encryption, compression, de-duplication, snapshots
5012 and immutable file systems, allowing me to mount the remote storage as
5013 a local mount point, look at and use the files as if they were local,
5014 while the content is stored in the cloud as well.  This allow me to
5015 have a backup that should survive fire.  The file system can not be
5016 shared between several machines at the same time, as only one can
5017 mount it at the time, but any machine with the encryption key and
5018 access to the storage service can mount it if it is unmounted.</p>
5019
5020 <p>It is simple to use.  I'm using it on Debian Wheezy, where the
5021 package is included already.  So to get started, run <tt>apt-get
5022 install s3ql</tt>.  Next, pick a storage provider.  I ended up picking
5023 Greenqloud, after reading their nice recipe on
5024 <a href="https://greenqloud.zendesk.com/entries/44611757-How-To-Use-S3QL-to-mount-a-StorageQloud-bucket-on-Debian-Wheezy">how
5025 to use S3QL with their Amazon S3 service</a>, because I trust the laws
5026 in Iceland more than those in USA when it come to keeping my personal
5027 data safe and private, and thus would rather spend money on a company
5028 in Iceland.  Another nice recipe is available from the article
5029 <a href="http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/Articles/HPC-Cloud-Storage">S3QL
5030 Filesystem for HPC Storage</a> by Jeff Layton in the HPC section of
5031 Admin magazine.  When the provider is picked, figure out how to get
5032 the API key needed to connect to the storage API.  With Greencloud,
5033 the key did not show up until I had added payment details to my
5034 account.</p>
5035
5036 <p>Armed with the API access details, it is time to create the file
5037 system.  First, create a new bucket in the cloud.  This bucket is the
5038 file system storage area.  I picked a bucket name reflecting the
5039 machine that was going to store data there, but any name will do.
5040 I'll refer to it as <tt>bucket-name</tt> below.  In addition, one need
5041 the API login and password, and a locally created password.  Store it
5042 all in ~root/.s3ql/authinfo2 like this:
5043
5044 <p><blockquote><pre>
5045 [s3c]
5046 storage-url: s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5047 backend-login: API-login
5048 backend-password: API-password
5049 fs-passphrase: local-password
5050 </pre></blockquote></p>
5051
5052 <p>I create my local passphrase using <tt>pwget 50</tt> or similar,
5053 but any sensible way to create a fairly random password should do it.
5054 Armed with these details, it is now time to run mkfs, entering the API
5055 details and password to create it:</p>
5056
5057 <p><blockquote><pre>
5058 # mkdir -m 700 /var/lib/s3ql-cache
5059 # mkfs.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5060   --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5061 Enter backend login:
5062 Enter backend password:
5063 Before using S3QL, make sure to read the user's guide, especially
5064 the 'Important Rules to Avoid Loosing Data' section.
5065 Enter encryption password:
5066 Confirm encryption password:
5067 Generating random encryption key...
5068 Creating metadata tables...
5069 Dumping metadata...
5070 ..objects..
5071 ..blocks..
5072 ..inodes..
5073 ..inode_blocks..
5074 ..symlink_targets..
5075 ..names..
5076 ..contents..
5077 ..ext_attributes..
5078 Compressing and uploading metadata...
5079 Wrote 0.00 MB of compressed metadata.
5080 # </pre></blockquote></p>
5081
5082 <p>The next step is mounting the file system to make the storage available.
5083
5084 <p><blockquote><pre>
5085 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5086   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
5087 Using 4 upload threads.
5088 Downloading and decompressing metadata...
5089 Reading metadata...
5090 ..objects..
5091 ..blocks..
5092 ..inodes..
5093 ..inode_blocks..
5094 ..symlink_targets..
5095 ..names..
5096 ..contents..
5097 ..ext_attributes..
5098 Mounting filesystem...
5099 # df -h /s3ql
5100 Filesystem                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
5101 s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name  1.0T     0  1.0T   0% /s3ql
5102 #
5103 </pre></blockquote></p>
5104
5105 <p>The file system is now ready for use.  I use rsync to store my
5106 backups in it, and as the metadata used by rsync is downloaded at
5107 mount time, no network traffic (and storage cost) is triggered by
5108 running rsync.  To unmount, one should not use the normal umount
5109 command, as this will not flush the cache to the cloud storage, but
5110 instead running the umount.s3ql command like this:
5111
5112 <p><blockquote><pre>
5113 # umount.s3ql /s3ql
5114 #
5115 </pre></blockquote></p>
5116
5117 <p>There is a fsck command available to check the file system and
5118 correct any problems detected.  This can be used if the local server
5119 crashes while the file system is mounted, to reset the "already
5120 mounted" flag.  This is what it look like when processing a working
5121 file system:</p>
5122
5123 <p><blockquote><pre>
5124 # fsck.s3ql --force --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5125 Using cached metadata.
5126 File system seems clean, checking anyway.
5127 Checking DB integrity...
5128 Creating temporary extra indices...
5129 Checking lost+found...
5130 Checking cached objects...
5131 Checking names (refcounts)...
5132 Checking contents (names)...
5133 Checking contents (inodes)...
5134 Checking contents (parent inodes)...
5135 Checking objects (reference counts)...
5136 Checking objects (backend)...
5137 ..processed 5000 objects so far..
5138 ..processed 10000 objects so far..
5139 ..processed 15000 objects so far..
5140 Checking objects (sizes)...
5141 Checking blocks (referenced objects)...
5142 Checking blocks (refcounts)...
5143 Checking inode-block mapping (blocks)...
5144 Checking inode-block mapping (inodes)...
5145 Checking inodes (refcounts)...
5146 Checking inodes (sizes)...
5147 Checking extended attributes (names)...
5148 Checking extended attributes (inodes)...
5149 Checking symlinks (inodes)...
5150 Checking directory reachability...
5151 Checking unix conventions...
5152 Checking referential integrity...
5153 Dropping temporary indices...
5154 Backing up old metadata...
5155 Dumping metadata...
5156 ..objects..
5157 ..blocks..
5158 ..inodes..
5159 ..inode_blocks..
5160 ..symlink_targets..
5161 ..names..
5162 ..contents..
5163 ..ext_attributes..
5164 Compressing and uploading metadata...
5165 Wrote 0.89 MB of compressed metadata.
5166 #
5167 </pre></blockquote></p>
5168
5169 <p>Thanks to the cache, working on files that fit in the cache is very
5170 quick, about the same speed as local file access.  Uploading large
5171 amount of data is to me limited by the bandwidth out of and into my
5172 house.  Uploading 685 MiB with a 100 MiB cache gave me 305 kiB/s,
5173 which is very close to my upload speed, and downloading the same
5174 Debian installation ISO gave me 610 kiB/s, close to my download speed.
5175 Both were measured using <tt>dd</tt>.  So for me, the bottleneck is my
5176 network, not the file system code.  I do not know what a good cache
5177 size would be, but suspect that the cache should e larger than your
5178 working set.</p>
5179
5180 <p>I mentioned that only one machine can mount the file system at the
5181 time.  If another machine try, it is told that the file system is
5182 busy:</p>
5183
5184 <p><blockquote><pre>
5185 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5186   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
5187 Using 8 upload threads.
5188 Backend reports that fs is still mounted elsewhere, aborting.
5189 #
5190 </pre></blockquote></p>
5191
5192 <p>The file content is uploaded when the cache is full, while the
5193 metadata is uploaded once every 24 hour by default.  To ensure the
5194 file system content is flushed to the cloud, one can either umount the
5195 file system, or ask S3QL to flush the cache and metadata using
5196 s3qlctrl:
5197
5198 <p><blockquote><pre>
5199 # s3qlctrl upload-meta /s3ql
5200 # s3qlctrl flushcache /s3ql
5201 #
5202 </pre></blockquote></p>
5203
5204 <p>If you are curious about how much space your data uses in the
5205 cloud, and how much compression and deduplication cut down on the
5206 storage usage, you can use s3qlstat on the mounted file system to get
5207 a report:</p>
5208
5209 <p><blockquote><pre>
5210 # s3qlstat /s3ql
5211 Directory entries:    9141
5212 Inodes:               9143
5213 Data blocks:          8851
5214 Total data size:      22049.38 MB
5215 After de-duplication: 21955.46 MB (99.57% of total)
5216 After compression:    21877.28 MB (99.22% of total, 99.64% of de-duplicated)
5217 Database size:        2.39 MB (uncompressed)
5218 (some values do not take into account not-yet-uploaded dirty blocks in cache)
5219 #
5220 </pre></blockquote></p>
5221
5222 <p>I mentioned earlier that there are several possible suppliers of
5223 storage.  I did not try to locate them all, but am aware of at least
5224 <a href="https://www.greenqloud.com/">Greenqloud</a>,
5225 <a href="http://drive.google.com/">Google Drive</a>,
5226 <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/">Amazon S3 web serivces</a>,
5227 <a href="http://www.rackspace.com/">Rackspace</a> and
5228 <a href="http://crowncloud.net/">Crowncloud</A>.  The latter even
5229 accept payment in Bitcoin.  Pick one that suit your need.  Some of
5230 them provide several GiB of free storage, but the prize models are
5231 quite different and you will have to figure out what suits you
5232 best.</p>
5233
5234 <p>While researching this blog post, I had a look at research papers
5235 and posters discussing the S3QL file system.  There are several, which
5236 told me that the file system is getting a critical check by the
5237 science community and increased my confidence in using it.  One nice
5238 poster is titled
5239 "<a href="http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/adtsc/publications/science_highlights_2013/docs/pg68_69.pdf">An
5240 Innovative Parallel Cloud Storage System using OpenStack’s SwiftObject
5241 Store and Transformative Parallel I/O Approach</a>" by Hsing-Bung
5242 Chen, Benjamin McClelland, David Sherrill, Alfred Torrez, Parks Fields
5243 and Pamela Smith.  Please  have a look.</p>
5244
5245 <p>Given my problems with different file systems earlier, I decided to
5246 check out the mounted S3QL file system to see if it would be usable as
5247 a home directory (in other word, that it provided POSIX semantics when
5248 it come to locking and umask handling etc).  Running
5249 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">my
5250 test code to check file system semantics</a>, I was happy to discover that
5251 no error was found.  So the file system can be used for home
5252 directories, if one chooses to do so.</p>
5253
5254 <p>If you do not want a locally file system, and want something that
5255 work without the Linux fuse file system, I would like to mention the
5256 <a href="http://www.tarsnap.com/">Tarsnap service</a>, which also
5257 provide locally encrypted backup using a command line client.  It have
5258 a nicer access control system, where one can split out read and write
5259 access, allowing some systems to write to the backup and others to
5260 only read from it.</p>
5261
5262 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
5263 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
5264 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
5265
5266       </div>
5267       <div class="tags">
5268
5269
5270         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
5271
5272
5273       </div>
5274     </div>
5275     <div class="padding"></div>
5276
5277     <div class="entry">
5278       <div class="title">
5279         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Freedombox_on_Dreamplug__Raspberry_Pi_and_virtual_x86_machine.html">Freedombox on Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and virtual x86 machine</a>
5280       </div>
5281       <div class="date">
5282         14th March 2014
5283       </div>
5284       <div class="body">
5285         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
5286 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware for
5287 making it easy for non-technical people to host their data and
5288 communication at home, and being able to communicate with their
5289 friends and family encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It has been
5290 going on for a while, and is slowly progressing towards a new test
5291 release (0.2).</p>
5292
5293 <p>And what day could be better than the Pi day to announce that the
5294 new version will provide "hard drive" / SD card / USB stick images for
5295 Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and VirtualBox (or any other virtualization
5296 system), and can also be installed using a Debian installer preseed
5297 file.  The Debian based Freedombox is now based on Debian Jessie,
5298 where most of the needed packages used are already present.  Only one,
5299 the freedombox-setup package, is missing.  To try to build your own
5300 boot image to test the current status, fetch the freedom-maker scripts
5301 and build using
5302 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/vmdebootstrap">vmdebootstrap</a>
5303 with a user with sudo access to become root:
5304
5305 <pre>
5306 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
5307   freedom-maker
5308 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
5309   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
5310   u-boot-tools
5311 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
5312 </pre>
5313
5314 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
5315 devices.  See the README for more details on the build. If you do not
5316 want all three images, trim the make line.  But note that thanks to <a
5317 href="https://bugs.debian.org/741407">a race condition in
5318 vmdebootstrap</a>, the build might fail without the patch to the
5319 kpartx call.</p>
5320
5321 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
5322 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
5323 the preseed values:</p>
5324
5325 <pre>
5326 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
5327 </pre>
5328
5329 <p>But note that due to <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/740673">a
5330 recently introduced bug in apt in Jessie</a>, the installer will
5331 currently hang while setting up APT sources.  Killing the
5332 '<tt>apt-cdrom ident</tt>' process when it hang a few times during the
5333 installation will get the installation going.  This affect all
5334 installations in Jessie, and I expect it will be fixed soon.</p>
5335
5336 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
5337 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
5338 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
5339 irc.debian.org)</a> and
5340 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
5341 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
5342
5343       </div>
5344       <div class="tags">
5345
5346
5347         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
5348
5349
5350       </div>
5351     </div>
5352     <div class="padding"></div>
5353
5354     <div class="entry">
5355       <div class="title">
5356         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_home_and_release_1_0_for_netgroup_and_innetgr__aka_ng_utils_.html">New home and release 1.0 for netgroup and innetgr (aka ng-utils)</a>
5357       </div>
5358       <div class="date">
5359         22nd February 2014
5360       </div>
5361       <div class="body">
5362         <p>Many years ago, I wrote a GPL licensed version of the netgroup and
5363 innetgr tools, because I needed them in
5364 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>.  I called the project
5365 ng-utils, and it has served me well.  I placed the project under the
5366 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/">Hungry Programmer</a> umbrella, and it was maintained in our CVS
5367 repository.  But many years ago, the CVS repository was dropped (lost,
5368 not migrated to new hardware, not sure), and the project have lacked a
5369 proper home since then.</p>
5370
5371 <p>Last summer, I had a look at the package and made a new release
5372 fixing a irritating crash bug, but was unable to store the changes in
5373 a proper source control system.  I applied for a project on
5374 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/">Alioth</a>, but did not have time
5375 to follow up on it.  Until today. :)</p>
5376
5377 <p>After many hours of cleaning and migration, the ng-utils project
5378 now have a new home, and a git repository with the highlight of the
5379 history of the project.  I published all release tarballs and imported
5380 them into the git repository.  As the project is really stable and not
5381 expected to gain new features any time soon, I decided to make a new
5382 release and call it 1.0.  Visit the new project home on
5383 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/">https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/</a>
5384 if you want to check it out.  The new version is also uploaded into
5385 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/ng-utils.html">Debian Unstable</a>.</p>
5386
5387       </div>
5388       <div class="tags">
5389
5390
5391         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5392
5393
5394       </div>
5395     </div>
5396     <div class="padding"></div>
5397
5398     <div class="entry">
5399       <div class="title">
5400         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_sysvinit_from_experimental_in_Debian_Hurd.html">Testing sysvinit from experimental in Debian Hurd</a>
5401       </div>
5402       <div class="date">
5403          3rd February 2014
5404       </div>
5405       <div class="body">
5406         <p>A few days ago I decided to try to help the Hurd people to get
5407 their changes into sysvinit, to allow them to use the normal sysvinit
5408 boot system instead of their old one.  This follow up on the
5409 <a href="https://teythoon.cryptobitch.de//categories/gsoc.html">great
5410 Google Summer of Code work</a> done last summer by Justus Winter to
5411 get Debian on Hurd working more like Debian on Linux.  To get started,
5412 I downloaded a prebuilt hard disk image from
5413 <a href="http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian-cd/hurd-i386/current/debian-hurd.img.tar.gz">http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian-cd/hurd-i386/current/debian-hurd.img.tar.gz</a>,
5414 and started it using virt-manager.</p>
5415
5416 <p>The first think I had to do after logging in (root without any
5417 password) was to get the network operational.  I followed
5418 <a href="https://www.debian.org/ports/hurd/hurd-install">the
5419 instructions on the Debian GNU/Hurd ports page</a> and ran these
5420 commands as root to get the machine to accept a IP address from the
5421 kvm internal DHCP server:</p>
5422
5423 <p><blockquote><pre>
5424 settrans -fgap /dev/netdde /hurd/netdde
5425 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[p]finet/ { print $2}')
5426 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[d]evnode/ { print $2}')
5427 dhclient /dev/eth0
5428 </pre></blockquote></p>
5429
5430 <p>After this, the machine had internet connectivity, and I could
5431 upgrade it and install the sysvinit packages from experimental and
5432 enable it as the default boot system in Hurd.</p>
5433
5434 <p>But before I did that, I set a password on the root user, as ssh is
5435 running on the machine it for ssh login to work a password need to be
5436 set.  Also, note that a bug somewhere in openssh on Hurd block
5437 compression from working.  Remember to turn that off on the client
5438 side.</p>
5439
5440 <p>Run these commands as root to upgrade and test the new sysvinit
5441 stuff:</p>
5442
5443 <p><blockquote><pre>
5444 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/experimental.list &lt;&lt;EOF
5445 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ experimental main
5446 EOF
5447 apt-get update
5448 apt-get dist-upgrade
5449 apt-get install -t experimental initscripts sysv-rc sysvinit \
5450     sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils
5451 update-alternatives --config runsystem
5452 </pre></blockquote></p>
5453
5454 <p>To reboot after switching boot system, you have to use
5455 <tt>reboot-hurd</tt> instead of just <tt>reboot</tt>, as there is not
5456 yet a sysvinit process able to receive the signals from the normal
5457 'reboot' command.  After switching to sysvinit as the boot system,
5458 upgrading every package and rebooting, the network come up with DHCP
5459 after boot as it should, and the settrans/pkill hack mentioned at the
5460 start is no longer needed.  But for some strange reason, there are no
5461 longer any login prompt in the virtual console, so I logged in using
5462 ssh instead.
5463
5464 <p>Note that there are some race conditions in Hurd making the boot
5465 fail some times.  No idea what the cause is, but hope the Hurd porters
5466 figure it out.  At least Justus said on IRC (#debian-hurd on
5467 irc.debian.org) that they are aware of the problem.  A way to reduce
5468 the impact is to upgrade to the Hurd packages built by Justus by
5469 adding this repository to the machine:</p>
5470
5471 <p><blockquote><pre>
5472 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/hurd-ci.list &lt;&lt;EOF
5473 deb http://darnassus.sceen.net/~teythoon/hurd-ci/ sid main
5474 EOF
5475 </pre></blockquote></p>
5476
5477 <p>At the moment the prebuilt virtual machine get some packages from
5478 http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian, because some of the packages in
5479 unstable do not yet include the required patches that are lingering in
5480 BTS.  This is the completely list of "unofficial" packages installed:</p>
5481
5482 <p><blockquote><pre>
5483 # aptitude search '?narrow(?version(CURRENT),?origin(Debian Ports))'
5484 i   emacs                   - GNU Emacs editor (metapackage)
5485 i   gdb                     - GNU Debugger
5486 i   hurd-recommended        - Miscellaneous translators
5487 i   isc-dhcp-client         - ISC DHCP client
5488 i   isc-dhcp-common         - common files used by all the isc-dhcp* packages
5489 i   libc-bin                - Embedded GNU C Library: Binaries
5490 i   libc-dev-bin            - Embedded GNU C Library: Development binaries
5491 i   libc0.3                 - Embedded GNU C Library: Shared libraries
5492 i A libc0.3-dbg             - Embedded GNU C Library: detached debugging symbols
5493 i   libc0.3-dev             - Embedded GNU C Library: Development Libraries and Hea
5494 i   multiarch-support       - Transitional package to ensure multiarch compatibilit
5495 i A x11-common              - X Window System (X.Org) infrastructure
5496 i   xorg                    - X.Org X Window System
5497 i A xserver-xorg            - X.Org X server
5498 i A xserver-xorg-input-all  - X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
5499 #
5500 </pre></blockquote></p>
5501
5502 <p>All in all, testing hurd has been an interesting experience. :)
5503 X.org did not work out of the box and I never took the time to follow
5504 the porters instructions to fix it.  This time I was interested in the
5505 command line stuff.<p>
5506
5507       </div>
5508       <div class="tags">
5509
5510
5511         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5512
5513
5514       </div>
5515     </div>
5516     <div class="padding"></div>
5517
5518     <div class="entry">
5519       <div class="title">
5520         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html">New chrpath release 0.16</a>
5521       </div>
5522       <div class="date">
5523         14th January 2014
5524       </div>
5525       <div class="body">
5526         <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to
5527 find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code
5528 analysis.  It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very
5529 useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of
5530 the source.  The company behind it provide
5531 <a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as
5532 a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are
5533 already checked.  A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at
5534 the Coverity system, and discovered that the
5535 <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and
5536 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a>
5537 projects I am involved with was already registered.  But these are
5538 fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to
5539 check, and decided to <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request
5540 checking of the chrpath project</a>.  It was
5541 added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects.  Six of
5542 these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an
5543 error.  Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction
5544 of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it
5545 is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in
5546 the future end up in a library.  Having fixed all defects and added
5547 <a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a
5548 mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to
5549 publish a new release.  These are the release notes:</p>
5550
5551 <p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p>
5552
5553 <ul>
5554
5555   <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li>
5556   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li>
5557   <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li>
5558
5559 </ul>
5560
5561 <p>You can
5562 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
5563 new version 0.16 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
5564 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
5565 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
5566 include a test suite check.</p>
5567
5568       </div>
5569       <div class="tags">
5570
5571
5572         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5573
5574
5575       </div>
5576     </div>
5577     <div class="padding"></div>
5578
5579     <div class="entry">
5580       <div class="title">
5581         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html">New chrpath release 0.15</a>
5582       </div>
5583       <div class="date">
5584         24th November 2013
5585       </div>
5586       <div class="body">
5587         <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that
5588 development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my
5589 acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath,
5590 the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already
5591 compiled ELF programs.  The update was triggered by the persistence of
5592 Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get
5593 support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he
5594 is working on.  I checked the
5595 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>,
5596 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and
5597 <a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a>
5598 packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from
5599 OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes.
5600 These are the release notes:</p>
5601
5602 <p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p>
5603
5604 <ul>
5605
5606   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work
5607    with newer architectures.  Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads
5608    up.</li>
5609
5610   <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li>
5611
5612   <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and
5613    Matthias Klose.</li>
5614
5615   <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by
5616    Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li>
5617
5618   <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in
5619    .dynamic is a NULL terminated string.  Based on patch found in
5620    Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li>
5621
5622 </ul>
5623
5624 <p>You can
5625 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
5626 new version 0.15 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
5627 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
5628 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
5629 include a testsuite check.</p>
5630
5631       </div>
5632       <div class="tags">
5633
5634
5635         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5636
5637
5638       </div>
5639     </div>
5640     <div class="padding"></div>
5641
5642     <div class="entry">
5643       <div class="title">
5644         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_init_d_boot_script_example_for_rsyslog.html">Debian init.d boot script example for rsyslog</a>
5645       </div>
5646       <div class="date">
5647          2nd November 2013
5648       </div>
5649       <div class="body">
5650         <p>If one of the points of switching to a new init system in Debian is
5651 <a href="http://thomas.goirand.fr/blog/?p=147">to get rid of huge
5652 init.d scripts</a>, I doubt we need to switch away from sysvinit and
5653 init.d scripts at all.  Here is an example init.d script, ie a rewrite
5654 of /etc/init.d/rsyslog:</p>
5655
5656 <p><pre>
5657 #!/lib/init/init-d-script
5658 ### BEGIN INIT INFO
5659 # Provides:          rsyslog
5660 # Required-Start:    $remote_fs $time
5661 # Required-Stop:     umountnfs $time
5662 # X-Stop-After:      sendsigs
5663 # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
5664 # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
5665 # Short-Description: enhanced syslogd
5666 # Description:       Rsyslog is an enhanced multi-threaded syslogd.
5667 #                    It is quite compatible to stock sysklogd and can be
5668 #                    used as a drop-in replacement.
5669 ### END INIT INFO
5670 DESC="enhanced syslogd"
5671 DAEMON=/usr/sbin/rsyslogd
5672 </pre></p>
5673
5674 <p>Pretty minimalistic to me... For the record, the original sysv-rc
5675 script was 137 lines, and the above is just 15 lines, most of it meta
5676 info/comments.</p>
5677
5678 <p>How to do this, you ask?  Well, one create a new script
5679 /lib/init/init-d-script looking something like this:
5680
5681 <p><pre>
5682 #!/bin/sh
5683
5684 # Define LSB log_* functions.
5685 # Depend on lsb-base (>= 3.2-14) to ensure that this file is present
5686 # and status_of_proc is working.
5687 . /lib/lsb/init-functions
5688
5689 #
5690 # Function that starts the daemon/service
5691
5692 #
5693 do_start()
5694 {
5695         # Return
5696         #   0 if daemon has been started
5697         #   1 if daemon was already running
5698         #   2 if daemon could not be started
5699         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON --test > /dev/null \
5700                 || return 1
5701         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON -- \
5702                 $DAEMON_ARGS \
5703                 || return 2
5704         # Add code here, if necessary, that waits for the process to be ready
5705         # to handle requests from services started subsequently which depend
5706         # on this one.  As a last resort, sleep for some time.
5707 }
5708
5709 #
5710 # Function that stops the daemon/service
5711 #
5712 do_stop()
5713 {
5714         # Return
5715         #   0 if daemon has been stopped
5716         #   1 if daemon was already stopped
5717         #   2 if daemon could not be stopped
5718         #   other if a failure occurred
5719         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --retry=TERM/30/KILL/5 --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
5720         RETVAL="$?"
5721         [ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2
5722         # Wait for children to finish too if this is a daemon that forks
5723         # and if the daemon is only ever run from this initscript.
5724         # If the above conditions are not satisfied then add some other code
5725         # that waits for the process to drop all resources that could be
5726         # needed by services started subsequently.  A last resort is to
5727         # sleep for some time.
5728         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --retry=0/30/KILL/5 --exec $DAEMON
5729         [ "$?" = 2 ] && return 2
5730         # Many daemons don't delete their pidfiles when they exit.
5731         rm -f $PIDFILE
5732         return "$RETVAL"
5733 }
5734
5735 #
5736 # Function that sends a SIGHUP to the daemon/service
5737 #
5738 do_reload() {
5739         #
5740         # If the daemon can reload its configuration without
5741         # restarting (for example, when it is sent a SIGHUP),
5742         # then implement that here.
5743         #
5744         start-stop-daemon --stop --signal 1 --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
5745         return 0
5746 }
5747
5748 SCRIPTNAME=$1
5749 scriptbasename="$(basename $1)"
5750 echo "SN: $scriptbasename"
5751 if [ "$scriptbasename" != "init-d-library" ] ; then
5752     script="$1"
5753     shift
5754     . $script
5755 else
5756     exit 0
5757 fi
5758
5759 NAME=$(basename $DAEMON)
5760 PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
5761
5762 # Exit if the package is not installed
5763 #[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0
5764
5765 # Read configuration variable file if it is present
5766 [ -r /etc/default/$NAME ] && . /etc/default/$NAME
5767
5768 # Load the VERBOSE setting and other rcS variables
5769 . /lib/init/vars.sh
5770
5771 case "$1" in
5772   start)
5773         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
5774         do_start
5775         case "$?" in
5776                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
5777                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
5778         esac
5779         ;;
5780   stop)
5781         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
5782         do_stop
5783         case "$?" in
5784                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
5785                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
5786         esac
5787         ;;
5788   status)
5789         status_of_proc "$DAEMON" "$NAME" && exit 0 || exit $?
5790         ;;
5791   #reload|force-reload)
5792         #
5793         # If do_reload() is not implemented then leave this commented out
5794         # and leave 'force-reload' as an alias for 'restart'.
5795         #
5796         #log_daemon_msg "Reloading $DESC" "$NAME"
5797         #do_reload
5798         #log_end_msg $?
5799         #;;
5800   restart|force-reload)
5801         #
5802         # If the "reload" option is implemented then remove the
5803         # 'force-reload' alias
5804         #
5805         log_daemon_msg "Restarting $DESC" "$NAME"
5806         do_stop
5807         case "$?" in
5808           0|1)
5809                 do_start
5810                 case "$?" in
5811                         0) log_end_msg 0 ;;
5812                         1) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Old process is still running
5813                         *) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Failed to start
5814                 esac
5815                 ;;
5816           *)
5817                 # Failed to stop
5818                 log_end_msg 1
5819                 ;;
5820         esac
5821         ;;
5822   *)
5823         echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|status|restart|force-reload}" >&2
5824         exit 3
5825         ;;
5826 esac
5827
5828 :
5829 </pre></p>
5830
5831 <p>It is based on /etc/init.d/skeleton, and could be improved quite a
5832 lot.  I did not really polish the approach, so it might not always
5833 work out of the box, but you get the idea.  I did not try very hard to
5834 optimize it nor make it more robust either.</p>
5835
5836 <p>A better argument for switching init system in Debian than reducing
5837 the size of init scripts (which is a good thing to do anyway), is to
5838 get boot system that is able to handle the kernel events sensibly and
5839 robustly, and do not depend on the boot to run sequentially.  The boot
5840 and the kernel have not behaved sequentially in years.</p>
5841
5842       </div>
5843       <div class="tags">
5844
5845
5846         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5847
5848
5849       </div>
5850     </div>
5851     <div class="padding"></div>
5852
5853     <div class="entry">
5854       <div class="title">
5855         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Browser_plugin_for_SPICE__spice_xpi__uploaded_to_Debian.html">Browser plugin for SPICE (spice-xpi) uploaded to Debian</a>
5856       </div>
5857       <div class="date">
5858          1st November 2013
5859       </div>
5860       <div class="body">
5861         <p><a href="http://www.spice-space.org/">The SPICE protocol</a> for
5862 remote display access is the preferred solution with oVirt and RedHat
5863 Enterprise Virtualization, and I was sad to discover the other day
5864 that the browser plugin needed to use these systems seamlessly was
5865 missing in Debian.  The <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/668284">request
5866 for a package</a> was from 2012-04-10 with no progress since
5867 2013-04-01, so I decided to wrap up a package based on the great work
5868 from Cajus Pollmeier and put it in a collab-maint maintained git
5869 repository to get a package I could use.  I would very much like
5870 others to help me maintain the package (or just take over, I do not
5871 mind), but as no-one had volunteered so far, I just uploaded it to
5872 NEW.  I hope it will be available in Debian in a few days.</p>
5873
5874 <p>The source is now available from
5875 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/spice-xpi.git;a=summary">http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/spice-xpi.git;a=summary</a>.</p>
5876
5877       </div>
5878       <div class="tags">
5879
5880
5881         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5882
5883
5884       </div>
5885     </div>
5886     <div class="padding"></div>
5887
5888     <div class="entry">
5889       <div class="title">
5890         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Teaching_vmdebootstrap_to_create_Raspberry_Pi_SD_card_images.html">Teaching vmdebootstrap to create Raspberry Pi SD card images</a>
5891       </div>
5892       <div class="date">
5893         27th October 2013
5894       </div>
5895       <div class="body">
5896         <p>The
5897 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/v/vmdebootstrap.html">vmdebootstrap</a>
5898 program is a a very nice system to create virtual machine images.  It
5899 create a image file, add a partition table, mount it and run
5900 debootstrap in the mounted directory to create a Debian system on a
5901 stick.  Yesterday, I decided to try to teach it how to make images for
5902 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi</a>, as part
5903 of a plan to simplify the build system for
5904 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the FreedomBox
5905 project</a>.  The FreedomBox project already uses vmdebootstrap for
5906 the virtualbox images, but its current build system made multistrap
5907 based system for Dreamplug images, and it is lacking support for
5908 Raspberry Pi.</p>
5909
5910 <p>Armed with the knowledge on how to build "foreign" (aka non-native
5911 architecture) chroots for Raspberry Pi, I dived into the vmdebootstrap
5912 code and adjusted it to be able to build armel images on my amd64
5913 Debian laptop.  I ended up giving vmdebootstrap five new options,
5914 allowing me to replicate the image creation process I use to make
5915 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">Debian
5916 Jessie based mesh node images for the Raspberry Pi</a>.  First, the
5917 <tt>--foreign /path/to/binfm_handler</tt> option tell vmdebootstrap to
5918 call debootstrap with --foreign and to copy the handler into the
5919 generated chroot before running the second stage.  This allow
5920 vmdebootstrap to create armel images on an amd64 host.  Next I added
5921 two new options <tt>--bootsize size</tt> and <tt>--boottype
5922 fstype</tt> to teach it to create a separate /boot/ partition with the
5923 given file system type, allowing me to create an image with a vfat
5924 partition for the /boot/ stuff.  I also added a <tt>--variant
5925 variant</tt> option to allow me to create smaller images without the
5926 Debian base system packages installed.  Finally, I added an option
5927 <tt>--no-extlinux</tt> to tell vmdebootstrap to not install extlinux
5928 as a boot loader.  It is not needed on the Raspberry Pi and probably
5929 most other non-x86 architectures.  The changes were accepted by the
5930 upstream author of vmdebootstrap yesterday and today, and is now
5931 available from
5932 <a href="http://git.liw.fi/cgi-bin/cgit/cgit.cgi/vmdebootstrap/">the
5933 upstream project page</a>.</p>
5934
5935 <p>To use it to build a Raspberry Pi image using Debian Jessie, first
5936 create a small script (the customize script) to add the non-free
5937 binary blob needed to boot the Raspberry Pi and the APT source
5938 list:</p>
5939
5940 <p><pre>
5941 #!/bin/sh
5942 set -e # Exit on first error
5943 rootdir="$1"
5944 cd "$rootdir"
5945 cat &lt;&lt;EOF > etc/apt/sources.list
5946 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
5947 EOF
5948 # Install non-free binary blob needed to boot Raspberry Pi.  This
5949 # install a kernel somewhere too.
5950 wget https://raw.github.com/Hexxeh/rpi-update/master/rpi-update \
5951     -O $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
5952 chmod a+x $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
5953 mkdir -p $rootdir/lib/modules
5954 touch $rootdir/boot/start.elf
5955 chroot $rootdir rpi-update
5956 </pre></p>
5957
5958 <p>Next, fetch the latest vmdebootstrap script and call it like this
5959 to build the image:</p>
5960
5961 <pre>
5962 sudo ./vmdebootstrap \
5963     --variant minbase \
5964     --arch armel \
5965     --distribution jessie \
5966     --mirror http://http.debian.net/debian \
5967     --image test.img \
5968     --size 600M \
5969     --bootsize 64M \
5970     --boottype vfat \
5971     --log-level debug \
5972     --verbose \
5973     --no-kernel \
5974     --no-extlinux \
5975     --root-password raspberry \
5976     --hostname raspberrypi \
5977     --foreign /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static \
5978     --customize `pwd`/customize \
5979     --package netbase \
5980     --package git-core \
5981     --package binutils \
5982     --package ca-certificates \
5983     --package wget \
5984     --package kmod
5985 </pre></p>
5986
5987 <p>The list of packages being installed are the ones needed by
5988 rpi-update to make the image bootable on the Raspberry Pi, with the
5989 exception of netbase, which is needed by debootstrap to find
5990 /etc/hosts with the minbase variant.  I really wish there was a way to
5991 set up an Raspberry Pi using only packages in the Debian archive, but
5992 that is not possible as far as I know, because it boots from the GPU
5993 using a non-free binary blob.</p>
5994
5995 <p>The build host need debootstrap, kpartx and qemu-user-static and
5996 probably a few others installed.  I have not checked the complete
5997 build dependency list.</p>
5998
5999 <p>The resulting image will not use the hardware floating point unit
6000 on the Raspberry PI, because the armel architecture in Debian is not
6001 optimized for that use.  So the images created will be a bit slower
6002 than <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/">Raspbian</a> based images.</p>
6003
6004       </div>
6005       <div class="tags">
6006
6007
6008         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network</a>.
6009
6010
6011       </div>
6012     </div>
6013     <div class="padding"></div>
6014
6015     <div class="entry">
6016       <div class="title">
6017         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Good_causes__Debian_Outreach_Program_for_Women__EFF_documenting_the_spying_and_Open_access_in_Norway.html">Good causes: Debian Outreach Program for Women, EFF documenting the spying and Open access in Norway</a>
6018       </div>
6019       <div class="date">
6020         15th October 2013
6021       </div>
6022       <div class="body">
6023         <p>The last few days I came across a few good causes that should get
6024 wider attention.  I recommend signing and donating to each one of
6025 these. :)</p>
6026
6027 <p>Via <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2013/18/">Debian
6028 Project News for 2013-10-14</a> I came across the Outreach Program for
6029 Women program which is a Google Summer of Code like initiative to get
6030 more women involved in free software.  One debian sponsor has offered
6031 to match <a href="http://debian.ch/opw2013">any donation done to Debian
6032 earmarked</a> for this initiative.  I donated a few minutes ago, and
6033 hope you will to. :)</p>
6034
6035 <p>And the Electronic Frontier Foundation just announced plans to
6036 create <a href="https://supporters.eff.org/donate/nsa-videos">video
6037 documentaries about the excessive spying</a> on every Internet user that
6038 take place these days, and their need to fund the work.  I've already
6039 donated.  Are you next?</p>
6040
6041 <p>For my Norwegian audience, the organisation Studentenes og
6042 Akademikernes Internasjonale Hjelpefond is collecting signatures for a
6043 statement under the heading
6044 <a href="http://saih.no/Bloggers_United/">Bloggers United for Open
6045 Access</a> for those of us asking for more focus on open access in the
6046 Norwegian government.  So far 499 signatures.  I hope you will sign it
6047 too.</p>
6048
6049       </div>
6050       <div class="tags">
6051
6052
6053         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
6054
6055
6056       </div>
6057     </div>
6058     <div class="padding"></div>
6059
6060     <div class="entry">
6061       <div class="title">
6062         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Videos_about_the_Freedombox_project___for_inspiration_and_learning.html">Videos about the Freedombox project - for inspiration and learning</a>
6063       </div>
6064       <div class="date">
6065         27th September 2013
6066       </div>
6067       <div class="body">
6068         <p>The <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox
6069 project</a> have been going on for a while, and have presented the
6070 vision, ideas and solution several places.  Here is a little
6071 collection of videos of talks and presentation of the project.</p>
6072
6073 <ul>
6074
6075 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukvUz5taxvA">FreedomBox -
6076 2,5 minute marketing film</a> (Youtube)</li>
6077
6078 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzW25QTVWsE">Eben Moglen
6079 discusses the Freedombox on CBS news 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
6080
6081 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae8SZbxfE0g">Eben Moglen -
6082 Freedom in the Cloud - Software Freedom, Privacy and and Security for
6083 Web 2.0 and Cloud computing at ISOC-NY Public Meeting 2010</a>
6084 (Youtube)</li>
6085
6086 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNaIji_3xBE">Fosdem 2011
6087 Keynote by Eben Moglen presenting the Freedombox</a> (Youtube)</li>
6088
6089 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bDDUyJSQ9s">Presentation of
6090 the Freedombox by James Vasile at Elevate in Gratz 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
6091
6092 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQTmnk27g9s"> Freedombox -
6093 Discovery, Identity, and Trust by Nick Daly at Freedombox Hackfest New
6094 York City in 2012</a> (Youtube)</li>
6095
6096 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbSB4Ba7Ck">Introduction
6097 to the Freedombox at Freedombox Hackfest New York City in 2012</a>
6098 (Youtube)</li>
6099
6100 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-P2Jaeg0aQ">Freedom, Out
6101 of the Box! by Bdale Garbee at linux.conf.au Ballarat, 2012</a> (Youtube) </li>
6102
6103 <li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/freedombox/">Freedombox
6104 1.0 by Eben Moglen and Bdale Garbee at Fosdem 2013</a> (FOSDEM) </li>
6105
6106 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LpYX2zVYg">What is the
6107 FreedomBox today by Bdale Garbee at Debconf13 in Vaumarcus
6108 2013</a> (Youtube)</li>
6109
6110 </ul>
6111
6112 <p>A larger list is available from
6113 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/TalksAndPresentations">the
6114 Freedombox Wiki</a>.</p>
6115
6116 <p>On other news, I am happy to report that Freedombox based on Debian
6117 Jessie is coming along quite well, and soon both Owncloud and using
6118 Tor should be available for testers of the Freedombox solution. :) In
6119 a few weeks I hope everything needed to test it is included in Debian.
6120 The withsqlite package is already in Debian, and the plinth package is
6121 pending in NEW.  The third and vital part of that puzzle is the
6122 metapackage/setup framework, which is still pending an upload.  Join
6123 us on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC
6124 (#freedombox on irc.debian.org)</a> and
6125 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6126 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6127
6128       </div>
6129       <div class="tags">
6130
6131
6132         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
6133
6134
6135       </div>
6136     </div>
6137     <div class="padding"></div>
6138
6139     <div class="entry">
6140       <div class="title">
6141         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Recipe_to_test_the_Freedombox_project_on_amd64_or_Raspberry_Pi.html">Recipe to test the Freedombox project on amd64 or Raspberry Pi</a>
6142       </div>
6143       <div class="date">
6144         10th September 2013
6145       </div>
6146       <div class="body">
6147         <p>I was introduced to the
6148 <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox project</a>
6149 in 2010, when Eben Moglen presented his vision about serving the need
6150 of non-technical people to keep their personal information private and
6151 within the legal protection of their own homes.  The idea is to give
6152 people back the power over their network and machines, and return
6153 Internet back to its intended peer-to-peer architecture.  Instead of
6154 depending on a central service, the Freedombox will give everyone
6155 control over their own basic infrastructure.</p>
6156
6157 <p>I've intended to join the effort since then, but other tasks have
6158 taken priority.  But this summers nasty news about the misuse of trust
6159 and privilege exercised by the "western" intelligence gathering
6160 communities increased my eagerness to contribute to a point where I
6161 actually started working on the project a while back.</p>
6162
6163 <p>The <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/freedombox/">initial
6164 Debian initiative</a> based on the vision from Eben Moglen, is to
6165 create a simple and cheap Debian based appliance that anyone can hook
6166 up in their home and get access to secure and private services and
6167 communication.  The initial deployment platform have been the
6168 <a href="http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-dreamplugdetails.aspx">Dreamplug</a>,
6169 which is a piece of hardware I do not own.  So to be able to test what
6170 the current Freedombox setup look like, I had to come up with a way to install
6171 it on some hardware I do have access to.  I have rewritten the
6172 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedom-maker">freedom-maker</a>
6173 image build framework to use .deb packages instead of only copying
6174 setup into the boot images, and thanks to this rewrite I am able to
6175 set up any machine supported by Debian Wheezy as a Freedombox, using
6176 the previously mentioned deb (and a few support debs for packages
6177 missing in Debian).</p>
6178
6179 <p>The current Freedombox setup consist of a set of bootstrapping
6180 scripts
6181 (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>),
6182 and a administrative web interface
6183 (<a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/Plinth">plinth</a> + exmachina +
6184 withsqlite), as well as a privacy enhancing proxy based on
6185 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>
6186 (freedombox-privoxy).  There is also a web/javascript based XMPP
6187 client (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/jwchat">jwchat</a>)
6188 trying (unsuccessfully so far) to talk to the XMPP server
6189 (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/ejabberd">ejabberd</a>).  The
6190 web interface is pluggable, and the goal is to use it to enable OpenID
6191 services, mesh network connectivity, use of TOR, etc, etc.  Not much of
6192 this is really working yet, see
6193 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedombox-todos/blob/master/TODO">the
6194 project TODO</a> for links to GIT repositories.  Most of the code is
6195 on github at the moment.  The HTTP proxy is operational out of the
6196 box, and the admin web interface can be used to add/remove plinth
6197 users.  I've not been able to do anything else with it so far, but
6198 know there are several branches spread around github and other places
6199 with lots of half baked features.</p>
6200
6201 <p>Anyway, if you want to have a look at the current state, the
6202 following recipes should work to give you a test machine to poke
6203 at.</p>
6204
6205 <p><strong>Debian Wheezy amd64</strong></p>
6206
6207 <ol>
6208
6209 <li>Fetch normal Debian Wheezy installation ISO.</li>
6210 <li>Boot from it, either as CD or USB stick.</li>
6211 <li><p>Press [tab] on the boot prompt and add this as a boot argument
6212 to the Debian installer:<p>
6213 <pre>url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat</a></pre></li>
6214
6215 <li>Answer the few language/region/password questions and pick disk to
6216 install on.</li>
6217
6218 <li>When the installation is finished and the machine have rebooted a
6219 few times, your Freedombox is ready for testing.</li>
6220
6221 </ol>
6222
6223 <p><strong>Raspberry Pi Raspbian</strong></p>
6224
6225 <ol>
6226
6227 <li>Fetch a Raspbian SD card image, create SD card.</li>
6228 <li>Boot from SD card, extend file system to fill the card completely.</li>
6229 <li><p>Log in and add this to /etc/sources.list:</p>
6230 <pre>
6231 deb <a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox</a> wheezy main
6232 </pre></li>
6233 <li><p>Run this as root:</p>
6234 <pre>
6235 wget -O - http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/BE1A583D.asc | \
6236    apt-key add -
6237 apt-get update
6238 apt-get install freedombox-setup
6239 /usr/lib/freedombox/setup
6240 </pre></li>
6241 <li>Reboot into your freshly created Freedombox.</li>
6242
6243 </ol>
6244
6245 <p>You can test it on other architectures too, but because the
6246 freedombox-privoxy package is binary, it will only work as intended on
6247 the architectures where I have had time to build the binary and put it
6248 in my APT repository.  But do not let this stop you.  It is only a
6249 short "<tt>apt-get source -b freedombox-privoxy</tt>" away. :)</p>
6250
6251 <p>Note that by default Freedombox is a DHCP server on the
6252 192.168.1.0/24 subnet, so if this is your subnet be careful and turn
6253 off the DHCP server by running "<tt>update-rc.d isc-dhcp-server
6254 disable</tt>" as root.</p>
6255
6256 <p>Please let me know if this works for you, or if you have any
6257 problems.  We gather on the IRC channel
6258 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">#freedombox</a> on
6259 irc.debian.org and the
6260 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">project
6261 mailing list</a>.</p>
6262
6263 <p>Once you get your freedombox operational, you can visit
6264 <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/</tt> to see the state of the plint
6265 welcome screen (dead end - do not be surprised if you are unable to
6266 get past it), and next visit <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/help/</tt>
6267 to look at the rest of plinth.  The default user is 'admin' and the
6268 default password is 'secret'.</p>
6269
6270       </div>
6271       <div class="tags">
6272
6273
6274         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
6275
6276
6277       </div>
6278     </div>
6279     <div class="padding"></div>
6280
6281     <div class="entry">
6282       <div class="title">
6283         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Intel_180_SSD_disk_with_Lenovo_firmware_can_not_use_Intel_firmware.html">Intel 180 SSD disk with Lenovo firmware can not use Intel firmware</a>
6284       </div>
6285       <div class="date">
6286         18th August 2013
6287       </div>
6288       <div class="body">
6289         <p>Earlier, I reported about
6290 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">my
6291 problems using an Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB disk</a>.  Friday I was
6292 told by IBM that the original disk should be thrown away.  And as
6293 there no longer was a problem if I bricked the firmware, I decided
6294 today to try to install Intel firmware to replace the Lenovo firmware
6295 currently on the disk.</p>
6296
6297 <p>I searched the Intel site for firmware, and found
6298 <a href="https://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&ProdId=3472&DwnldID=18363&ProductFamily=Solid-State+Drives+and+Caching&ProductLine=Intel%c2%ae+High+Performance+Solid-State+Drive&ProductProduct=Intel%c2%ae+SSD+520+Series+(180GB%2c+2.5in+SATA+6Gb%2fs%2c+25nm%2c+MLC)&lang=eng">issdfut_2.0.4.iso</a>
6299 (aka Intel SATA Solid-State Drive Firmware Update Tool) which
6300 according to the site should contain the latest firmware for SSD
6301 disks.  I inserted the broken disk in one of my spare laptops and
6302 booted the ISO from a USB stick.  The disk was recognized, but the
6303 program claimed the newest firmware already were installed and refused
6304 to insert any Intel firmware.  So no change, and the disk is still
6305 unable to handle write load. :( I guess the only way to get them
6306 working would be if Lenovo releases new firmware.  No idea how likely
6307 that is.  Anyway, just blogging about this test for completeness.  I
6308 got a working Samsung disk, and see no point in spending more time on
6309 the broken disks.</p>
6310
6311       </div>
6312       <div class="tags">
6313
6314
6315         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6316
6317
6318       </div>
6319     </div>
6320     <div class="padding"></div>
6321
6322     <div class="entry">
6323       <div class="title">
6324         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">How to fix a Thinkpad X230 with a broken 180 GB SSD disk</a>
6325       </div>
6326       <div class="date">
6327         17th July 2013
6328       </div>
6329       <div class="body">
6330         <p>Today I switched to
6331 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
6332 new laptop</a>.  I've previously written about the problems I had with
6333 my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
6334 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Intel_SSD_520_Series_180_GB_with_Lenovo_firmware_still_lock_up_from_sustained_writes.html">180
6335 GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
6336 sustained writes.  My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
6337 trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
6338 identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
6339 disk instead to fix it once and for all.  The Samsung disk survived
6340 the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
6341 random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
6342 decided to trust it with my data.  I have installed it as a Debian Edu
6343 Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
6344 server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
6345 station from now on.</p>
6346
6347 <p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
6348 Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
6349 performance and increase life time of the disk.  The Linux kernel and
6350 user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
6351 environment.  To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
6352 package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning.  The
6353 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
6354 for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
6355 is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
6356 package.  If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
6357 will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
6358 file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
6359
6360 <p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
6361 set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD.  It is adjusted to my use case,
6362 where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
6363 addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
6364 top of this again.  See the README file in the package source for the
6365 references I used to pick the settings.  At the moment these
6366 parameters are tuned:</p>
6367
6368 <ul>
6369
6370 <li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
6371     (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
6372
6373 <li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
6374     this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
6375     0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
6376
6377 <li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
6378     systems.</li>
6379
6380 <li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
6381     /etc/fstab.</li>
6382
6383 <li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
6384
6385 <li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
6386     cron.daily).</li>
6387
6388 <li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
6389     to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
6390
6391 </ul>
6392
6393 <p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
6394 the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
6395 little gain.  My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
6396 those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
6397 computer.  I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
6398 from getting the data on the disk (see
6399 <a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
6400 Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
6401 right thing to do.</p>
6402
6403 <p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
6404 it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
6405 indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
6406
6407 <p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
6408 and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
6409 file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
6410 instead of during my work.</p>
6411
6412 <p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
6413 this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
6414
6415 <p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning.  I expect
6416 iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
6417 have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
6418
6419 <p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
6420 there.</p>
6421
6422 <p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
6423 as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
6424 disk.  It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
6425 the Lenovo firmware.  But I have not tried and did not want to do so
6426 without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
6427 disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
6428 back.</p>
6429
6430       </div>
6431       <div class="tags">
6432
6433
6434         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6435
6436
6437       </div>
6438     </div>
6439     <div class="padding"></div>
6440
6441     <div class="entry">
6442       <div class="title">
6443         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Intel_SSD_520_Series_180_GB_with_Lenovo_firmware_still_lock_up_from_sustained_writes.html">Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB with Lenovo firmware still lock up from sustained writes</a>
6444       </div>
6445       <div class="date">
6446         10th July 2013
6447       </div>
6448       <div class="body">
6449         <p>A few days ago, I wrote about
6450 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
6451 problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
6452 was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
6453 sustained write.  My supplier is in contact with
6454 <a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
6455 replacement disk to try to fix the problem.  They decided to send an
6456 identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
6457
6458 <p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
6459 Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it.  The new disk have the
6460 same firmware version as the original.  This time my hope raised
6461 slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
6462 die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
6463 going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%.  But around 60%, the disk
6464 died again and I was back on square one.  I still do not have a new
6465 laptop with a disk I can trust.  I can not live with a disk that might
6466 lock up when I download a new
6467 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
6468 other large files.  I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
6469 the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
6470
6471 <p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
6472 11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
6473 LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
6474 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
6475 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
6476 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
6477
6478 <p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
6479 11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
6480 LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
6481 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
6482 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
6483 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
6484
6485 <p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
6486 SA, date and WNPP values.  Mentioning all the details here in case
6487 someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
6488 failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
6489 exist).</p>
6490
6491       </div>
6492       <div class="tags">
6493
6494
6495         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6496
6497
6498       </div>
6499     </div>
6500     <div class="padding"></div>
6501
6502     <div class="entry">
6503       <div class="title">
6504         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/July_13th__Debian_Ubuntu_BSP_and_Skolelinux_Debian_Edu_developer_gathering_in_Oslo.html">July 13th: Debian/Ubuntu BSP and Skolelinux/Debian Edu developer gathering in Oslo</a>
6505       </div>
6506       <div class="date">
6507          9th July 2013
6508       </div>
6509       <div class="body">
6510         <p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
6511 Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
6512 party in Oslo.  It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
6513 member assosiation NUUG</a> and
6514 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
6515 project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
6516 Bitraf</a>.</p>
6517
6518 <p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening.  Everyone is
6519 welcome, and there is no fee to participate.  There is on the other
6520 hand limited space, and only room for 30 people.  Please put your name
6521 on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
6522 wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
6523
6524       </div>
6525       <div class="tags">
6526
6527
6528         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
6529
6530
6531       </div>
6532     </div>
6533     <div class="padding"></div>
6534
6535     <div class="entry">
6536       <div class="title">
6537         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">The Thinkpad is dead, long live the Thinkpad X230?</a>
6538       </div>
6539       <div class="date">
6540          5th July 2013
6541       </div>
6542       <div class="body">
6543         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
6544 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
6545 for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>.  Unfortunately I did not have much
6546 time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
6547 will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived.  I
6548 ended up picking a
6549 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
6550 with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
6551 a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly.  But my
6552 second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful.  More
6553 on that below.</p>
6554
6555 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
6556 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
6557 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
6558 feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
6559 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
6560 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
6561 to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
6562 disks from my search parameters.  I also asked around among friends to
6563 get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
6564
6565 <p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
6566 X41.  I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
6567 significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
6568 hand a lot more to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly
6569 good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
6570 I will get used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
6571 needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
6572
6573 <p>Turning off the touch pad was simple.  All it took was a quick
6574 visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
6575
6576 <p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop.  The 180 GB SSD disk
6577 lock up during load.  And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
6578 with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
6579 I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
6580 reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
6581 default in Ubuntu).  And the bug with is already known.  It was
6582 reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
6583 report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
6584 Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD).  It is also reported to the Linux
6585 kernel developers as
6586 <a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
6587 report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
6588 (SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
6589 Lenovo forums, both for
6590 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
6591 2012-11-10</a> and for
6592 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/X-Series-ThinkPad-Laptops/x230-SATA-errors-with-180GB-Intel-520-SSD-under-heavy-write-load/m-p/1068147">X230
6593 03-20-2013</a>.  The problem do not only affect installation.  The
6594 reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
6595 on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
6596 problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
6597 There is even a
6598 <a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
6599 available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
6600 minutes by writing to a file.</p>
6601
6602 <p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
6603 contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
6604 requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
6605 firmware.  Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
6606 Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i).  I
6607 hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
6608 fixed. :)</p>
6609
6610       </div>
6611       <div class="tags">
6612
6613
6614         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6615
6616
6617       </div>
6618     </div>
6619     <div class="padding"></div>
6620
6621     <div class="entry">
6622       <div class="title">
6623         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230.html">The Thinkpad is dead, long live the Thinkpad X230</a>
6624       </div>
6625       <div class="date">
6626          4th July 2013
6627       </div>
6628       <div class="body">
6629         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
6630 trusty old Thinkpad X41.  Unfortunately I did not have much time to
6631 spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived.  I ended up
6632 picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
6633 X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu
6634 Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly.  As I write
6635 this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
6636 with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
6637 with an expencive door stop.</p>
6638
6639 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
6640 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
6641 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
6642 feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
6643 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
6644 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
6645 to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
6646
6647 <p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
6648 wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
6649 to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly good and the
6650 individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
6651 used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
6652 new laptop now. :)</p>
6653
6654 <p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
6655
6656       </div>
6657       <div class="tags">
6658
6659
6660         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6661
6662
6663       </div>
6664     </div>
6665     <div class="padding"></div>
6666
6667     <div class="entry">
6668       <div class="title">
6669         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_locate_and_install_required_firmware_packages_on_Debian__Isenkram_0_4_.html">Automatically locate and install required firmware packages on Debian (Isenkram 0.4)</a>
6670       </div>
6671       <div class="date">
6672         25th June 2013
6673       </div>
6674       <div class="body">
6675         <p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
6676 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
6677 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
6678 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
6679 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
6680 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
6681 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
6682 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
6683 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
6684 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
6685 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
6686
6687 <p><pre>
6688 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
6689 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
6690 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
6691 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
6692 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
6693 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
6694 firmware-ipw2x00
6695 firmware-ipw2x00
6696 Preconfiguring packages ...
6697 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
6698 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
6699 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
6700 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
6701 #
6702 </pre></p>
6703
6704 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
6705 printed instead:</p>
6706
6707 <p><pre>
6708 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
6709 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
6710 #
6711 </pre></p>
6712
6713 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
6714 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
6715
6716 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
6717 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
6718 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
6719 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
6720 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
6721 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
6722 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
6723 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
6724 machine.</p>
6725
6726 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
6727 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
6728 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
6729 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
6730 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
6731 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
6732
6733       </div>
6734       <div class="tags">
6735
6736
6737         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
6738
6739
6740       </div>
6741     </div>
6742     <div class="padding"></div>
6743
6744     <div class="entry">
6745       <div class="title">
6746         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fixing_the_Linux_black_screen_of_death_on_machines_with_Intel_HD_video.html">Fixing the Linux black screen of death on machines with Intel HD video</a>
6747       </div>
6748       <div class="date">
6749         11th June 2013
6750       </div>
6751       <div class="body">
6752         <p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
6753 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
6754 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
6755 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
6756 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
6757 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
6758 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
6759 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
6760 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
6761 i915 driver used by the
6762 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
6763 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
6764
6765 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
6766 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
6767 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
6768 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
6769 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
6770
6771 <pre>
6772 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
6773 update-initramfs -u -k all
6774 </pre>
6775
6776 <p>Since March 2012 there is
6777 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
6778 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
6779 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
6780 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
6781 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
6782 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
6783 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
6784 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
6785 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
6786 number.</p>
6787
6788 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
6789 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
6790
6791 <p><pre>
6792 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
6793     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
6794     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
6795  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
6796  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
6797     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
6798  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
6799     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
6800  Latency: 0
6801  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
6802  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
6803  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
6804  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
6805  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
6806  Capabilities: <access denied>
6807  Kernel driver in use: i915
6808 </pre></p>
6809
6810 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
6811
6812 <p><pre>
6813 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
6814        ...
6815         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
6816         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
6817        ...
6818 }
6819 </pre></p>
6820
6821 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
6822 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
6823 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
6824 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
6825 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
6826 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
6827 yet shown up in
6828 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
6829 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
6830 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
6831 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
6832 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
6833 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
6834
6835 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
6836 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
6837 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
6838 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
6839 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
6840 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
6841 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
6842 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
6843 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
6844 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
6845 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
6846 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
6847
6848 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
6849 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
6850 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
6851 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
6852 backlight.</p>
6853
6854       </div>
6855       <div class="tags">
6856
6857
6858         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6859
6860
6861       </div>
6862     </div>
6863     <div class="padding"></div>
6864
6865     <div class="entry">
6866       <div class="title">
6867         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_install_Linux_on_a_Packard_Bell_Easynote_LV_preinstalled_with_Windows_8.html">How to install Linux on a Packard Bell Easynote LV preinstalled with Windows 8</a>
6868       </div>
6869       <div class="date">
6870         27th May 2013
6871       </div>
6872       <div class="body">
6873         <p>Two days ago, I asked
6874 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_can_I_install_Linux_on_a_Packard_Bell_Easynote_LV_preinstalled_with_Windows_8_.html">how
6875 I could install Linux on a Packard Bell EasyNote LV computer
6876 preinstalled with Windows 8</a>.  I found a solution, but am horrified
6877 with the obstacles put in the way of Linux users on a laptop with UEFI
6878 and Windows 8.</p>
6879
6880 <p>I never found out if the cause of my problems were the use of UEFI
6881 secure booting or fast boot.  I suspect fast boot was the problem,
6882 causing the firmware to boot directly from HD without considering any
6883 key presses and alternative devices, but do not know UEFI settings
6884 enough to tell.</p>
6885
6886 <p>There is no way to install Linux on the machine in question without
6887 opening the box and disconnecting the hard drive!  This is as far as I
6888 can tell, the only way to get access to the firmware setup menu
6889 without accepting the Windows 8 license agreement.  I am told (and
6890 found description on how to) that it is possible to configure the
6891 firmware setup once booted into Windows 8.  But as I believe the terms
6892 of that agreement are completely unacceptable, accepting the license
6893 was never an alternative.  I do not enter agreements I do not intend
6894 to follow.</p>
6895
6896 <p>I feared I had to return the laptops and ask for a refund, and
6897 waste many hours on this, but luckily there was a way to get it to
6898 work.  But I would not recommend it to anyone planning to run Linux on
6899 it, and I have become sceptical to Windows 8 certified laptops.  Is
6900 this the way Linux will be forced out of the market place, by making
6901 it close to impossible for "normal" users to install Linux without
6902 accepting the Microsoft Windows license terms?  Or at least not
6903 without risking to loose the warranty?</p>
6904
6905 <p>I've updated the
6906 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Linux Laptop
6907 wiki page for Packard Bell EasyNote LV</a>, to ensure the next person
6908 do not have to struggle as much as I did to get Linux into the
6909 machine.</p>
6910
6911 <p>Thanks to Bob Rosbag, Florian Weimer, Philipp Kern, Ben Hutching,
6912 Michael Tokarev and others for feedback and ideas.</p>
6913
6914       </div>
6915       <div class="tags">
6916
6917
6918         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6919
6920
6921       </div>
6922     </div>
6923     <div class="padding"></div>
6924
6925     <div class="entry">
6926       <div class="title">
6927         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_can_I_install_Linux_on_a_Packard_Bell_Easynote_LV_preinstalled_with_Windows_8_.html">How can I install Linux on a Packard Bell Easynote LV preinstalled with Windows 8?</a>
6928       </div>
6929       <div class="date">
6930         25th May 2013
6931       </div>
6932       <div class="body">
6933         <p>I've run into quite a problem the last few days.  I bought three
6934 new laptops for my parents and a few others.  I bought Packard Bell
6935 Easynote LV to run Kubuntu on and use as their home computer.  But I
6936 am completely unable to figure out how to install Linux on it.  The
6937 computer is preinstalled with Windows 8, and I suspect it uses UEFI
6938 instead of a BIOS to boot.</p>
6939
6940 <p>The problem is that I am unable to get it to PXE boot, and unable
6941 to get it to boot the Linux installer from my USB stick.  I have yet
6942 to try the DVD install, and still hope it will work.  when I turn on
6943 the computer, there is no information on what buttons to press to get
6944 the normal boot menu.  I expect to get some boot menu to select PXE or
6945 USB stick booting.  When booting, it first ask for the language to
6946 use, then for some regional settings, and finally if I will accept the
6947 Windows 8 terms of use.  As these terms are completely unacceptable to
6948 me, I have no other choice but to turn off the computer and try again
6949 to get it to boot the Linux installer.</p>
6950
6951 <p>I have gathered my findings so far on a Linlap page about the
6952 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
6953 EasyNote LV</a> model.  If you have any idea how to get Linux
6954 installed on this machine, please get in touch or update that wiki
6955 page.  If I can't find a way to install Linux, I will have to return
6956 the laptop to the seller and find another machine for my parents.</p>
6957
6958 <p>I wonder, is this the way Linux will be forced out of the market
6959 using UEFI and "secure boot" by making it impossible to install Linux
6960 on new Laptops?</p>
6961
6962       </div>
6963       <div class="tags">
6964
6965
6966         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6967
6968
6969       </div>
6970     </div>
6971     <div class="padding"></div>
6972
6973     <div class="entry">
6974       <div class="title">
6975         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_transform_a_Debian_based_system_to_a_Debian_Edu_installation.html">How to transform a Debian based system to a Debian Edu installation</a>
6976       </div>
6977       <div class="date">
6978         17th May 2013
6979       </div>
6980       <div class="body">
6981         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is
6982 an operating system based on Debian intended for use in schools.  It
6983 contain a turn-key solution for the computer network provided to
6984 pupils in the primary schools.  It provide both the central server,
6985 network boot servers and desktop environments with heaps of
6986 educational software.  The project was founded almost 12 years ago,
6987 2001-07-02.  If you want to support the project, which is in need for
6988 cash to fund developer gatherings and other project related activity,
6989 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">please
6990 donate some money</a>.
6991
6992 <p>A topic that come up again and again on the Debian Edu mailing
6993 lists and elsewhere, is the question on how to transform a Debian or
6994 Ubuntu installation into a Debian Edu installation.  It isn't very
6995 hard, and last week I wrote a script to replicate the steps done by
6996 the Debian Edu installer.</p>
6997
6998 <p>The script,
6999 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/branches/wheezy/debian-edu-config/share/debian-edu-config/tools/debian-edu-bless?view=markup">debian-edu-bless<a/>
7000 in the debian-edu-config package, will go through these six steps and
7001 transform an existing Debian Wheezy or Ubuntu (untested) installation
7002 into a Debian Edu Workstation:</p>
7003
7004 <ol>
7005
7006 <li>Add skolelinux related APT sources.</li>
7007 <li>Create /etc/debian-edu/config with the wanted configuration.</li>
7008 <li>Install debian-edu-install to load preseeding values and pull in
7009     our configuration.</li>
7010 <li>Preseed debconf database with profile setup in
7011     /etc/debian-edu/config, and run tasksel to install packages
7012     according to the profile specified in the config above,
7013     overriding some of the Debian automation machinery.</li>
7014 <li>Run debian-edu-cfengine-D installation to configure everything
7015     that could not be done using preseeding.</li>
7016 <li>Ask for a reboot to enable all the configuration changes.</li>
7017
7018 </ol>
7019
7020 <p>There are some steps in the Debian Edu installation that can not be
7021 replicated like this.  Disk partitioning and LVM setup, for example.
7022 So this script just assume there is enough disk space to install all
7023 the needed packages.</p>
7024
7025 <p>The script was created to help a Debian Edu student working on
7026 setting up <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org">Raspberry Pi</a> as a
7027 Debian Edu client, and using it he can take the existing
7028 <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/FrontPage‎">Raspbian</a> installation and
7029 transform it into a fully functioning Debian Edu Workstation (or
7030 Roaming Workstation, or whatever :).</p>
7031
7032 <p>The default setting in the script is to create a KDE Workstation.
7033 If a LXDE based Roaming workstation is wanted instead, modify the
7034 PROFILE and DESKTOP values at the top to look like this instead:</p>
7035
7036 <p><pre>
7037 PROFILE="Roaming-Workstation"
7038 DESKTOP="lxde"
7039 </pre></p>
7040
7041 <p>The script could even become useful to set up Debian Edu servers in
7042 the cloud, by starting with a virtual Debian installation at some
7043 virtual hosting service and setting up all the services on first
7044 boot.</p>
7045
7046       </div>
7047       <div class="tags">
7048
7049
7050         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7051
7052
7053       </div>
7054     </div>
7055     <div class="padding"></div>
7056
7057     <div class="entry">
7058       <div class="title">
7059         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian__the_Linux_distribution_of_choice_for_LEGO_designers_.html">Debian, the Linux distribution of choice for LEGO designers?</a>
7060       </div>
7061       <div class="date">
7062         11th May 2013
7063       </div>
7064       <div class="body">
7065         <P>In January,
7066 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
7067 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
7068 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
7069 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
7070 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
7071 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
7072 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
7073 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
7074 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
7075 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
7076 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
7077 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
7078
7079 <p><table>
7080 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/brickos">brickos</a></td><td>alternative OS for LEGO Mindstorms RCX. Supports development in C/C++</td></tr>
7081 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
7082 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/libnxt">libnxt</a></td><td>utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NX</td></tr>
7083 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
7084 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
7085 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
7086 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/python-nxt">python-nxt</a></td><td>python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot</td></tr>
7087 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/python-nxt-filer">python-nxt-filer</a></td><td>simple GUI to manage files on a LEGO Mindstorms NXT</td></tr>
7088 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/scratch">scratch</a></td><td>easy to use programming environment for ages 8 and up</td></tr>
7089 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
7090 </table></p>
7091
7092 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
7093 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
7094 available in experimental.</p>
7095
7096 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
7097 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
7098 for LEGO designers.</p>
7099
7100       </div>
7101       <div class="tags">
7102
7103
7104         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
7105
7106
7107       </div>
7108     </div>
7109     <div class="padding"></div>
7110
7111     <div class="entry">
7112       <div class="title">
7113         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Wheezy_is_out___and_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_should_soon_follow___newinwheezy.html">Debian Wheezy is out - and Debian Edu / Skolelinux should soon follow! #newinwheezy</a>
7114       </div>
7115       <div class="date">
7116          5th May 2013
7117       </div>
7118       <div class="body">
7119         <p>When I woke up this morning, I was very happy to see that the
7120 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130504">release announcement
7121 for Debian Wheezy</a> was waiting in my mail box.  This is a great
7122 Debian release, and I expect to move my machines at home over to it fairly
7123 soon.</p>
7124
7125 <p>The new debian release contain heaps of new stuff, and one program
7126 in particular make me very happy to see included.  The
7127 <a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">Scratch</a> program, made famous by
7128 the <a href="http://www.code.org/">Teach kids code</a> movement, is
7129 included for the first time.  Alongside similar programs like
7130 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/kturtle/">kturtle</a> and
7131 <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/Turtle_Art">turtleart</a>,
7132 it allow for visual programming where syntax errors can not happen,
7133 and a friendly programming environment for learning to control the
7134 computer.  Scratch will also be included in the next release of Debian
7135 Edu.</a>
7136
7137 <p>And now that Wheezy is wrapped up, we can wrap up the next Debian
7138 Edu/Skolelinux release too.  The
7139 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/04/msg00132.html">first
7140 alpha release</a> went out last week, and the next should soon
7141 follow.<p>
7142
7143       </div>
7144       <div class="tags">
7145
7146
7147         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7148
7149
7150       </div>
7151     </div>
7152     <div class="padding"></div>
7153
7154     <div class="entry">
7155       <div class="title">
7156         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram_0_2_finally_in_the_Debian_archive.html">Isenkram 0.2 finally in the Debian archive</a>
7157       </div>
7158       <div class="date">
7159          3rd April 2013
7160       </div>
7161       <div class="body">
7162         <p>Today the <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram
7163 package</a> finally made it into the archive, after lingering in NEW
7164 for many months.  I uploaded it to the Debian experimental suite
7165 2013-01-27, and today it was accepted into the archive.</p>
7166
7167 <p>Isenkram is a system for suggesting to users what packages to
7168 install to work with a pluggable hardware device.  The suggestion pop
7169 up when the device is plugged in.  For example if a Lego Mindstorm NXT
7170 is inserted, it will suggest to install the program needed to program
7171 the NXT controller.  Give it a go, and report bugs and suggestions to
7172 BTS. :)</p>
7173
7174       </div>
7175       <div class="tags">
7176
7177
7178         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
7179
7180
7181       </div>
7182     </div>
7183     <div class="padding"></div>
7184
7185     <div class="entry">
7186       <div class="title">
7187         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Bitcoin_GUI_now_available_from_Debian_unstable__and_Ubuntu_raring_.html">Bitcoin GUI now available from Debian/unstable (and Ubuntu/raring)</a>
7188       </div>
7189       <div class="date">
7190          2nd February 2013
7191       </div>
7192       <div class="body">
7193         <p>My
7194 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
7195 bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
7196 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
7197 Debian was waiting in NEW.  It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
7198 2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then.  It was
7199 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
7200 version too.</p>
7201
7202 <p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
7203 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
7204 architectures.  For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
7205 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
7206 architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
7207 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
7208 no-one have been able to propose a fix.  If you got an idea what is
7209 failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
7210
7211 <p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
7212 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
7213 if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
7214 #696715</a>).  So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
7215 it. :)</p>
7216
7217 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
7218 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
7219 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
7220
7221       </div>
7222       <div class="tags">
7223
7224
7225         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7226
7227
7228       </div>
7229     </div>
7230     <div class="padding"></div>
7231
7232     <div class="entry">
7233       <div class="title">
7234         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a>
7235       </div>
7236       <div class="date">
7237         22nd January 2013
7238       </div>
7239       <div class="body">
7240         <p>Yesterday, I
7241 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
7242 for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
7243 pluggable hardware devices, which I
7244 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
7245 out to create</a> earlier this month.  Several valuable testers showed
7246 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
7247 people.  But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
7248 for this project.  Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
7249 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name.  In the
7250 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
7251 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
7252 repository in Debian.  The new name?  It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
7253 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
7254
7255 <pre>
7256 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
7257 cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
7258 </pre>
7259
7260 <p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet.  If you
7261 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
7262 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
7263 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
7264
7265 <p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
7266 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc.  Typical hardware
7267 stuff, in other words.  I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
7268 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
7269 word.</p>
7270
7271 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
7272 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
7273 process.</p>
7274
7275 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
7276 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
7277
7278       </div>
7279       <div class="tags">
7280
7281
7282         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
7283
7284
7285       </div>
7286     </div>
7287     <div class="padding"></div>
7288
7289     <div class="entry">
7290       <div class="title">
7291         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">First prototype ready making hardware easier to use in Debian</a>
7292       </div>
7293       <div class="date">
7294         21st January 2013
7295       </div>
7296       <div class="body">
7297         <p>Early this month I set out to try to
7298 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
7299 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>.  Now my
7300 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience.  To test
7301 it, fetch the
7302 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
7303 from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
7304 package.  You might have to log out and in again activate the
7305 autostart script.</p>
7306
7307 <p>The design is simple:</p>
7308
7309 <ul>
7310
7311 <li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
7312 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
7313
7314 <li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
7315 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
7316 initially did.</li>
7317
7318 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
7319 the APT database, a database
7320 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
7321 via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
7322
7323 <li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
7324 isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
7325 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
7326 package or packages.</li>
7327
7328 <li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
7329 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
7330
7331 <li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
7332 package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
7333
7334 </ul>
7335
7336 <p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system.  Here
7337 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action.  First the
7338 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
7339 approve all the dependencies.  Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
7340
7341 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
7342 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
7343 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
7344 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
7345 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
7346
7347 <p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
7348 is already useful.  The database of hardware to package mappings also
7349 need more work.  It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
7350 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
7351 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
7352 method.  I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
7353 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
7354 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
7355
7356 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
7357 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
7358 '<tt>svn checkout
7359 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
7360 hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'.  If you lack debuild, install the
7361 devscripts package.</p>
7362
7363 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
7364 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
7365 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository.  See
7366 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
7367 instructions</a> for details.</p>
7368
7369       </div>
7370       <div class="tags">
7371
7372
7373         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
7374
7375
7376       </div>
7377     </div>
7378     <div class="padding"></div>
7379
7380     <div class="entry">
7381       <div class="title">
7382         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">Thank you Thinkpad X41, for your long and trustworthy service</a>
7383       </div>
7384       <div class="date">
7385         19th January 2013
7386       </div>
7387       <div class="body">
7388         <p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died.  It died quietly and
7389 suddenly in bed.  With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
7390 black.  The power button was no longer able to turn it on.  It was a
7391 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had.  Better than both
7392 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S.  Far better than the
7393 Compaq I had before that.  Now I need to find a replacement.  To keep
7394 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
7395 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
7396 not a durable solution.
7397
7398 <p>My laptop needs are fairly modest.  This is my wishlist from when I
7399 got a new one more than 10 years ago.  It still holds true.:)</p>
7400
7401 <ul>
7402
7403 <li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
7404   than A4).</li>
7405 <li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
7406 <li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
7407 <li>Long battery life time.  Preferable a week.</li>
7408 <li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
7409 <li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
7410 <li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
7411 <li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
7412 <li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
7413 size).</li>
7414 <li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
7415   X.org packages.</li>
7416 <li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
7417   the time).
7418
7419 </ul>
7420
7421 <p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
7422 list.  The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
7423 last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
7424 at other features to choose my laptop.  But are there still made as
7425 robust laptops as my X41?  The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
7426 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
7427 Lenovo took over.  But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
7428 still be useful.</p>
7429
7430 <p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
7431 external keyboard?  I'll have to check the
7432 <a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
7433 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
7434 of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
7435 Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
7436
7437       </div>
7438       <div class="tags">
7439
7440
7441         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7442
7443
7444       </div>
7445     </div>
7446     <div class="padding"></div>
7447
7448     <div class="entry">
7449       <div class="title">
7450         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_find_a_browser_plugin_supporting_a_given_MIME_type.html">How to find a browser plugin supporting a given MIME type</a>
7451       </div>
7452       <div class="date">
7453         18th January 2013
7454       </div>
7455       <div class="body">
7456         <p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
7457 install to get support for a given MIME type.  Thanks to
7458 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
7459 done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
7460 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
7461 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
7462 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
7463
7464 <pre>
7465 #!/usr/bin/python
7466 import sys
7467 import apt
7468 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
7469     cache = apt.Cache()
7470     cache.open(None)
7471     thepkgs = []
7472     for pkg in cache:
7473         version = pkg.candidate
7474         if version is None:
7475             version = pkg.installed
7476         if version is None:
7477             continue
7478         record = version.record
7479         if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
7480             continue
7481         mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
7482         for t in mime_types:
7483             t = t.rstrip().strip()
7484             if t == mimetype:
7485                 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
7486     return thepkgs
7487 mimetype = "audio/ogg"
7488 if 1 < len(sys.argv):
7489     mimetype = sys.argv[1]
7490 print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
7491 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
7492     print "  %s" %pkg
7493 </pre>
7494
7495 <p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
7496
7497 <pre>
7498 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
7499 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
7500   gecko-mediaplayer
7501 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
7502 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
7503   browser-plugin-gnash
7504 %
7505 </pre>
7506
7507 <p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
7508 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
7509 packages.  It would be great if Debian supported such feature too.  Is
7510 anyone working on adding it?</p>
7511
7512 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
7513 request for icweasel support for this feature is
7514 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
7515 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today).  Lack
7516 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
7517 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
7518
7519       </div>
7520       <div class="tags">
7521
7522
7523         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7524
7525
7526       </div>
7527     </div>
7528     <div class="padding"></div>
7529
7530     <div class="entry">
7531       <div class="title">
7532         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_.html">What is the most supported MIME type in Debian?</a>
7533       </div>
7534       <div class="date">
7535         16th January 2013
7536       </div>
7537       <div class="body">
7538         <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
7539 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
7540 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
7541 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
7542 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing.  With such
7543 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
7544 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
7545 downloaded by the browser.</p>
7546
7547 <p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
7548 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
7549 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there.  The result
7550 can be found on the
7551 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
7552 site</a>.  Using the collected information, it become possible to
7553 answer the question in the title.  Here are the 20 most supported MIME
7554 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
7555 The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
7556
7557 <p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
7558
7559 <pre>
7560   count MIME type
7561   ----- -----------------------
7562      32 text/plain
7563      30 audio/mpeg
7564      29 image/png
7565      28 image/jpeg
7566      27 application/ogg
7567      26 audio/x-mp3
7568      25 image/tiff
7569      25 image/gif
7570      22 image/bmp
7571      22 audio/x-wav
7572      20 audio/x-flac
7573      19 audio/x-mpegurl
7574      18 video/x-ms-asf
7575      18 audio/x-musepack
7576      18 audio/x-mpeg
7577      18 application/x-ogg
7578      17 video/mpeg
7579      17 audio/x-scpls
7580      17 audio/ogg
7581      16 video/x-ms-wmv
7582 </pre>
7583
7584 <p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
7585
7586 <pre>
7587   count MIME type
7588   ----- -----------------------
7589      33 text/plain
7590      32 image/png
7591      32 image/jpeg
7592      29 audio/mpeg
7593      27 image/gif
7594      26 image/tiff
7595      26 application/ogg
7596      25 audio/x-mp3
7597      22 image/bmp
7598      21 audio/x-wav
7599      19 audio/x-mpegurl
7600      19 audio/x-mpeg
7601      18 video/mpeg
7602      18 audio/x-scpls
7603      18 audio/x-flac
7604      18 application/x-ogg
7605      17 video/x-ms-asf
7606      17 text/html
7607      17 audio/x-musepack
7608      16 image/x-xbitmap
7609 </pre>
7610
7611 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
7612
7613 <pre>
7614   count MIME type
7615   ----- -----------------------
7616      31 text/plain
7617      31 image/png
7618      31 image/jpeg
7619      29 audio/mpeg
7620      28 application/ogg
7621      27 image/gif
7622      26 image/tiff
7623      26 audio/x-mp3
7624      23 audio/x-wav
7625      22 image/bmp
7626      21 audio/x-flac
7627      20 audio/x-mpegurl
7628      19 audio/x-mpeg
7629      18 video/x-ms-asf
7630      18 video/mpeg
7631      18 audio/x-scpls
7632      18 application/x-ogg
7633      17 audio/x-musepack
7634      16 video/x-ms-wmv
7635      16 video/x-msvideo
7636 </pre>
7637
7638 <p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
7639 information mentioned in DEP-11.  I have not yet had time to look at
7640 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
7641 issues.</p>
7642
7643 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
7644 discovering a typo in my script.</p>
7645
7646       </div>
7647       <div class="tags">
7648
7649
7650         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7651
7652
7653       </div>
7654     </div>
7655     <div class="padding"></div>
7656
7657     <div class="entry">
7658       <div class="title">
7659         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_modalias_info_to_find_packages_handling_my_hardware.html">Using modalias info to find packages handling my hardware</a>
7660       </div>
7661       <div class="date">
7662         15th January 2013
7663       </div>
7664       <div class="body">
7665         <p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
7666 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
7667 values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
7668 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
7669 dongle support in Debian</a>.  Using this knowledge, I have tested how
7670 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
7671 to hardware.  This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
7672 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
7673 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
7674 packages.</p>
7675
7676 <p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
7677 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
7678 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
7679 modalias.</p>
7680
7681 <p><blockquote>
7682 Package: package-name
7683 <br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
7684 </blockquote></p>
7685
7686 <p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
7687 for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
7688
7689 <p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
7690 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
7691
7692 <p><blockquote>
7693 Package: cheese
7694 <br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
7695 </blockquote></p>
7696
7697 <p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
7698 CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
7699
7700 <p><blockquote>
7701 Package: pcmciautils
7702 <br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
7703 </blockquote></p>
7704
7705 <p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
7706 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
7707
7708 <p><blockquote>
7709 Package: colorhug-client
7710 <br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
7711 </blockquote></p>
7712
7713 <p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
7714 file in the Debian archive.  Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
7715 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
7716
7717 <p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
7718 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
7719 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
7720 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
7721 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information.  I've
7722 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
7723 is working as it should with my prototype.  It even made it to Ubuntu
7724 Raring.</p>
7725
7726 <p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
7727 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
7728 implementation of the lookup code.  The idea is to create files for
7729 each modalias and let the shell do the matching.  Please check out and
7730 try the
7731 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
7732 shell script.  It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
7733 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
7734 repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
7735
7736 <p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
7737 install yubikey-personalization:</p>
7738
7739 <p><blockquote>
7740 % ./hw-support-lookup
7741 <br>yubikey-personalization
7742 <br>%
7743 </blockquote></p>
7744
7745 <p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
7746 propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
7747
7748 <p><blockquote>
7749 % ./hw-support-lookup
7750 <br>pcmciautils
7751 <br>%
7752 </blockquote></p>
7753
7754 <p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
7755 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
7756 database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
7757
7758 <p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
7759 packages and hardware.  One source would be to look at packages with
7760 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
7761 extract their modalias information.  Another would be to look at
7762 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
7763 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
7764 generate a modalias matching rule.  I have not tested any of these to
7765 see if it work.</p>
7766
7767 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
7768 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
7769 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
7770 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
7771
7772       </div>
7773       <div class="tags">
7774
7775
7776         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
7777
7778
7779       </div>
7780     </div>
7781     <div class="padding"></div>
7782
7783     <div class="entry">
7784       <div class="title">
7785         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">Modalias strings - a practical way to map "stuff" to hardware</a>
7786       </div>
7787       <div class="date">
7788         14th January 2013
7789       </div>
7790       <div class="body">
7791         <p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
7792 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
7793 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
7794 to document the details.  Here are my findings so far, also available
7795 in
7796 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
7797 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
7798
7799 <p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
7800
7801 <p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
7802 values stands for.  It is in part based on information from
7803 &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> &gt;,
7804 &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;,
7805 &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
7806 &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;.
7807
7808 <p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
7809 this shell script:</p>
7810
7811 <pre>
7812 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
7813 </pre>
7814
7815 <p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
7816 using modinfo:</p>
7817
7818 <pre>
7819 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
7820 alias:          serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
7821 alias:          serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
7822 %
7823 </pre>
7824
7825 <p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
7826
7827 <p>A typical PCI entry can look like this.  This is an Intel Host
7828 Bridge memory controller:</p>
7829
7830 <p><blockquote>
7831 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
7832 </blockquote></p>
7833
7834 <p>This represent these values:</p>
7835
7836 <pre>
7837  v   00008086  (vendor)
7838  d   00002770  (device)
7839  sv  00001028  (subvendor)
7840  sd  000001AD  (subdevice)
7841  bc  06        (bus class)
7842  sc  00        (bus subclass)
7843  i   00        (interface)
7844 </pre>
7845
7846 <p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
7847 -n' as 8086:2770.  The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
7848 0600.  The 0600 class is a host bridge.  Other useful bus values are
7849 0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
7850
7851 <p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
7852 means.</p>
7853
7854 <p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
7855
7856 <p>Some typical USB entries can look like this.  This is an internal
7857 USB hub in a laptop:</p>
7858
7859 <p><blockquote>
7860 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
7861 </blockquote></p>
7862
7863 <p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
7864
7865 <pre>
7866  v    1D6B  (device vendor)
7867  p    0001  (device product)
7868  d    0206  (bcddevice)
7869  dc     09  (device class)
7870  dsc    00  (device subclass)
7871  dp     00  (device protocol)
7872  ic     09  (interface class)
7873  isc    00  (interface subclass)
7874  ip     00  (interface protocol)
7875 </pre>
7876
7877 <p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub.  Some times the relevant
7878 class is in the interface class section.  For a simple USB web camera,
7879 these alias entries show up:</p>
7880
7881 <p><blockquote>
7882 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
7883 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
7884 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
7885 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
7886 </blockquote></p>
7887
7888 <p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
7889 camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
7890 microphone).  Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
7891
7892 <p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
7893
7894 <p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff.  This is an IR
7895 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
7896
7897 <p><blockquote>
7898 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
7899 </blockquote></p>
7900
7901 <p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
7902
7903 <p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
7904
7905 <p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
7906 and model.  This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
7907 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
7908
7909 <p><blockquote>
7910 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
7911 </blockquote></p>
7912
7913 <p>The values present are</p>
7914
7915 <pre>
7916  bvn  IBM            (BIOS vendor)
7917  bvr  1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
7918  bd   06/15/2005     (BIOS date)
7919  svn  IBM            (system vendor)
7920  pn   2371H4G        (product name)
7921  pvr  ThinkPadX40    (product version)
7922  rvn  IBM            (board vendor)
7923  rn   2371H4G        (board name)
7924  rvr  NotAvailable   (board version)
7925  cvn  IBM            (chassis vendor)
7926  ct   10             (chassis type)
7927  cvr  NotAvailable   (chassis version)
7928 </pre>
7929
7930 <p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook.  Other interesting values can be
7931 found in the dmidecode source:</p>
7932
7933 <pre>
7934   3 Desktop
7935   4 Low Profile Desktop
7936   5 Pizza Box
7937   6 Mini Tower
7938   7 Tower
7939   8 Portable
7940   9 Laptop
7941  10 Notebook
7942  11 Hand Held
7943  12 Docking Station
7944  13 All In One
7945  14 Sub Notebook
7946  15 Space-saving
7947  16 Lunch Box
7948  17 Main Server Chassis
7949  18 Expansion Chassis
7950  19 Sub Chassis
7951  20 Bus Expansion Chassis
7952  21 Peripheral Chassis
7953  22 RAID Chassis
7954  23 Rack Mount Chassis
7955  24 Sealed-case PC
7956  25 Multi-system
7957  26 CompactPCI
7958  27 AdvancedTCA
7959  28 Blade
7960  29 Blade Enclosing
7961 </pre>
7962
7963 <p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
7964 table.  For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
7965 claim it is a desktop.</p>
7966
7967 <p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
7968
7969 <p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs.  One example is from my
7970 test machine:</p>
7971
7972 <p><blockquote>
7973 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
7974 </blockquote></p>
7975
7976 <p>The values present are</p>
7977
7978 <pre>
7979   ty  01  (type)
7980   pr  00  (prototype)
7981   id  00  (id)
7982   ex  00  (extra)
7983 </pre>
7984
7985 <p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver.  I am not sure what
7986 the valid values are.</p>
7987
7988 <p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
7989
7990 <p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
7991 file2alias.c.  There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
7992 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
7993 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
7994 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro.  I did not spend time documenting all of
7995 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
7996 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
7997
7998 <p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
7999
8000 <p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
8001 one can use the following shell script:</p>
8002
8003 <pre>
8004   for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
8005     echo "$id" ; \
8006     /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/  /' ; \
8007   done
8008 </pre>
8009
8010 <p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
8011 list is very long on my test machine):</p>
8012
8013 <pre>
8014   acpi:ACPI0003:
8015     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
8016   acpi:device:
8017   FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
8018   acpi:IBM0068:
8019     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
8020     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
8021     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
8022     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
8023   acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
8024     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
8025     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
8026     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
8027   [...]
8028 </pre>
8029
8030 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
8031 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
8032 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
8033 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
8034
8035 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
8036 "find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
8037 in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
8038
8039       </div>
8040       <div class="tags">
8041
8042
8043         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
8044
8045
8046       </div>
8047     </div>
8048     <div class="padding"></div>
8049
8050     <div class="entry">
8051       <div class="title">
8052         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Moved_the_pymissile_Debian_packaging_to_collab_maint.html">Moved the pymissile Debian packaging to collab-maint</a>
8053       </div>
8054       <div class="date">
8055         10th January 2013
8056       </div>
8057       <div class="body">
8058         <p>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
8059 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
8060 Launcher and updated the Debian package
8061 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">pymissile</a> to make
8062 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in.  I
8063 also added a "Modaliases" header to test it in the Debian archive and
8064 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
8065 plug in his rocket launcher.  In the process I moved the source to a
8066 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
8067 contribute.  <a href="http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/">Upstream</a>
8068 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
8069 years of relative silence.  The new git repository is not listed in
8070 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
8071 bit more before I upload the new version.  If you want to check out
8072 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
8073 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git">gitweb
8074 view</a> or use "<tt>git clone
8075 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git</tt>".</p>
8076
8077       </div>
8078       <div class="tags">
8079
8080
8081         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
8082
8083
8084       </div>
8085     </div>
8086     <div class="padding"></div>
8087
8088     <div class="entry">
8089       <div class="title">
8090         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">Lets make hardware dongles easier to use in Debian</a>
8091       </div>
8092       <div class="date">
8093          9th January 2013
8094       </div>
8095       <div class="body">
8096         <p>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
8097 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
8098 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
8099 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
8100 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
8101 machine.  Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
8102 Linux distribution.  When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
8103 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
8104 I need to talk to it.  When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
8105 yubikey-personalization package.  The information required to do this
8106 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.</p>
8107
8108 <p>Some years ago, I proposed to
8109 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg01206.html">use
8110 the discover subsystem to implement this</a>.  The idea is fairly
8111 simple:
8112
8113 <ul>
8114
8115 <li>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
8116   starting when a user log in.</li>
8117
8118 <li>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
8119   hardware is inserted into the computer.</li>
8120
8121 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
8122   database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
8123   packages.</li>
8124
8125 <li>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
8126   package, and make it easy to install it.</li>
8127
8128 </ul>
8129
8130 <p>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
8131 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
8132 discover database to find packages and
8133 <a href="http://www.packagekit.org/">PackageKit</a> to install
8134 packages.</p>
8135
8136 <p>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
8137 draft package is now checked into
8138 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
8139 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>.  In the process, I updated the
8140 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html">discover-data</a>
8141 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
8142 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
8143 2.2013.01.09 to unstable.  I also discovered that the current
8144 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html">discover</a>
8145 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
8146 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present.  I ported it to use
8147 libusb as a fall back option to get it working.  The fixed package
8148 version 2.1.2-6 is now in experimental (didn't upload it to unstable
8149 because of the freeze).</p>
8150
8151 <p>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
8152 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
8153 inserted):</p>
8154
8155 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-09-hw-autoinstall.png"></p>
8156
8157 <p>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
8158 install the proposed packages by pressing the "Please install
8159 program(s)" button should to be implemented.</p>
8160
8161 <p>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
8162 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
8163 from hardware to Debian packages.  Check if 'discover-pkginstall -l'
8164 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
8165 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
8166 reportbug if it isn't.  Or, if you know of a better way to provide
8167 such mapping, please let me know.</p>
8168
8169 <p>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
8170 should be considered before it is ready for production use.  Is dbus
8171 the correct way to detect new hardware?  At the moment I look for HAL
8172 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
8173 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop.  Are there better events to use?
8174 How should the user be notified?  Is the desktop notification
8175 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
8176 popup instead?  How should packages be installed?  When should they
8177 not be installed?</p>
8178
8179 <p>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
8180 please send me an email. :)</p>
8181
8182       </div>
8183       <div class="tags">
8184
8185
8186         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
8187
8188
8189       </div>
8190     </div>
8191     <div class="padding"></div>
8192
8193     <div class="entry">
8194       <div class="title">
8195         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">New IRC channel for LEGO designers using Debian</a>
8196       </div>
8197       <div class="date">
8198          2nd January 2013
8199       </div>
8200       <div class="body">
8201         <p>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
8202 <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx">LEGO Mindstorm
8203 NXT</a>.  My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
8204 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
8205 already in Debian Squeeze.  If Debian support for LEGO is something
8206 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
8207 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> (server
8208 irc.debian.org).  There is a lot that could be done to improve the
8209 Debian support for LEGO designers.  For example both CAD software
8210 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)</p>
8211
8212 <p>Update 2012-01-03: A
8213 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">project page</a>
8214 including links to Lego related packages is now available.</p>
8215
8216       </div>
8217       <div class="tags">
8218
8219
8220         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
8221
8222
8223       </div>
8224     </div>
8225     <div class="padding"></div>
8226
8227     <div class="entry">
8228       <div class="title">
8229         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">How to backport bitcoin-qt version 0.7.2-2 to Debian Squeeze</a>
8230       </div>
8231       <div class="date">
8232         25th December 2012
8233       </div>
8234       <div class="body">
8235         <p>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
8236 year!  I hope next year will prove to be a good year.</p>
8237
8238 <p><a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">Bitcoin</a>, the digital
8239 decentralised "currency" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
8240 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
8241 experiment.  And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
8242 <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> is about to improve a bit.
8243 The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">new debian source
8244 package</a> (version 0.7.2-2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
8245 in <a href="http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW queue</A>
8246 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
8247 name.</p>
8248
8249 <p>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
8250 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
8251 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:</p>
8252
8253 <blockquote><pre>
8254 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
8255 cd bitcoin
8256 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
8257 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
8258 </pre></blockquote>
8259
8260 <p>You might have to install some build dependencies as well.  The
8261 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
8262 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment.  Note that the
8263 client will download the complete set of bitcoin "blocks", which need
8264 around 5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment.  Make sure your
8265 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
8266 all the blocks.  The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
8267 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
8268 not be able to get all the features out of the client.</p>
8269
8270 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
8271 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
8272 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8273
8274       </div>
8275       <div class="tags">
8276
8277
8278         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8279
8280
8281       </div>
8282     </div>
8283     <div class="padding"></div>
8284
8285     <div class="entry">
8286       <div class="title">
8287         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html">A word on bitcoin support in Debian</a>
8288       </div>
8289       <div class="date">
8290         21st December 2012
8291       </div>
8292       <div class="body">
8293         <p>It has been a while since I wrote about
8294 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>, the decentralised
8295 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
8296 have been busy elsewhere.  But two days ago, I started looking at the
8297 state of <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin in
8298 Debian</a> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet.  The package
8299 is now maintained by a
8300 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/">team of
8301 people</a>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team.  We
8302 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
8303 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
8304 Wheezy.  It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
8305 backports).  The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
8306 it from entering testing.  To try to help the team and improve the
8307 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
8308 reports.  I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
8309 Corallo in a
8310 <a href="https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin">PPA for
8311 Ubuntu</a>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
8312 Debian package.</p>
8313
8314 <p>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
8315 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
8316 improve the package.  It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
8317 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
8318 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
8319 setup.  As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
8320 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-20121217/000041.html">a
8321 patch to backport</a> the latest version.  Jonas is going to look at
8322 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
8323 new version to unstable.
8324
8325 <p>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
8326 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system.  I
8327 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
8328 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
8329 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
8330 transactions to Wikileaks.  But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
8331 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
8332 they sell products and services.  Improving the bitcoin support in
8333 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
8334 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
8335 pay with bitcoin is still not very good.  The bitcoin: URI is a step
8336 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
8337 use.  Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
8338 quick transaction.  I believe there are other clients available, but
8339 have not tested them.</p>
8340
8341 <p>My
8342 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">experiment
8343 with bitcoins</a> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
8344 I received 20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
8345 years ago, as can be
8346 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">seen
8347 on the blockexplorer service</a>.  Thank you everyone for your
8348 donation.  The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
8349 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
8350 number of users have gone up since then.  If you use bitcoin and want
8351 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
8352 the same address as last time,
8353 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8354
8355       </div>
8356       <div class="tags">
8357
8358
8359         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8360
8361
8362       </div>
8363     </div>
8364     <div class="padding"></div>
8365
8366     <div class="entry">
8367       <div class="title">
8368         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Git_repository_for_song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Git repository for song book for Computer Scientists</a>
8369       </div>
8370       <div class="date">
8371          7th September 2012
8372       </div>
8373       <div class="body">
8374         <p>As I
8375 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">mentioned
8376 this summer</a>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
8377 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
8378 <a href="https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook">Gitorious
8379 repository for the project</a>.</p>
8380
8381 <p>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
8382 to the HTML version.  To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
8383 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
8384 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.</p>
8385
8386 <p>Want to sing?  You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
8387 PostScript formats at
8388 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's Computer
8389 Science Songbook</a>.</p>
8390
8391       </div>
8392       <div class="tags">
8393
8394
8395         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
8396
8397
8398       </div>
8399     </div>
8400     <div class="padding"></div>
8401
8402     <div class="entry">
8403       <div class="title">
8404         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gratulerer_med_19__rsdagen__Debian_.html">Gratulerer med 19-årsdagen, Debian!</a>
8405       </div>
8406       <div class="date">
8407         16th August 2012
8408       </div>
8409       <div class="body">
8410         <p>I dag fyller
8411 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120813">Debian-prosjektet 19
8412 år</a>.  Jeg har fulgt det de siste 12 årene, og er veldig glad for å kunne
8413 si gratulerer med dagen, Debian!</p>
8414
8415       </div>
8416       <div class="tags">
8417
8418
8419         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>.
8420
8421
8422       </div>
8423     </div>
8424     <div class="padding"></div>
8425
8426     <div class="entry">
8427       <div class="title">
8428         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Song book for Computer Scientists</a>
8429       </div>
8430       <div class="date">
8431         24th June 2012
8432       </div>
8433       <div class="body">
8434         <p>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
8435 <a href="http://www.uit.no/">University of Tromsø</a>, I started
8436 collecting computer related songs for use at parties.  The original
8437 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
8438 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
8439 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format.  I have
8440 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
8441 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
8442 help me extend and update the book.  If anyone is volunteering to help
8443 me with this, send me an email.  Also let me know if there are songs
8444 missing in my book.</p>
8445
8446 <p>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
8447 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
8448 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
8449 Especially now that <a href="http://debconf12.debconf.org/">Debconf
8450 12</a> is about to start (and I am not going).  Want to sing?  Check
8451 out <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's
8452 Computer Science Songbook</a>.
8453
8454       </div>
8455       <div class="tags">
8456
8457
8458         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
8459
8460
8461       </div>
8462     </div>
8463     <div class="padding"></div>
8464
8465     <div class="entry">
8466       <div class="title">
8467         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html">Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge</a>
8468       </div>
8469       <div class="date">
8470         21st November 2011
8471       </div>
8472       <div class="body">
8473         <p>At work we have heaps of servers.  I believe the total count is
8474 around 1000 at the moment.  To be able to get help from the vendors
8475 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
8476 up to date.  If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the
8477 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
8478 firmware is upgraded.  So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
8479 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
8480 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
8481 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
8482 the tools to do so.</p>
8483
8484 <p>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
8485 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got.  Most of
8486 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
8487 so far.  This blog post is about the Dell part.</P>
8488
8489 <p>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
8490 <a href="ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz">an XML file</a>
8491 with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing
8492 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
8493 site I can find it.  Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
8494 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
8495 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
8496 be activated on the first reboot.</p>
8497
8498 <p>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
8499 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
8500 servers at a site?  Please get in touch and lets share resources.</p>
8501
8502 <p><pre>
8503 #!/usr/bin/perl
8504 use strict;
8505 use warnings;
8506 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
8507 BEGIN {
8508     # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
8509     my %rhelmodules = (
8510         'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
8511         );
8512     for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
8513         eval "use $module;";
8514         if ($@) {
8515             my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
8516             system("yum install -y $pkg");
8517             eval "use $module;";
8518         }
8519     }
8520 }
8521 my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
8522
8523 upgrade_dell();
8524
8525 exit 0;
8526
8527 sub run_firmware_script {
8528     my ($opts, $script) = @_;
8529     unless ($script) {
8530         print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
8531         exit 1
8532     }
8533     print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
8534
8535     if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
8536         print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
8537     } else {
8538         print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
8539     }
8540 }
8541
8542 sub run_firmware_scripts {
8543     my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
8544     # Run firmware packages
8545     for my $dir (@dirs) {
8546         print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
8547         opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
8548         while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
8549             next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
8550             run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
8551         }
8552         closedir $dh;
8553     }
8554 }
8555
8556 sub download {
8557     my $url = shift;
8558     print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
8559     system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
8560 }
8561
8562 sub upgrade_dell {
8563     my @dirs;
8564     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
8565     chomp $product;
8566
8567     if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
8568
8569         # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
8570         system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
8571
8572         my $tmpdir = tempdir(
8573             CLEANUP => 1
8574             );
8575         chdir($tmpdir);
8576         fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
8577         system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
8578         my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
8579         # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
8580         my $fwopts = "-q";
8581         if (@paths) {
8582             for my $url (@paths) {
8583                 fetch_dell_fw($url);
8584             }
8585             run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
8586         } else {
8587             print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
8588             print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
8589         }
8590         chdir('/');
8591     } else {
8592         print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
8593         print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
8594     }
8595 }
8596
8597 sub fetch_dell_fw {
8598     my $path = shift;
8599     my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
8600     download($url);
8601 }
8602
8603 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
8604 # firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
8605 # machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
8606 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
8607     my $filename = shift;
8608
8609     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
8610     chomp $product;
8611     my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
8612
8613     print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
8614
8615     my $xml = XMLin($filename);
8616     my @paths;
8617     for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
8618         my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
8619         my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
8620         my $oscode;
8621         if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
8622             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
8623         } else {
8624             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
8625         }
8626         if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
8627         {
8628             @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
8629         }
8630     }
8631     for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
8632         my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
8633
8634         # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
8635         next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
8636
8637         my $cpath = $component->{path};
8638         for my $path (@paths) {
8639             if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
8640                 push(@paths, $cpath);
8641             }
8642         }
8643     }
8644     return @paths;
8645 }
8646 </pre>
8647
8648 <p>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
8649 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking.  Anyone know a
8650 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers?  At the
8651 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
8652 outdated.</p>
8653
8654       </div>
8655       <div class="tags">
8656
8657
8658         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8659
8660
8661       </div>
8662     </div>
8663     <div class="padding"></div>
8664
8665     <div class="entry">
8666       <div class="title">
8667         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_is_booting_into_runlevel_1_different_from_single_user_boots_.html">How is booting into runlevel 1 different from single user boots?</a>
8668       </div>
8669       <div class="date">
8670          4th August 2011
8671       </div>
8672       <div class="body">
8673         <p>Wouter Verhelst have some
8674 <a href="http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot">interesting
8675 comments and opinions</a> on my blog post on
8676 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">the
8677 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian</a> and my blog post about
8678 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">the
8679 default KDE desktop in Debian</a>.  I only have time to address one
8680 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
8681 misunderstanding he bring forward:</p>
8682
8683 <p><blockquote>
8684 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
8685 single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line;
8686 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
8687 </blockquote></p>
8688
8689 <p>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
8690 and booting into runlevel 1 is the same.  I am not surprised he
8691 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
8692 thing to believe.  But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
8693 runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user
8694 mode.  I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
8695 hard to explain.</p>
8696
8697 <p>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
8698 "<tt>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin</tt>".  This means the only thing that is
8699 executed in single user mode is sulogin.  Single user mode is a boot
8700 state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
8701 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
8702 enters the single user state.  When switching to runlevel 1, the state
8703 is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1
8704 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
8705 runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
8706 1.  It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the
8707 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
8708 mode).</p>
8709
8710 <p>This summary might make it clearer.  When booting for the first
8711 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
8712 "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  When booting into
8713 runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc
8714 S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  A problem show up when
8715 trying to continue after visiting single user mode.  Not all services
8716 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
8717 unpredicatble state.  This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
8718 after visiting single user mode.</p>
8719
8720 <p>A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of
8721 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/.  When switching from say runlevel 2
8722 to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
8723 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
8724 started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels
8725 2-5.  I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
8726 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not <strong>required</strong> to get a
8727 functioning single user mode during boot.</p>
8728
8729 <p>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
8730 and discovered this problem a few years ago.  I suspect it originates
8731 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.</p>
8732
8733       </div>
8734       <div class="tags">
8735
8736
8737         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8738
8739
8740       </div>
8741     </div>
8742     <div class="padding"></div>
8743
8744     <div class="entry">
8745       <div class="title">
8746         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">What should start from /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian? - almost nothing</a>
8747       </div>
8748       <div class="date">
8749         30th July 2011
8750       </div>
8751       <div class="body">
8752         <p>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
8753 are started from /etc/rcS.d/.  In fact, there is a bite more of them
8754 than make sense, and this causes a few problems.  What kind of
8755 problems, you might ask.  There are at least two problems.  The first
8756 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
8757 runlevel 1.  One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
8758 the expected state.  The other is that single user boot will sometimes
8759 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
8760 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
8761 machine from a problem in that subsystem.  A minor additional point is
8762 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
8763 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
8764 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.</p>
8765
8766 <p>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/.  In short, only the
8767 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
8768 presented during a single user boot should go there.  Everything else
8769 should go into the numeric runlevels.  This means things like
8770 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
8771 the numeric runlevels.  Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d
8772 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
8773 out.  Do your package have one of them?  Please help us make single
8774 user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.</p>
8775
8776 <p>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
8777 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
8778 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
8779 is presented.</p>
8780
8781 <p>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound.  To keep
8782 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
8783 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
8784 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
8785 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
8786 moved first.  This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
8787 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
8788 the system state correct.  This will require some coordination when it
8789 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
8790 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
8791 on them.  Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
8792 package, while others are still left to do.  I wish I had time to work
8793 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
8794 find time to push this forward.</p>
8795
8796       </div>
8797       <div class="tags">
8798
8799
8800         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8801
8802
8803       </div>
8804     </div>
8805     <div class="padding"></div>
8806
8807     <div class="entry">
8808       <div class="title">
8809         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">What is missing in the Debian desktop, or why my parents use Kubuntu</a>
8810       </div>
8811       <div class="date">
8812         29th July 2011
8813       </div>
8814       <div class="body">
8815         <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
8816 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
8817 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
8818 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
8819 issues.</p>
8820
8821 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
8822 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
8823 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
8824
8825 <ol>
8826
8827 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
8828 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
8829 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
8830 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
8831 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
8832 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
8833 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
8834 Debian.</li>
8835
8836 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
8837 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
8838 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
8839 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
8840 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
8841 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
8842 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
8843 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
8844 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
8845 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
8846 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
8847 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
8848 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
8849
8850 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
8851 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
8852 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
8853 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
8854 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
8855 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
8856 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
8857 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
8858 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
8859 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
8860
8861 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
8862 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
8863 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
8864 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
8865 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
8866 latter behaviour.</li>
8867
8868 </ol>
8869
8870 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
8871 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
8872 it do not matter much.</p>
8873
8874 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
8875 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
8876 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>
8877
8878       </div>
8879       <div class="tags">
8880
8881
8882         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
8883
8884
8885       </div>
8886     </div>
8887     <div class="padding"></div>
8888
8889     <div class="entry">
8890       <div class="title">
8891         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Perl_modules_used_by_FixMyStreet_which_are_missing_in_Debian_Squeeze.html">Perl modules used by FixMyStreet which are missing in Debian/Squeeze</a>
8892       </div>
8893       <div class="date">
8894         26th July 2011
8895       </div>
8896       <div class="body">
8897         <p>The Norwegian <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</A>
8898 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
8899 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10
8900 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
8901 security support for a few years.</p>
8902
8903 <p>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
8904 that are missing in Debian at the moment.  It would be great if these
8905 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
8906 their own <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com">FixMyStreet</a> clone
8907 in their own country using only Debian packages.  The list of modules
8908 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group
8909 will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
8910 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
8911 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
8912 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
8913 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
8914 easier in the future.</p>
8915
8916 <p>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
8917 installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name'
8918 and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package.  But this leave me
8919 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
8920 do not have time for.</p>
8921
8922       </div>
8923       <div class="tags">
8924
8925
8926         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>.
8927
8928
8929       </div>
8930     </div>
8931     <div class="padding"></div>
8932
8933     <div class="entry">
8934       <div class="title">
8935         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Norwegian_FixMyStreet_have_kept_me_busy_the_last_few_weeks.html">A Norwegian FixMyStreet have kept me busy the last few weeks</a>
8936       </div>
8937       <div class="date">
8938          3rd April 2011
8939       </div>
8940       <div class="body">
8941         <p>Here is a small update for my English readers.  Most of my blog
8942 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
8943 update in English.</p>
8944
8945 <p>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
8946 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
8947 of the British service
8948 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> up and running,
8949 and it has been running for a month now.  The entire project has been
8950 organised by me and two others.  Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
8951 to fund the development work.  In January I drafted a contract with
8952 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> on what to develop,
8953 and in February the development took place.  Most of it involved
8954 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
8955 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
8956 running in any country by now.  The Norwegian
8957 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is using
8958 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> as the map
8959 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
8960 support for this had to be added/fixed.</p>
8961
8962 <p>The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend
8963 polishing the system before we announced it March 7th.  The system is
8964 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000
8965 problem reports in a few weeks.  Soon we hope to announce the Android
8966 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
8967 public infrastructure.</p>
8968
8969 <p>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
8970 such service?</p>
8971
8972       </div>
8973       <div class="tags">
8974
8975
8976         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart</a>.
8977
8978
8979       </div>
8980     </div>
8981     <div class="padding"></div>
8982
8983     <div class="entry">
8984       <div class="title">
8985         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_NVD_and_CPE_to_track_CVEs_in_locally_maintained_software.html">Using NVD and CPE to track CVEs in locally maintained software</a>
8986       </div>
8987       <div class="date">
8988         28th January 2011
8989       </div>
8990       <div class="body">
8991         <p>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
8992 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo.  My idea is that
8993 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
8994 available on the Internet, and check our locally
8995 maintained/distributed software against this information.  It should
8996 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten.  The
8997 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
8998 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
8999 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
9000 out which security holes were present in our free software
9001 collection.</p>
9002
9003 <p>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
9004 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
9005 consistent way across data sources.  I considered several ways to do
9006 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
9007 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
9008 existing naming scheme.  And it seem like I am not the first one to
9009 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
9010 solution.  Enter the <a href="http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html">Common
9011 Platform Enumeration</a> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
9012 software, hardware and other platform components.  The CPE ids are
9013 mapped to CVEs in the <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/">National
9014 Vulnerability Database</a>, allowing me to look up know security
9015 issues for any CPE name.  With this in place, all I need to do is to
9016 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
9017 This is fairly trivial (I google for 'cve cpe $package' and check the
9018 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).</p>
9019
9020 <p>To give you an example.  The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
9021 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip.  If the old version 1.3.3 was the package to
9022 check out, one could look up
9023 <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
9024 in NVD</a> and get a list of 6 security holes with public CVE entries.
9025 The most recent one is
9026 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-0001">CVE-2010-0001</a>,
9027 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
9028 list of affected versions is provided.</p>
9029
9030 <p>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
9031 for offline processing of issues.  Using this dump, I've written a
9032 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
9033 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs.  One give it CPEs
9034 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
9035 security issues out.</p>
9036
9037 <p>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
9038 information need to be high.  For that to happen, I believe as many as
9039 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database.  I notice
9040 RHEL is providing
9041 <a href="https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt">a
9042 map from CVE to CPE</a>, indicating that they are using the CPE
9043 information.  I'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.</p>
9044
9045 <p>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
9046 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
9047 the CVE database in NVD.  The result look fairly good, but there are
9048 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
9049 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
9050 Debian believe are affected by a CVE).  Hope to find time to improve
9051 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
9052 someone maintaining it.  So far my three emails with questions and
9053 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
9054 established soon.</p>
9055
9056 <p>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
9057 mapping.  It would be useful to know which packages in for example
9058 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
9059 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
9060 for their packages.</p>
9061
9062       </div>
9063       <div class="tags">
9064
9065
9066         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
9067
9068
9069       </div>
9070     </div>
9071     <div class="padding"></div>
9072
9073     <div class="entry">
9074       <div class="title">
9075         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Which_module_is_loaded_for_a_given_PCI_and_USB_device_.html">Which module is loaded for a given PCI and USB device?</a>
9076       </div>
9077       <div class="date">
9078         23rd January 2011
9079       </div>
9080       <div class="body">
9081         <p>In the
9082 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data">discover-data</a>
9083 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
9084 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
9085 information.  One part of this script that I find very useful when
9086 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
9087 to the PCI device it claims.  It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
9088 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with.  To see
9089 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
9090 <tt>/usr/share/bug/discover-data 3>&1</tt>.  The relevant output on
9091 one of my machines like this:</p>
9092
9093 <pre>
9094 loaded modules:
9095 10de:03eb i2c_nforce2
9096 10de:03f1 ohci_hcd
9097 10de:03f2 ehci_hcd
9098 10de:03f0 snd_hda_intel
9099 10de:03ec pata_amd
9100 10de:03f6 sata_nv
9101 1022:1103 k8temp
9102 109e:036e bttv
9103 109e:0878 snd_bt87x
9104 11ab:4364 sky2
9105 </pre>
9106
9107 <p>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
9108 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor 3:</p>
9109
9110 <pre>
9111 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
9112     echo loaded pci modules:
9113     (
9114         cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
9115         for address in * ; do
9116             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
9117                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
9118                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
9119                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
9120                     id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $3}'`
9121                     echo "$id $module"
9122                 fi
9123             fi
9124         done
9125     )
9126     echo
9127 fi
9128 </pre>
9129
9130 <p>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
9131 mappings:</p>
9132
9133 <pre>
9134 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
9135     echo loaded usb modules:
9136     (
9137         cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
9138         for address in * ; do
9139             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
9140                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
9141                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
9142                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
9143                     id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $6}')
9144                     if [ "$id" ] ; then
9145                         echo "$id $module"
9146                     fi
9147                 fi
9148             fi
9149         done
9150     )
9151     echo
9152 fi
9153 </pre>
9154
9155 <p>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
9156 well.</p>
9157
9158       </div>
9159       <div class="tags">
9160
9161
9162         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9163
9164
9165       </div>
9166     </div>
9167     <div class="padding"></div>
9168
9169     <div class="entry">
9170       <div class="title">
9171         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_if_a_laptop_is_working_with_Linux.html">How to test if a laptop is working with Linux</a>
9172       </div>
9173       <div class="date">
9174         22nd December 2010
9175       </div>
9176       <div class="body">
9177         <p>The last few days I have spent at work here at the <a
9178 href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> testing if the new
9179 batch of computers will work with Linux.  Every year for the last few
9180 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
9181 computers, and this year HP won the bid.  Two different desktops and
9182 five different laptops are on the list this year.  We in the UNIX
9183 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
9184 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
9185 university.</p>
9186
9187 <p>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
9188 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well.  To test, I PXE
9189 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
9190 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware.  When
9191 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
9192 on.  If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
9193 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
9194 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.</p>
9195
9196 <p>Anyway, to get to the point of this post.  Here is the simple tests
9197 I perform on a new model.</p>
9198
9199 <ul>
9200
9201 <li>Is PXE installation working?  I'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
9202 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment.  If I feel like it, I also test with
9203 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.</li>
9204
9205 <li>Is X.org working?  If the graphical login screen show up after
9206 installation, X.org is working.</li>
9207
9208 <li>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working?  Running glxgears (in
9209 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
9210 reported by the program.</li>
9211
9212 <li>Is sound working?  With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
9213 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful.  If there
9214 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
9215 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound.  I
9216 normally test this by playing
9217 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20101012-chef/ ">a HTML5
9218 video</a> in Firefox/Iceweasel.</li>
9219
9220 <li>Is the USB subsystem working?  I test this by plugging in a USB
9221 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
9222
9223 <li>Is the CD/DVD player working?  I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
9224 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
9225
9226 <li>Is any built in camera working?  Test using cheese, and see if a
9227 picture from the v4l device show up.</li>
9228
9229 <li>Is bluetooth working?  Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
9230 any bluetooth devices are discovered.  In my office, I normally see a
9231 few.</li>
9232
9233 <li>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working.  I have
9234 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
9235 notice this.</li>
9236
9237 <li>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working?  I'm testing if the
9238 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
9239 resume.</li>
9240
9241 <li>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
9242 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
9243 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc?  The set of buttons differ from
9244 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
9245 not.</li>
9246
9247 <li>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
9248 acceleration sensors etc.  I rarely test these, as I do not know how
9249 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
9250 existence.</li>
9251
9252 </ul>
9253
9254 <p>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
9255 for the HP machines I am testing.  I'm not done yet, so I will report
9256 the test results later.  For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work
9257 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
9258 and audio fail on RHEL6.  Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p.  As you
9259 can see, I have most machines left to test.  One interesting
9260 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
9261 RHEL6 with glxgears.  No idea why.</p>
9262
9263       </div>
9264       <div class="tags">
9265
9266
9267         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9268
9269
9270       </div>
9271     </div>
9272     <div class="padding"></div>
9273
9274     <div class="entry">
9275       <div class="title">
9276         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html">Some thoughts on BitCoins</a>
9277       </div>
9278       <div class="date">
9279         11th December 2010
9280       </div>
9281       <div class="body">
9282         <p>As I continue to explore
9283 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>, I've starting to wonder
9284 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
9285 and regulations here in Norway.  Here are some random notes.</p>
9286
9287 <p>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
9288 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
9289 is known to everyone.  This means that if a BitCoin address has been
9290 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
9291 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
9292 that address.  There is even a web service to look at the details for
9293 all transactions.  There I can see that my address
9294 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a>
9295 have received 16.06 Bitcoin, the
9296 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3</a>
9297 address of Simon Phipps have received 181.97 BitCoin and the address
9298 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt</A>
9299 of EFF have received 2447.38 BitCoins so far.  Thank you to each and
9300 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
9301 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
9302 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
9303 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction.  I'm told
9304 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
9305 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
9306 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.</p>
9307
9308 <p>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
9309 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
9310 without declaring it.  There are money laundering, tax and accounting
9311 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
9312 If the Skolelinux foundation
9313 (<a href="http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">SLX
9314 Debian Labs</a>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
9315 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
9316 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
9317 not, should everything or nothing be declared?  What exchange rate
9318 should be used when calculating taxes?  Would receivers have to pay
9319 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
9320 BitCoin?  I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.</p>
9321
9322 <p>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
9323 accepted by a lot of users.  It must be possible to get easy access to
9324 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
9325 easy to spend it.  At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
9326 access to, but there are very few places to spend it.  I am not really
9327 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
9328 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins.  I
9329 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
9330 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
9331 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
9332 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular.  I'm sure they
9333 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
9334 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
9335 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
9336 currencies.</p>
9337
9338 <p>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
9339 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
9340 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
9341 to see which one get the next lump of cash).  The "winner" get 50
9342 BitCoin when this happen.  Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
9343 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
9344 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
9345 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the 50
9346 BitCoins.  Check out
9347 <a href="http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/">BitCoin Pool</a>
9348 if this sounds interesting.  I have not had time to try to set up a
9349 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
9350 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
9351 yet.</p>
9352
9353 <p>Update 2010-12-15: Found an <a
9354 href="http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi">interesting
9355 criticism</a> of bitcoin.  Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
9356 it was interesting to read.  The arguments presented seem to be
9357 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.</p>
9358
9359       </div>
9360       <div class="tags">
9361
9362
9363         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
9364
9365
9366       </div>
9367     </div>
9368     <div class="padding"></div>
9369
9370     <div class="entry">
9371       <div class="title">
9372         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">Now accepting bitcoins - anonymous and distributed p2p crypto-money</a>
9373       </div>
9374       <div class="date">
9375         10th December 2010
9376       </div>
9377       <div class="body">
9378         <p>With this weeks lawless
9379 <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/06/wikileaks/index.html">governmental
9380 attacks</a> on Wikileak and
9381 <a href="http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/2010/12/06/war_on_speech">free
9382 speech</a>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
9383 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
9384 A blog post from
9385 <a href="http://webmink.com/2010/12/06/now-accepting-bitcoin/">Simon
9386 Phipps on bitcoin</a> reminded me about a project that a friend of
9387 mine mentioned earlier.  I decided to follow Simon's example, and get
9388 involved with <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>.  I got
9389 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
9390 some bitcoins to get started.  I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
9391 for helping me remember BitCoin.</p>
9392
9393 <p>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder?  It is a digital
9394 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
9395 networks.  It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
9396 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
9397 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions.  The
9398 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets 2.9
9399 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
9400 line client builds just fine.  Hopefully Jonas
9401 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/578157">will get the package into
9402 Debian</a> soon.</p>
9403
9404 <p>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
9405 There are <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/trade">companies accepting
9406 bitcoins</a> when selling services and goods, and there are even
9407 currency "stock" markets where the exchange rate is decided.  There
9408 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising.  If you
9409 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
9410 you can even get
9411 <a href="https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/">some for free</a> (0.05
9412 bitcoin at the time of writing).  Use
9413 <a href="http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/">BitcoinWatch</a> to keep an eye
9414 on the current exchange rates.</p>
9415
9416 <p>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
9417 machines.  If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
9418 donations to the address
9419 <b>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</b>.  Thank you!</p>
9420
9421       </div>
9422       <div class="tags">
9423
9424
9425         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
9426
9427
9428       </div>
9429     </div>
9430     <div class="padding"></div>
9431
9432     <div class="entry">
9433       <div class="title">
9434         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html">Why isn't Debian Edu using VLC?</a>
9435       </div>
9436       <div class="date">
9437         27th November 2010
9438       </div>
9439       <div class="body">
9440         <p>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
9441 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
9442 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
9443 to play a video file or stream.  Only if VLC fail will I drag out
9444 gmplayer to see if it can do better.  The reason is mostly the failure
9445 model and trust.  When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
9446 reporting the problem.  When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
9447 just hangs.  The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.<p>
9448
9449 <p>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
9450 mplayer in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
9451 Edu/Skolelinux</a>.  The reason is simple.  We need a good browser
9452 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
9453 not very good.  For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
9454 is no way for the user to pause the video.  Also, when I
9455 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">last
9456 tested the browser plugins</a> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
9457 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked.  If
9458 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
9459 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.</P>
9460
9461 <p>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
9462 annoying.  The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
9463 keyboard shortcuts.  When the player is in full screen mode, its
9464 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
9465 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode.  I
9466 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
9467 window mode.  Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
9468 the current video.  It is very nice when playing short videos from the
9469 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
9470 what is going on.</p>
9471
9472       </div>
9473       <div class="tags">
9474
9475
9476         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
9477
9478
9479       </div>
9480     </div>
9481     <div class="padding"></div>
9482
9483     <div class="entry">
9484       <div class="title">
9485         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades_of_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop__now_with_apt_get_autoremove.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades of the Gnome and KDE desktop, now with apt-get autoremove</a>
9486       </div>
9487       <div class="date">
9488         22nd November 2010
9489       </div>
9490       <div class="body">
9491         <p>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
9492 upgrade testing of the
9493 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
9494 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a> to do <tt>apt-get autoremove</tt> when using apt-get.
9495 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
9496 can now present the updated result from today:</p>
9497
9498 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
9499
9500 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
9501
9502 <blockquote><p>
9503   apache2.2-bin
9504   aptdaemon
9505   baobab
9506   binfmt-support
9507   browser-plugin-gnash
9508   cheese-common
9509   cli-common
9510   cups-pk-helper
9511   dmz-cursor-theme
9512   empathy
9513   empathy-common
9514   freedesktop-sound-theme
9515   freeglut3
9516   gconf-defaults-service
9517   gdm-themes
9518   gedit-plugins
9519   geoclue
9520   geoclue-hostip
9521   geoclue-localnet
9522   geoclue-manual
9523   geoclue-yahoo
9524   gnash
9525   gnash-common
9526   gnome
9527   gnome-backgrounds
9528   gnome-cards-data
9529   gnome-codec-install
9530   gnome-core
9531   gnome-desktop-environment
9532   gnome-disk-utility
9533   gnome-screenshot
9534   gnome-search-tool
9535   gnome-session-canberra
9536   gnome-system-log
9537   gnome-themes-extras
9538   gnome-themes-more
9539   gnome-user-share
9540   gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
9541   gstreamer0.10-tools
9542   gtk2-engines
9543   gtk2-engines-pixbuf
9544   gtk2-engines-smooth
9545   hamster-applet
9546   libapache2-mod-dnssd
9547   libapr1
9548   libaprutil1
9549   libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
9550   libaprutil1-ldap
9551   libart2.0-cil
9552   libboost-date-time1.42.0
9553   libboost-python1.42.0
9554   libboost-thread1.42.0
9555   libchamplain-0.4-0
9556   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0
9557   libcheese-gtk18
9558   libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
9559   libcryptui0
9560   libdiscid0
9561   libelf1
9562   libepc-1.0-2
9563   libepc-common
9564   libepc-ui-1.0-2
9565   libfreerdp-plugins-standard
9566   libfreerdp0
9567   libgconf2.0-cil
9568   libgdata-common
9569   libgdata7
9570   libgdu-gtk0
9571   libgee2
9572   libgeoclue0
9573   libgexiv2-0
9574   libgif4
9575   libglade2.0-cil
9576   libglib2.0-cil
9577   libgmime2.4-cil
9578   libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
9579   libgnome2.24-cil
9580   libgnomepanel2.24-cil
9581   libgpod-common
9582   libgpod4
9583   libgtk2.0-cil
9584   libgtkglext1
9585   libgtksourceview2.0-common
9586   libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
9587   libmono-addins0.2-cil
9588   libmono-cairo2.0-cil
9589   libmono-corlib2.0-cil
9590   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
9591   libmono-posix2.0-cil
9592   libmono-security2.0-cil
9593   libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
9594   libmono-system2.0-cil
9595   libmtp8
9596   libmusicbrainz3-6
9597   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
9598   libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
9599   libopal3.6.8
9600   libpolkit-gtk-1-0
9601   libpt2.6.7
9602   libpython2.6
9603   librpm1
9604   librpmio1
9605   libsdl1.2debian
9606   libsrtp0
9607   libssh-4
9608   libtelepathy-farsight0
9609   libtelepathy-glib0
9610   libtidy-0.99-0
9611   media-player-info
9612   mesa-utils
9613   mono-2.0-gac
9614   mono-gac
9615   mono-runtime
9616   nautilus-sendto
9617   nautilus-sendto-empathy
9618   p7zip-full
9619   pkg-config
9620   python-aptdaemon
9621   python-aptdaemon-gtk
9622   python-axiom
9623   python-beautifulsoup
9624   python-bugbuddy
9625   python-clientform
9626   python-coherence
9627   python-configobj
9628   python-crypto
9629   python-cupshelpers
9630   python-elementtree
9631   python-epsilon
9632   python-evolution
9633   python-feedparser
9634   python-gdata
9635   python-gdbm
9636   python-gst0.10
9637   python-gtkglext1
9638   python-gtksourceview2
9639   python-httplib2
9640   python-louie
9641   python-mako
9642   python-markupsafe
9643   python-mechanize
9644   python-nevow
9645   python-notify
9646   python-opengl
9647   python-openssl
9648   python-pam
9649   python-pkg-resources
9650   python-pyasn1
9651   python-pysqlite2
9652   python-rdflib
9653   python-serial
9654   python-tagpy
9655   python-twisted-bin
9656   python-twisted-conch
9657   python-twisted-core
9658   python-twisted-web
9659   python-utidylib
9660   python-webkit
9661   python-xdg
9662   python-zope.interface
9663   remmina
9664   remmina-plugin-data
9665   remmina-plugin-rdp
9666   remmina-plugin-vnc
9667   rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
9668   rhythmbox-plugins
9669   rpm-common
9670   rpm2cpio
9671   seahorse-plugins
9672   shotwell
9673   software-center
9674   system-config-printer-udev
9675   telepathy-gabble
9676   telepathy-mission-control-5
9677   telepathy-salut
9678   tomboy
9679   totem
9680   totem-coherence
9681   totem-mozilla
9682   totem-plugins
9683   transmission-common
9684   xdg-user-dirs
9685   xdg-user-dirs-gtk
9686   xserver-xephyr
9687 </p></blockquote>
9688
9689 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
9690
9691 <blockquote><p>
9692   cheese
9693   ekiga
9694   eog
9695   epiphany-extensions
9696   evolution-exchange
9697   fast-user-switch-applet
9698   file-roller
9699   gcalctool
9700   gconf-editor
9701   gdm
9702   gedit
9703   gedit-common
9704   gnome-games
9705   gnome-games-data
9706   gnome-nettool
9707   gnome-system-tools
9708   gnome-themes
9709   gnuchess
9710   gucharmap
9711   guile-1.8-libs
9712   libavahi-ui0
9713   libdmx1
9714   libgalago3
9715   libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
9716   libgtksourceview2.0-0
9717   liblircclient0
9718   libsdl1.2debian-alsa
9719   libspeexdsp1
9720   libsvga1
9721   rhythmbox
9722   seahorse
9723   sound-juicer
9724   system-config-printer
9725   totem-common
9726   transmission-gtk
9727   vinagre
9728   vino
9729 </p></blockquote>
9730
9731 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9732
9733 <blockquote><p>
9734   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
9735 </p></blockquote>
9736
9737 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9738
9739 <blockquote><p>
9740 [nothing]
9741 </p></blockquote>
9742
9743 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
9744
9745 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
9746
9747 <blockquote><p>
9748   ksmserver
9749 </p></blockquote>
9750
9751 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
9752
9753 <blockquote><p>
9754   kwin
9755   network-manager-kde
9756 </p></blockquote>
9757
9758 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9759
9760 <blockquote><p>
9761   arts
9762   dolphin
9763   freespacenotifier
9764   google-gadgets-gst
9765   google-gadgets-xul
9766   kappfinder
9767   kcalc
9768   kcharselect
9769   kde-core
9770   kde-plasma-desktop
9771   kde-standard
9772   kde-window-manager
9773   kdeartwork
9774   kdeartwork-emoticons
9775   kdeartwork-style
9776   kdeartwork-theme-icon
9777   kdebase
9778   kdebase-apps
9779   kdebase-workspace
9780   kdebase-workspace-bin
9781   kdebase-workspace-data
9782   kdeeject
9783   kdelibs
9784   kdeplasma-addons
9785   kdeutils
9786   kdewallpapers
9787   kdf
9788   kfloppy
9789   kgpg
9790   khelpcenter4
9791   kinfocenter
9792   konq-plugins-l10n
9793   konqueror-nsplugins
9794   kscreensaver
9795   kscreensaver-xsavers
9796   ktimer
9797   kwrite
9798   libgle3
9799   libkde4-ruby1.8
9800   libkonq5
9801   libkonq5-templates
9802   libnetpbm10
9803   libplasma-ruby
9804   libplasma-ruby1.8
9805   libqt4-ruby1.8
9806   marble-data
9807   marble-plugins
9808   netpbm
9809   nuvola-icon-theme
9810   plasma-dataengines-workspace
9811   plasma-desktop
9812   plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
9813   plasma-runners-addons
9814   plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
9815   plasma-scriptengine-python
9816   plasma-scriptengine-qedje
9817   plasma-scriptengine-ruby
9818   plasma-scriptengine-webkit
9819   plasma-scriptengines
9820   plasma-wallpapers-addons
9821   plasma-widget-folderview
9822   plasma-widget-networkmanagement
9823   ruby
9824   sweeper
9825   update-notifier-kde
9826   xscreensaver-data-extra
9827   xscreensaver-gl
9828   xscreensaver-gl-extra
9829   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
9830 </p></blockquote>
9831
9832 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9833
9834 <blockquote><p>
9835   ark
9836   google-gadgets-common
9837   google-gadgets-qt
9838   htdig
9839   kate
9840   kdebase-bin
9841   kdebase-data
9842   kdepasswd
9843   kfind
9844   klipper
9845   konq-plugins
9846   konqueror
9847   ksysguard
9848   ksysguardd
9849   libarchive1
9850   libcln6
9851   libeet1
9852   libeina-svn-06
9853   libggadget-1.0-0b
9854   libggadget-qt-1.0-0b
9855   libgps19
9856   libkdecorations4
9857   libkephal4
9858   libkonq4
9859   libkonqsidebarplugin4a
9860   libkscreensaver5
9861   libksgrd4
9862   libksignalplotter4
9863   libkunitconversion4
9864   libkwineffects1a
9865   libmarblewidget4
9866   libntrack-qt4-1
9867   libntrack0
9868   libplasma-geolocation-interface4
9869   libplasmaclock4a
9870   libplasmagenericshell4
9871   libprocesscore4a
9872   libprocessui4a
9873   libqalculate5
9874   libqedje0a
9875   libqtruby4shared2
9876   libqzion0a
9877   libruby1.8
9878   libscim8c2a
9879   libsmokekdecore4-3
9880   libsmokekdeui4-3
9881   libsmokekfile3
9882   libsmokekhtml3
9883   libsmokekio3
9884   libsmokeknewstuff2-3
9885   libsmokeknewstuff3-3
9886   libsmokekparts3
9887   libsmokektexteditor3
9888   libsmokekutils3
9889   libsmokenepomuk3
9890   libsmokephonon3
9891   libsmokeplasma3
9892   libsmokeqtcore4-3
9893   libsmokeqtdbus4-3
9894   libsmokeqtgui4-3
9895   libsmokeqtnetwork4-3
9896   libsmokeqtopengl4-3
9897   libsmokeqtscript4-3
9898   libsmokeqtsql4-3
9899   libsmokeqtsvg4-3
9900   libsmokeqttest4-3
9901   libsmokeqtuitools4-3
9902   libsmokeqtwebkit4-3
9903   libsmokeqtxml4-3
9904   libsmokesolid3
9905   libsmokesoprano3
9906   libtaskmanager4a
9907   libtidy-0.99-0
9908   libweather-ion4a
9909   libxklavier16
9910   libxxf86misc1
9911   okteta
9912   oxygencursors
9913   plasma-dataengines-addons
9914   plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
9915   plasma-widget-lancelot
9916   plasma-widgets-addons
9917   plasma-widgets-workspace
9918   polkit-kde-1
9919   ruby1.8
9920   systemsettings
9921   update-notifier-common
9922 </p></blockquote>
9923
9924 <p>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
9925 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
9926 differences.  I have no idea what packages should be installed after
9927 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.</p>
9928
9929       </div>
9930       <div class="tags">
9931
9932
9933         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9934
9935
9936       </div>
9937     </div>
9938     <div class="padding"></div>
9939
9940     <div class="entry">
9941       <div class="title">
9942         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Migrating_Xen_virtual_machines_using_LVM_to_KVM_using_disk_images.html">Migrating Xen virtual machines using LVM to KVM using disk images</a>
9943       </div>
9944       <div class="date">
9945         22nd November 2010
9946       </div>
9947       <div class="body">
9948         <p>Most of the computers in use by the
9949 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project</a>
9950 are virtual machines.  And they have been Xen machines running on a
9951 fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
9952 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge 2950 host machine.  This was a
9953 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
9954 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
9955 know is not supported by KVM.  So to migrate, we had to convert
9956 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.</p>
9957
9958 <p>I found
9959 <a href="http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM">a
9960 nice recipe</a> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
9961 migration.  It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
9962 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
9963 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data.  I NFS mounted the
9964 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.</p>
9965
9966 <pre>
9967 #!/bin/sh
9968
9969 # Based on
9970 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
9971
9972 set -e
9973 set -x
9974
9975 if [ -z "$1" ] ; then
9976     echo "Usage: $0 &lt;hostname&gt;"
9977     exit 1
9978 else
9979     host="$1"
9980 fi
9981
9982 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
9983     echo "error: unable to find LVM volume for $host"
9984     exit 1
9985 fi
9986
9987 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs.  not sure why.
9988 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
9989 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
9990 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
9991
9992 img=$host.img
9993 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
9994 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
9995
9996 parted $img mklabel msdos
9997 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap 0 $disksize
9998 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
9999 parted $img set 1 boot on
10000
10001 modprobe dm-mod
10002 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
10003 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
10004
10005 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=1M
10006 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
10007 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
10008
10009 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
10010 losetup -d /dev/loop0
10011 </pre>
10012
10013 <p>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
10014 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.</p>
10015
10016 <p>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
10017 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and
10018 set up grub to boot from the disk image.  After this, the KVM machines
10019 seem to work just fine.</p>
10020
10021       </div>
10022       <div class="tags">
10023
10024
10025         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10026
10027
10028       </div>
10029     </div>
10030     <div class="padding"></div>
10031
10032     <div class="entry">
10033       <div class="title">
10034         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades, apt vs aptitude with the Gnome and KDE desktop</a>
10035       </div>
10036       <div class="date">
10037         20th November 2010
10038       </div>
10039       <div class="body">
10040         <p>I'm still running upgrade testing of the
10041 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
10042 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
10043 status.  Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.</p>
10044
10045 <p>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
10046 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
10047 can see if anything should be changed.</p>
10048
10049 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
10050
10051 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10052
10053 <blockquote><p>
10054   apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
10055   browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-4.3 cups-pk-helper
10056   dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
10057   freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
10058   gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
10059   geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
10060   gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
10061   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
10062   gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
10063   gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
10064   gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
10065   gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
10066   gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
10067   libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
10068   libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-0 libboost-date-time1.42.0
10069   libboost-python1.42.0 libboost-thread1.42.0 libchamplain-0.4-0
10070   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
10071   libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-1.0-2
10072   libepc-common libepc-ui-1.0-2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
10073   libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
10074   libgdl-1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-0 libgif4
10075   libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
10076   libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
10077   libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
10078   libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
10079   libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
10080   libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
10081   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
10082   libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
10083   libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-6
10084   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6.8
10085   libpolkit-gtk-1-0 libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
10086   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
10087   libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-4
10088   libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-0.99-0
10089   libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
10090   mono-2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
10091   nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
10092   openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-4suite-xml
10093   python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
10094   python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
10095   python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
10096   python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
10097   python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
10098   python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
10099   python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
10100   python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
10101   python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
10102   python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
10103   python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
10104   python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
10105   python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
10106   remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
10107   rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
10108   software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
10109   telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-5 telepathy-salut tomboy
10110   totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
10111   transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
10112   zip
10113 </p></blockquote>
10114
10115 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
10116
10117 <blockquote><p>
10118   arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
10119   epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
10120   fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
10121   gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
10122   gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
10123   gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
10124   guile-1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
10125   libavahi-ui0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7
10126   libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
10127   libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1
10128   libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3 libfaad0 libgadu3
10129   libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
10130   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
10131   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
10132   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
10133   libgtkhtml2-0 libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgtksourceview2.0-0
10134   libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
10135   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
10136   libmagick++10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
10137   libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
10138   libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpisock9
10139   libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8
10140   libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
10141   libspeexdsp1 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libsvga1
10142   libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
10143   libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
10144   libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
10145   sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
10146   totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
10147 </p></blockquote>
10148
10149 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10150
10151 <blockquote><p>
10152   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
10153 </p></blockquote>
10154
10155 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10156
10157 <blockquote><p>
10158 [nothing]
10159 </p></blockquote>
10160
10161 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
10162
10163 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10164
10165 <blockquote><p>
10166   autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-4.3 dcoprss
10167   edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
10168   ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
10169   gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
10170   kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
10171   kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
10172   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
10173   kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
10174   kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
10175   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
10176   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
10177   kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
10178   killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
10179   kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
10180   ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42.0
10181   libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
10182   libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
10183   libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
10184   libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
10185   libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
10186   libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
10187   libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
10188   libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
10189   libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
10190   lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
10191   openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
10192   parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
10193   pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
10194   speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
10195   ttf-sazanami-gothic
10196 </p></blockquote>
10197
10198 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10199
10200 <blockquote><p>
10201   amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
10202   dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
10203   kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
10204   kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
10205   keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
10206   kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
10207   kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
10208   klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
10209   kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
10210   kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
10211   kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
10212   ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
10213   ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
10214   kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
10215   kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
10216   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
10217   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2
10218   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
10219   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
10220   libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0 libicu38
10221   libiec61883-0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
10222   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
10223   libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
10224   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
10225   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
10226   libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
10227   libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
10228   libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 librss1 libsensors3
10229   libsmbios2 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90
10230   libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
10231   mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
10232   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
10233   ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
10234 </p></blockquote>
10235
10236 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10237
10238 <blockquote><p>
10239   dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
10240   kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
10241   kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
10242   kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
10243   netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
10244   xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra
10245   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
10246 </p></blockquote>
10247
10248 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10249
10250 <blockquote><p>
10251   kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
10252 </p></blockquote>
10253
10254       </div>
10255       <div class="tags">
10256
10257
10258         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10259
10260
10261       </div>
10262     </div>
10263     <div class="padding"></div>
10264
10265     <div class="entry">
10266       <div class="title">
10267         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html">Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd</a>
10268       </div>
10269       <div class="date">
10270         20th November 2010
10271       </div>
10272       <div class="body">
10273         <p>Answering
10274 <a href="http://www.listware.net/201011/gnash-dev/67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html">the
10275 call from the Gnash project</a> for
10276 <a href="http://www.gnashdev.org:8010">buildbot</a> slaves to test the
10277 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
10278 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
10279 Debian/Squeeze.  I hope this can help the developers in getting new
10280 releases out more often.</p>
10281
10282 <p>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
10283 I have considered setting up a <a
10284 href="http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/">Debian/kfreebsd</a>
10285 machine as well.  I have also considered using the kfreebsd
10286 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the 5
10287 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video.  Because of this, I
10288 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
10289 kfreebsd.  Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
10290 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
10291 screen at random locations).  Have not gotten very far with the
10292 testing.  Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
10293 fatal problem.  Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
10294 useful as a file server for NUUG.  Will try to find time to set up a
10295 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.</p>
10296
10297       </div>
10298       <div class="tags">
10299
10300
10301         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
10302
10303
10304       </div>
10305     </div>
10306     <div class="padding"></div>
10307
10308     <div class="entry">
10309       <div class="title">
10310         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html">Debian in 3D</a>
10311       </div>
10312       <div class="date">
10313          9th November 2010
10314       </div>
10315       <div class="body">
10316         <p><img src="http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/23/e0/c4/f9/2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg"></p>
10317
10318 <p>3D printing is just great.  I just came across this Debian logo in
10319 3D linked in from
10320 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2010/11/09/participatory-branding/">the
10321 thingiverse blog</a>.</p>
10322
10323       </div>
10324       <div class="tags">
10325
10326
10327         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10328
10329
10330       </div>
10331     </div>
10332     <div class="padding"></div>
10333
10334     <div class="entry">
10335       <div class="title">
10336         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html">Software updates 2010-10-24</a>
10337       </div>
10338       <div class="date">
10339         24th October 2010
10340       </div>
10341       <div class="body">
10342         <p>Some updates.</p>
10343
10344 <p>My <a href="http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">gnash pledge</a> to
10345 raise money for the project is going well.  The lower limit of 10
10346 signers was reached in 24 hours, and so far 13 people have signed it.
10347 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
10348 how far we can get before the time limit of December 24 is reached.
10349 :)</p>
10350
10351 <p>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
10352 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
10353 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
10354 It is called
10355 <a href="http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html">kcov</a>,
10356 and can be used using <tt>kcov &lt;directory&gt; &lt;binary&gt;</tt>.
10357 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
10358 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
10359 libglib2.0-dev.  Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
10360 solvable.  I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.</p>
10361
10362 <p>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for <a
10363 href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2010/10/msg00002.html">a
10364 new alpha release of Debian Edu</a>, and just published the second
10365 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
10366 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>
10367 release.  Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
10368 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
10369 client servers and diskless workstations.  A nice touch added
10370 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
10371 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.</p>
10372
10373       </div>
10374       <div class="tags">
10375
10376
10377         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
10378
10379
10380       </div>
10381     </div>
10382     <div class="padding"></div>
10383
10384     <div class="entry">
10385       <div class="title">
10386         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_notes_on_Flash_in_Debian_and_Debian_Edu.html">Some notes on Flash in Debian and Debian Edu</a>
10387       </div>
10388       <div class="date">
10389          4th September 2010
10390       </div>
10391       <div class="body">
10392         <p>In the <a href="http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote">Debian
10393 popularity-contest numbers</a>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
10394 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian.  The sixth
10395 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla.  This is a clear indication that
10396 working flash is important for Debian users.  Around 10 percent of the
10397 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
10398 installed.</p>
10399
10400 <p>In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008
10401 («<a href="http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile&do=view&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf">Skolelinux
10402 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
10403 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs</a>»), one of the most important problems
10404 schools experienced with <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
10405 Edu/Skolelinux</a> was the lack of working Flash.  A lot of educational
10406 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
10407 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
10408 good reason to stay with Windows.</p>
10409
10410 <p>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
10411 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
10412 everything you told him but could work fairly well.  This was a
10413 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
10414 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
10415 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
10416 example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
10417 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
10418 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
10419 pages they want to visit.</p>
10420
10421 <p>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
10422 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
10423 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
10424 Video to working out of the box.  For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
10425 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
10426 the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
10427 unstable.  The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7.
10428 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
10429 release team have not had time to reply to it yet.  I hope they agree
10430 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
10431 accept the new package into Squeeze.</p>
10432
10433       </div>
10434       <div class="tags">
10435
10436
10437         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
10438
10439
10440       </div>
10441     </div>
10442     <div class="padding"></div>
10443
10444     <div class="entry">
10445       <div class="title">
10446         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html">Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery</a>
10447       </div>
10448       <div class="date">
10449         27th July 2010
10450       </div>
10451       <div class="body">
10452         <p>I discovered this while doing
10453 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">automated
10454 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze</a>.  A few packages
10455 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
10456 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
10457 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.</p>
10458
10459 <p>An example is from todays
10460 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt">upgrade
10461 of KDE using aptitude</a>.  In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
10462 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade.  The cause is simple.  If a
10463 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
10464 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
10465 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
10466 because its dependencies are unavailable.</p>
10467
10468 <p>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:</p>
10469
10470 <blockquote><pre>
10471 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
10472  perl-modules depends on perl (>= 5.10.1-1); however:
10473   Version of perl on system is 5.10.0-19lenny2.
10474 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
10475  dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
10476 </pre></blockquote>
10477
10478 <p>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
10479 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/527917">reported as a bug</a>, and will
10480 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
10481 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
10482 failures.  Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
10483 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
10484 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
10485 of dependency loops.</p>
10486
10487 <p>Thanks to
10488 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/06/msg00116.html">the
10489 tireless effort by Bill Allombert</a>, the number of circular
10490 dependencies
10491 <a href="http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html">left in Debian
10492 is dropping</a>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)</p>
10493
10494 <p>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
10495 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590605">update-notifier</a> and
10496 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590604">different behaviour</a> between
10497 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
10498 dependency.  Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
10499 it.</p>
10500
10501       </div>
10502       <div class="tags">
10503
10504
10505         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
10506
10507
10508       </div>
10509     </div>
10510     <div class="padding"></div>
10511
10512     <div class="entry">
10513       <div class="title">
10514         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_are_they_searching_for___PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_in_LDAP.html">What are they searching for - PowerDNS and ISC DHCP in LDAP</a>
10515       </div>
10516       <div class="date">
10517         17th July 2010
10518       </div>
10519       <div class="body">
10520         <p>This is a
10521 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">followup</a>
10522 on my
10523 <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
10524 work</a> on
10525 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">merging
10526 all</a> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.</p>
10527
10528 <p>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
10529 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
10530 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server.  The two
10531 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.</p>
10532
10533 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
10534 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
10535 on a Debian Edu main-server.  Here is a summary.
10536
10537 <p><strong>powerdns</strong></p>
10538
10539 <a href="http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend">Clues
10540 on how to</a> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
10541 the web.
10542
10543 <p>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
10544 One "strict" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
10545 using the same LDAP objects, and a "tree" mode where the forward and
10546 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
10547 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
10548 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.</p>
10549
10550 <p>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
10551 base, and uses a "base" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
10552 "dc=tjener,dc=intern," to the base with a filter for
10553 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" for the forward entry and
10554 "dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa," with a filter for
10555 "(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)" for the reverse entry.  For
10556 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
10557 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
10558 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
10559 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
10560 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
10561 spfrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entries it is looking for
10562 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
10563 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
10564 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  The equivalent
10565 ldapsearch commands could look like this:</p>
10566
10567 <blockquote><pre>
10568 ldapsearch -h ldap \
10569   -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
10570   -s base -x '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
10571   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
10572   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
10573   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
10574   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
10575
10576 ldapsearch -h ldap \
10577   -b dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
10578   -s base -x '(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)'
10579   dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
10580   hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
10581   srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
10582 </pre></blockquote>
10583
10584 <p>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
10585 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
10586 example LDAP objects used there.  In addition to these objects, the
10587 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10588 also exist.</p>
10589
10590 <blockquote><pre>
10591 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10592 objectclass: top
10593 objectclass: dnsdomain
10594 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10595 dc: tjener
10596 arecord: 10.0.2.2
10597 associateddomain: tjener.intern
10598
10599 dn: dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10600 objectclass: top
10601 objectclass: dnsdomain2
10602 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10603 dc: 2
10604 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
10605 associateddomain: 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
10606 </pre></blockquote>
10607
10608 <p>In strict mode, the server behaves differently.  When looking for
10609 forward DNS entries, it is doing a "subtree" scoped search with the
10610 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
10611 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
10612 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
10613 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
10614 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entires it also do a
10615 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is "(arecord=10.0.2.2)"
10616 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
10617 modifytimestamp.  In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
10618 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
10619 instead.</p>
10620
10621 <p>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
10622 like this:</p>
10623
10624 <blockquote><pre>
10625 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
10626   '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
10627   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
10628   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
10629   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
10630   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
10631
10632 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
10633   '(arecord=10.0.2.2)' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
10634 </pre></blockquote>
10635
10636 <p>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
10637 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
10638 reverse lookups.</p>
10639
10640 <p>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
10641 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
10642 need to generate a DNS reply.  This make it able to work with any
10643 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.</p>
10644
10645 <p>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC 1274) and
10646 dnsdomain2 schemas.  The latter is used for reverse entries like
10647 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.</p>
10648
10649 <p>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
10650 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
10651 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain).  The use
10652 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
10653 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.</p>
10654
10655 <p>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
10656 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
10657 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
10658 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
10659 (zonename and relativedomainname).</p>
10660
10661 <p>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
10662 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
10663 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
10664 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
10665 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
10666 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):</p>
10667
10668 <blockquote><pre>
10669 objectclass ( some-oid NAME 'dnsDomainAux'
10670     SUP top
10671     AUXILIARY
10672     MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
10673           DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
10674           TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
10675           NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
10676           A6Record $ DNAMERecord
10677     ))
10678 </pre></blockquote>
10679
10680 <p>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
10681 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
10682 all the attributes PowerDNS wants.  I've sent an email to the PowerDNS
10683 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
10684 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
10685 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.</p>
10686
10687 <p><strong>ISC dhcp</strong></p>
10688
10689 <p>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
10690 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want.  This
10691 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
10692 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
10693 what is needed without having to read the source code.</p>
10694
10695 <p>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
10696 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
10697 stored.  These are the relevant entries from
10698 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:</p>
10699
10700 <blockquote><pre>
10701 ldap-base-dn "dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no";
10702 ldap-dhcp-server-cn "dhcp";
10703 </pre></blockquote>
10704
10705 <p>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
10706 configuration it need.  The cn "dhcp" is located using the given LDAP
10707 base and the filter "(&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))".  The
10708 search result is this entry:</p>
10709
10710 <blockquote><pre>
10711 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10712 cn: dhcp
10713 objectClass: top
10714 objectClass: dhcpServer
10715 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10716 </pre></blockquote>
10717
10718 <p>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
10719 subtree with DHCP configuration.  The DHCP configuration subtree base
10720 is located using a base scope search with base "cn=DHCP
10721 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" and filter
10722 "(&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))".
10723 The search result is this entry:</p>
10724
10725 <blockquote><pre>
10726 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10727 cn: DHCP Config
10728 objectClass: top
10729 objectClass: dhcpService
10730 objectClass: dhcpOptions
10731 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10732 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
10733 dhcpStatements: authoritative
10734 dhcpOption: smtp-server code 69 = array of ip-address
10735 dhcpOption: www-server code 72 = array of ip-address
10736 dhcpOption: wpad-url code 252 = text
10737 </pre></blockquote>
10738
10739 <p>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time.  When
10740 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
10741 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
10742 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
10743 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost.  These provide options
10744 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc.  Leaving out the
10745 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
10746 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
10747 related computer objects.</p>
10748
10749 <p>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
10750 of the client (00:00:00:00:00:00 in this example), using a subtree
10751 scoped search with "cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" as
10752 the base and "(&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
10753 00:00:00:00:00:00))" as the filter.  This is what a host object look
10754 like:</p>
10755
10756 <blockquote><pre>
10757 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10758 cn: hostname
10759 objectClass: top
10760 objectClass: dhcpHost
10761 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10762 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
10763 </pre></blockquote>
10764
10765 <p>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
10766 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
10767 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure.  On the
10768 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
10769 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries.  The latter should make
10770 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
10771 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
10772 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
10773 structural object class.
10774
10775 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
10776
10777 <p>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
10778 to which LDAP schemas to use.  While its "tree" mode is rigid when it
10779 come to the the LDAP structure, the "strict" mode is very flexible,
10780 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
10781 in the configuration.</p>
10782
10783 <p>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
10784 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
10785 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
10786 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
10787 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
10788 structure.</p>
10789
10790 <p>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
10791 this might work for Debian Edu:</p>
10792
10793 <blockquote><pre>
10794 ou=services
10795   cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
10796     cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
10797     cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
10798       cn=10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
10799         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
10800     cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
10801       cn=192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
10802         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
10803     ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
10804       cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
10805 </pre></blockquote>
10806
10807 <P>This is not tested yet.  If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
10808 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
10809 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
10810 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.</p>
10811
10812 <p>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
10813 like this:</p>
10814
10815 <blockquote><pre>
10816 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10817 dc: hostname
10818 objectClass: top
10819 objectClass: dhcpHost
10820 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10821 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
10822 associateddomain: hostname.intern
10823 arecord: 10.11.12.13
10824 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10825 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
10826 </pre></blockquote>
10827
10828 </p>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
10829 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
10830 auxiliary object class.</p>
10831
10832       </div>
10833       <div class="tags">
10834
10835
10836         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
10837
10838
10839       </div>
10840     </div>
10841     <div class="padding"></div>
10842
10843     <div class="entry">
10844       <div class="title">
10845         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects</a>
10846       </div>
10847       <div class="date">
10848         14th July 2010
10849       </div>
10850       <div class="body">
10851         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
10852 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
10853 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
10854 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
10855 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.</p>
10856
10857 <p>I've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
10858 information finally found a solution that seem to work.</p>
10859
10860 <p>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
10861 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry.  If
10862 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
10863 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
10864 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
10865 to a slave DNS server.</p>
10866
10867 <p>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
10868 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
10869 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
10870 I've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
10871 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup.  It
10872 seem to work.</p>
10873
10874 <p>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
10875 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
10876 an earlier email.  The combined LDAP object will look something like
10877 this:</p>
10878
10879 <blockquote><pre>
10880   dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10881   cn: hostname
10882   objectClass: dhcphost
10883   objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10884   objectclass: dnsdomainaux
10885   associateddomain: hostname.intern
10886   arecord: 10.11.12.13
10887   dhcphwaddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10888   dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
10889   ldapconfigsound: Y
10890 </pre></blockquote>
10891
10892 <p>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
10893 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
10894 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress.  LTSP will use
10895 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.</p>
10896
10897 <p>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
10898 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
10899 outside the "DHCP Config" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
10900 that.  If I can't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
10901 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
10902 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
10903 content.  I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
10904 might be a good place to put it.</p>
10905
10906 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10907 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
10908
10909       </div>
10910       <div class="tags">
10911
10912
10913         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
10914
10915
10916       </div>
10917     </div>
10918     <div class="padding"></div>
10919
10920     <div class="entry">
10921       <div class="title">
10922         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html">Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP</a>
10923       </div>
10924       <div class="date">
10925         11th July 2010
10926       </div>
10927       <div class="body">
10928         <p>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
10929 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
10930 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
10931 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.</p>
10932
10933 <p>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
10934 to get configuration from LDAP.  The idea is to look up the MAC
10935 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
10936 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
10937 LTSP clients.</p>
10938
10939 <p>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
10940 in a "computer" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
10941 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.</p>
10942
10943 <p>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
10944 this approach.  A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
10945 need to be written.  Comments, suggestions, etc?</p>
10946
10947 <blockquote><pre>
10948 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
10949 #
10950 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
10951 #
10952 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
10953 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
10954 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
10955 #
10956 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
10957 # existence of attribute names.
10958 #
10959 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
10960 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
10961 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
10962 #
10963 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
10964 # configuration settings.  Something like this should work:
10965 #
10966 # objectclass ( 1.1.2.2 NAME 'ltspClientAux'
10967 #     SUP top
10968 #     AUXILIARY
10969 #     MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
10970
10971 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
10972 if [ "$LDAPSERVER" ] ; then
10973     LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
10974     for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk '{print $5}'|sort -u) ; do
10975         filter="(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))"
10976         ldapsearch -h "$LDAPSERVER" -b "$LDAPBASE" -v -x "$filter" | \
10977             grep '^ltspConfig' | while read attr value ; do
10978             # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
10979             attr=$(echo $attr | sed 's/^ltspConfig//i' | tr a-z A-Z)
10980             # bass value on to clients
10981             eval "$attr=$value; export $attr"
10982         done
10983     done
10984 fi
10985 </pre></blockquote>
10986
10987 <p>I'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
10988 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
10989 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
10990 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
10991 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)</p>
10992
10993 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10994 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
10995
10996 <p>Update 2010-07-17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
10997 configuration in LDAP that was created around year 2000 by
10998 <a href="http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html">PC
10999 Xperience, Inc., 2000</a>.  I found its
11000 <a href="http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/">files</a> on a
11001 personal home page over at redhat.com.</p>
11002
11003       </div>
11004       <div class="tags">
11005
11006
11007         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
11008
11009
11010       </div>
11011     </div>
11012     <div class="padding"></div>
11013
11014     <div class="entry">
11015       <div class="title">
11016         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
11017       </div>
11018       <div class="date">
11019          9th July 2010
11020       </div>
11021       <div class="body">
11022         <p>Since
11023 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">my
11024 last post</a> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
11025 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma.  The java application
11026 <a href="http://jxplorer.org/">jXplorer</a> is claimed to be capable of
11027 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
11028 authenticate using Kerberos.  I have only tested the Kerberos
11029 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
11030 LDAP with my test user yet.  It is
11031 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html">available in
11032 Debian</a> testing and unstable at the moment.  The only problem I
11033 have with it is how it handle errors.  If something go wrong, its
11034 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
11035 and remove the failing query.  Nothing big, but very annoying.</p>
11036
11037       </div>
11038       <div class="tags">
11039
11040
11041         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
11042
11043
11044       </div>
11045     </div>
11046     <div class="padding"></div>
11047
11048     <div class="entry">
11049       <div class="title">
11050         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_desktop.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades, apt vs aptitude with the Gnome desktop</a>
11051       </div>
11052       <div class="date">
11053          3rd July 2010
11054       </div>
11055       <div class="body">
11056         <p>Here is a short update on my <a
11057 href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">my
11058 Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing</a>.  Here is a summary of the
11059 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude.  I'm
11060 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
11061 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
11062 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> and
11063 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585716">#585716</a>).</p>
11064
11065 <p>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
11066 complete list of the installed packages.  Based on this I see these
11067 differences when I did a test run today.  As usual, I do not really
11068 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
11069 publish the difference.</p>
11070
11071 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
11072
11073 <blockquote><p>
11074   at-spi cpp-4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
11075   libatspi1.0-0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-1-common
11076   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
11077   libgtksourceview-common libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
11078   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
11079   libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
11080   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
11081   python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
11082 </p></blockquote>
11083
11084 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
11085
11086 <blockquote><p>
11087   bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
11088   gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
11089   libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-50
11090   libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
11091   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9
11092   libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3
11093   libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
11094   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
11095   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11096   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
11097   libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
11098   libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++10
11099   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
11100   libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5
11101   libparted1.8-10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
11102   libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
11103   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1
11104   libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
11105   libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
11106   mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
11107 </p></blockquote>
11108
11109 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
11110
11111 <blockquote><p>
11112   gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
11113   python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
11114   xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11115   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11116   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
11117   xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
11118   xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
11119   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11120   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11121   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11122   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11123   xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
11124   xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
11125   xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
11126   xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
11127   xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
11128   xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
11129   xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
11130   xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
11131   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
11132   xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
11133 </p></blockquote>
11134
11135 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
11136
11137 <blockquote><p>
11138   deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
11139   xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
11140   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
11141 </p></blockquote>
11142
11143 <p>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
11144 <a href="http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120">changed
11145 in git</a> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
11146 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
11147 the difference somewhat.
11148
11149       </div>
11150       <div class="tags">
11151
11152
11153         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11154
11155
11156       </div>
11157     </div>
11158     <div class="padding"></div>
11159
11160     <div class="entry">
11161       <div class="title">
11162         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
11163       </div>
11164       <div class="date">
11165         28th June 2010
11166       </div>
11167       <div class="body">
11168         <p>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
11169 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
11170 tool to browse the LDAP tree.  The only one I was able to find in
11171 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
11172 <a href="http://luma.sourceforge.net/">LUMA</a>, which has proved to
11173 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
11174 populated by default in Skolelinux.  Thanks to it, I have been able to
11175 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
11176 objects.  It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze.  If you
11177 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)</p>
11178
11179 <p>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
11180 the BTS yet.  There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
11181 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
11182 Debian submenu in KDE.  I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
11183 released.</p>
11184
11185 <p>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet.  I would
11186 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
11187 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet.  So in the mean time, I use
11188 <a href="http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/">ldapvi</a> for that.</p>
11189
11190 <p>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
11191 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11192
11193 <p>Update 2010-06-29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
11194 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html">gq</a> package as a
11195 useful GUI alternative.  It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
11196 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze.  Unless that
11197 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.</p>
11198
11199       </div>
11200       <div class="tags">
11201
11202
11203         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
11204
11205
11206       </div>
11207     </div>
11208     <div class="padding"></div>
11209
11210     <div class="entry">
11211       <div class="title">
11212         <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">Idea for a change to LDAP schemas allowing DNS and DHCP info to be combined into one object</a>
11213       </div>
11214       <div class="date">
11215         24th June 2010
11216       </div>
11217       <div class="body">
11218         <p>A while back, I
11219 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
11220 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
11221 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
11222 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
11223
11224 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
11225 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
11226 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
11227 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
11228
11229 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
11230 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
11231 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
11232 Debian Edu.</p>
11233
11234 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
11235 the
11236 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
11237 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
11238 available today from IETF.</p>
11239
11240 <pre>
11241 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
11242 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
11243 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
11244  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
11245         NAME 'dhcpHost'
11246         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
11247 -       SUP top
11248 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
11249         MUST cn
11250         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
11251         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
11252 </pre>
11253
11254 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
11255 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
11256 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
11257
11258 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11259 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11260
11261       </div>
11262       <div class="tags">
11263
11264
11265         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
11266
11267
11268       </div>
11269     </div>
11270     <div class="padding"></div>
11271
11272     <div class="entry">
11273       <div class="title">
11274         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Calling_tasksel_like_the_installer__while_still_getting_useful_output.html">Calling tasksel like the installer, while still getting useful output</a>
11275       </div>
11276       <div class="date">
11277         16th June 2010
11278       </div>
11279       <div class="body">
11280         <p>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
11281 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run.  Until now,
11282 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
11283 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
11284 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
11285 this:
11286
11287 <blockquote><pre>
11288 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11289 tasksel --new-install
11290 </pre></blockquote>
11291
11292 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
11293 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
11294 any output what so ever.
11295
11296 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
11297 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
11298 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
11299 happen.  Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
11300 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
11301 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run.  I ended up using
11302 code like this:
11303
11304 <blockquote><pre>
11305 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11306 cmd="$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed 's/debconf-apt-progress -- //')"
11307 $cmd
11308 </pre></blockquote>
11309
11310 <p>The content of $cmd is typically something like "<tt>aptitude -q
11311 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
11312 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
11313 ~pimportant</tt>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
11314 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
11315 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
11316 installation.</p>
11317
11318 <p>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
11319 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
11320 like this.</p>
11321
11322       </div>
11323       <div class="tags">
11324
11325
11326         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
11327
11328
11329       </div>
11330     </div>
11331     <div class="padding"></div>
11332
11333     <div class="entry">
11334       <div class="title">
11335         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__removals_by_apt_and_aptitude.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades, removals by apt and aptitude</a>
11336       </div>
11337       <div class="date">
11338         13th June 2010
11339       </div>
11340       <div class="body">
11341         <p>My
11342 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">testing
11343 of Debian upgrades</a> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've
11344 finally made the upgrade logs available from
11345 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/</a>.
11346 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
11347 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting.  This time
11348 I will only focus on their removal plans.</p>
11349
11350 <p>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
11351 to remove 72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze.  The
11352 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
11353 xserver-xorg-video* drivers.  Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
11354 sure why.  When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove 129
11355 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
11356 longer needed.  Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
11357 I do not know.  Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?</p>
11358
11359 <p>For KDE, apt-get want to remove 82 packages, among them kdebase
11360 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
11361 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove 192 packages, none which are
11362 too surprising.</p>
11363
11364 <p>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
11365 and avoided, and perhaps others as well.  Here are the complete list
11366 of planned removals.  The complete logs is available from the URL
11367 above.  Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
11368 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
11369 conffile questions.  No idea why.  I worked around it by using
11370 '<tt>echo >> /proc/<em>pidofdpkg</em>/fd/0</tt>' to tell dpkg to
11371 continue.</p>
11372
11373 <p><b>apt-get gnome 72</b>
11374 <br>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
11375   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
11376   iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-1-0
11377   libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
11378   nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
11379   serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
11380   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11381   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11382   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
11383   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
11384   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
11385   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
11386   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11387   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11388   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11389   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11390   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11391   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
11392   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
11393   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
11394   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
11395   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
11396   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
11397   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
11398   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
11399   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
11400   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
11401   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9
11402   xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support</p>
11403
11404 <p><b>aptitude gnome 129</b>
11405
11406 <br>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
11407   djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
11408   gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
11409   gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
11410   libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
11411   libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
11412   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20
11413   libeel2-data libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libfaad0 libgail-common
11414   libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libgdl-1-0 libgdl-1-common
11415   libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0
11416   libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11417   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
11418   libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
11419   libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6
11420   libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++10
11421   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
11422   libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2
11423   libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10
11424   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-8
11425   libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8 libssh2-1
11426   libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
11427   libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
11428   libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
11429   libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
11430   openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
11431   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
11432   python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
11433   python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
11434   swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
11435   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11436   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
11437   zip</p>
11438
11439 <p><b>apt-get kde 82</b>
11440
11441 <br>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
11442   kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
11443   kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
11444   kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
11445   kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
11446   libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
11447   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11448   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11449   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
11450   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
11451   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
11452   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
11453   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11454   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11455   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11456   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11457   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11458   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
11459   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
11460   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
11461   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
11462   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
11463   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
11464   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
11465   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
11466   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
11467   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
11468   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9</p>
11469
11470 <p><b>aptitude kde 192</b>
11471 <br>bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
11472   djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
11473   ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
11474   kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
11475   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
11476   kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
11477   kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
11478   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
11479   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
11480   kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
11481   kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
11482   klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
11483   kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
11484   krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
11485   ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
11486   kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
11487   kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
11488   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
11489   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
11490   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
11491   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
11492   libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0
11493   libicu38 libiec61883-0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
11494   libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
11495   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
11496   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
11497   libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
11498   libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 libsmbios2
11499   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
11500   libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
11501   libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
11502   openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
11503   superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
11504   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
11505   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11506   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
11507   xulrunner-1.9</p>
11508
11509
11510       </div>
11511       <div class="tags">
11512
11513
11514         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11515
11516
11517       </div>
11518     </div>
11519     <div class="padding"></div>
11520
11521     <div class="entry">
11522       <div class="title">
11523         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze</a>
11524       </div>
11525       <div class="date">
11526         11th June 2010
11527       </div>
11528       <div class="body">
11529         <p>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
11530 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly.  A few bugs
11531 have been discovered and reported in the process
11532 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585410">#585410</a> in nagios3-cgi,
11533 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584879">#584879</a> already fixed in
11534 enscript and <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> in
11535 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
11536 am working on a script to automate the test.</p>
11537
11538 <p>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
11539 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
11540 it.  To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
11541 script is inserted.  To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
11542 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
11543 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).</p>
11544
11545 <p>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
11546 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
11547 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
11548 is created.  The bug report
11549 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566000">#566000</a> make me suspect
11550 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
11551 to make sure the upgrade go well.  Testing on virtual and real
11552 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
11553 do the trick in such settings anyway.  This is a
11554 <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-804130/">known
11555 issue</a> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
11556 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
11557 working with old kernels or something like that.  I really wish the
11558 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
11559 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
11560 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
11561 Debian Squeeze.</p>
11562
11563 <p>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades.  This test
11564 script, which I call <tt>upgrade-test</tt> for now, is doing the
11565 trick:</p>
11566
11567 <blockquote><pre>
11568 #!/bin/sh
11569 set -ex
11570
11571 if [ "$1" ] ; then
11572     desktop=$1
11573 else
11574     desktop=gnome
11575 fi
11576
11577 from=lenny
11578 to=squeeze
11579
11580 exec &lt; /dev/null
11581 unset LANG
11582 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
11583 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
11584 fuser -mv .
11585 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
11586 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
11587 cat > $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d &lt;&lt;EOF
11588 #!/bin/sh
11589 exit 101
11590 EOF
11591 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
11592 exit_cleanup() {
11593     umount $tmpdir/proc
11594 }
11595 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
11596 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
11597 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
11598
11599 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
11600
11601 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger.  It need the test scripts
11602 # to return the correct answers.
11603 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
11604     chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
11605
11606 # Include the desktop and laptop task
11607 for test in desktop laptop ; do
11608     echo > $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test &lt;&lt;EOF
11609 #!/bin/sh
11610 exit 2
11611 EOF
11612     chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
11613 done
11614
11615 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11616 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
11617 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
11618 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
11619
11620 echo deb $mirror $to main > $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
11621 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
11622 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
11623 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
11624 fuser -mv
11625 </pre></blockquote>
11626
11627 <p>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
11628 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
11629 differently so far.  I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
11630 regularly and post the result on the web.  The Gnome upgrade currently
11631 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
11632 kdebase-workspace-data</p>
11633
11634 <p>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
11635 (KDE 167 KiB, Gnome 516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
11636 post, so I will refrain from trying.  I can report that for Gnome,
11637 aptitude report 760 packages upgraded, 448 newly installed, 129 to
11638 remove and 1 not upgraded and 1024MB need to be downloaded while for
11639 KDE the same numbers are 702 packages upgraded, 507 newly installed,
11640 193 to remove and 0 not upgraded and 1117MB need to be downloaded</p>
11641
11642 <p>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
11643 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
11644 booting without a hitch.  Was unsure if there were still bugs with
11645 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
11646 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
11647 packages.</p>
11648
11649       </div>
11650       <div class="tags">
11651
11652
11653         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11654
11655
11656       </div>
11657     </div>
11658     <div class="padding"></div>
11659
11660     <div class="entry">
11661       <div class="title">
11662         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Upstart_or_sysvinit___as_init_d_scripts_see_it.html">Upstart or sysvinit - as init.d scripts see it</a>
11663       </div>
11664       <div class="date">
11665          6th June 2010
11666       </div>
11667       <div class="body">
11668         <p>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
11669 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
11670 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd.  The packages with such
11671 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
11672 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart.  Because of
11673 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
11674 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.</p>
11675
11676 <p>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
11677 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
11678 COLUMNS):</p>
11679
11680 <blockquote><pre>
11681 DEFAULT_RUNLEVEL=2
11682 previous=N
11683 PREVLEVEL=
11684 RUNLEVEL=
11685 runlevel=S
11686 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
11687 UPSTART_INSTANCE=
11688 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
11689 </pre></blockquote>
11690
11691 <p>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
11692 script.</p>
11693
11694 <blockquote><pre>
11695 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-2.88
11696 previous=N
11697 PREVLEVEL=N
11698 RUNLEVEL=S
11699 runlevel=S
11700 </pre></blockquote>
11701
11702 <p>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
11703 sysvinit are not set by upstart.  Not sure if it is intentional or not
11704 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.</p>
11705
11706 <p>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
11707 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
11708 choice.</p>
11709
11710       </div>
11711       <div class="tags">
11712
11713
11714         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11715
11716
11717       </div>
11718     </div>
11719     <div class="padding"></div>
11720
11721     <div class="entry">
11722       <div class="title">
11723         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html">A manual for standards wars...</a>
11724       </div>
11725       <div class="date">
11726          6th June 2010
11727       </div>
11728       <div class="body">
11729         <p>Via the
11730 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html">blog
11731 of Rob Weir</a> I came across the very interesting essay named
11732 <a href="http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf">The Art of
11733 Standards Wars</a> (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
11734 following the standards wars of today.</p>
11735
11736       </div>
11737       <div class="tags">
11738
11739
11740         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
11741
11742
11743       </div>
11744     </div>
11745     <div class="padding"></div>
11746
11747     <div class="entry">
11748       <div class="title">
11749         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_computer_hardware_models_used_at_site.html">Sitesummary tip: Listing computer hardware models used at site</a>
11750       </div>
11751       <div class="date">
11752          3rd June 2010
11753       </div>
11754       <div class="body">
11755         <p>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
11756 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
11757 information extracted from each machine.  The script to do so is
11758 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
11759 the Skolelinux build servers:</p>
11760
11761 <blockquote><pre>
11762 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
11763   vendor                    count
11764   Dell Computer Corporation     1
11765     PowerEdge 1750              1
11766   IBM                           1
11767     eserver xSeries 345 -[8670M1X]-     1
11768   Intel                         2
11769   [no-dmi-info]                 3
11770 maintainer:~#
11771 </pre></blockquote>
11772
11773 <p>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
11774 provided in each machine.  Here there are Intel machines without model
11775 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
11776 machines listed as [no-dmi-info].  One can add -l as a command line
11777 option to list the individual machines.</p>
11778
11779 <p>A larger list is
11780 <a href="http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/">available from the the
11781 city of Narvik</a>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
11782 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly.  In their report there
11783 are ~1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
11784 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
11785 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
11786 collector.</p>
11787
11788       </div>
11789       <div class="tags">
11790
11791
11792         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary</a>.
11793
11794
11795       </div>
11796     </div>
11797     <div class="padding"></div>
11798
11799     <div class="entry">
11800       <div class="title">
11801         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/KDM_fail_at_boot_with_NVidia_cards___and_no_one_try_to_fix_it_.html">KDM fail at boot with NVidia cards - and no one try to fix it?</a>
11802       </div>
11803       <div class="date">
11804          1st June 2010
11805       </div>
11806       <div class="body">
11807         <p>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
11808 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled.  The
11809 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
11810 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
11811 wait.</p>
11812
11813 <p>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
11814 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">#583312</a> initially filed
11815 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
11816 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
11817 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/524751">#524751</a> initially filed against
11818 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.</p>
11819
11820 <p>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
11821 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
11822 distribution work out of the box for these users.  The nvidia driver
11823 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
11824 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
11825 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
11826 distribution that work for them.  I have no idea what the solution is,
11827 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.</p>
11828
11829 <p>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.</p>
11830
11831       </div>
11832       <div class="tags">
11833
11834
11835         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11836
11837
11838       </div>
11839     </div>
11840     <div class="padding"></div>
11841
11842     <div class="entry">
11843       <div class="title">
11844         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_seem_to_hold_up_well_in_Debian_testing.html">Parallellized boot seem to hold up well in Debian/testing</a>
11845       </div>
11846       <div class="date">
11847         27th May 2010
11848       </div>
11849       <div class="body">
11850         <p>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
11851 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
11852 issues are known and should be solved:
11853
11854 <p><ul>
11855
11856 <li>The wicd package seen to
11857 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/508289">break NFS mounting</a> and
11858 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/581586">network setup</a> when
11859 parallel booting is enabled.  No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
11860 seem to be on the case.</li>
11861
11862 <li>The nvidia X driver seem to
11863 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">have a race condition</a>
11864 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect.  The
11865 maintainer is on the case.</li>
11866
11867 <li>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
11868 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
11869 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/575080">try to switch back</a> to
11870 sysv-rc.  One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
11871 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
11872 sysv-rc more robust.  Will investigate some more and probably upload a
11873 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
11874 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.</li>
11875
11876 </ul></p>
11877
11878 <p>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
11879 solvable before Squeeze is released.  In addition to these there are
11880 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
11881 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.</p>
11882
11883 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
11884 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
11885 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
11886 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
11887
11888 <p>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.</p>
11889
11890       </div>
11891       <div class="tags">
11892
11893
11894         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11895
11896
11897       </div>
11898     </div>
11899     <div class="padding"></div>
11900
11901     <div class="entry">
11902       <div class="title">
11903         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html">More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer</a>
11904       </div>
11905       <div class="date">
11906         22nd May 2010
11907       </div>
11908       <div class="body">
11909         <p>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
11910 found time today to return to the project.  Having to spend less time
11911 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
11912 definitely helped freeing some time.</p>
11913
11914 <p>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu.  We
11915 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
11916 get disk and network controllers working.  Without having these
11917 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
11918 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
11919 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
11920 an external medium is a support pain.  Initially, I expected it to be
11921 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
11922 debian-installer to find and use them.  This proved to be wrong.
11923 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
11924 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
11925 /cdrom/firmware/).  This also proved to not work, and at this point I
11926 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
11927 going to work.</p>
11928
11929 <p>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
11930 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
11931 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
11932 packages.  It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
11933 "external" media devices.  Today I changed it to also look in the
11934 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
11935 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu.  I also changed it to
11936 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
11937 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
11938 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
11939 Edu.</p>
11940
11941 <p>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
11942 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
11943 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
11944 run these before activating the firmware during installation.  The
11945 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
11946 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.</p>
11947
11948 <p>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
11949 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.</p>
11950
11951       </div>
11952       <div class="tags">
11953
11954
11955         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11956
11957
11958       </div>
11959     </div>
11960     <div class="padding"></div>
11961
11962     <div class="entry">
11963       <div class="title">
11964         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_is_now_the_default_in_Debian_unstable.html">Parallellized boot is now the default in Debian/unstable</a>
11965       </div>
11966       <div class="date">
11967         14th May 2010
11968       </div>
11969       <div class="body">
11970         <p>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
11971 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
11972 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
11973 expected, if I am to believe the
11974 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
11975 on debian-devel@</a>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
11976 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
11977 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen.  If serious problems are
11978 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
11979 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
11980 version.</p>
11981
11982 More information about
11983 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
11984 based boot sequencing</a> is available from the Debian wiki.  It is
11985 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
11986 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:</p>
11987
11988 <blockquote><pre>
11989 CONCURRENCY=none
11990 </pre></blockquote>
11991
11992 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
11993 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
11994 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
11995 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
11996
11997       </div>
11998       <div class="tags">
11999
12000
12001         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12002
12003
12004       </div>
12005     </div>
12006     <div class="padding"></div>
12007
12008     <div class="entry">
12009       <div class="title">
12010         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_MAC_address_of_all_clients.html">Sitesummary tip: Listing MAC address of all clients</a>
12011       </div>
12012       <div class="date">
12013         14th May 2010
12014       </div>
12015       <div class="body">
12016         <p>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
12017 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">sitesummary
12018 system</a> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
12019 network.  Each machine will automatically report its status to the
12020 central server after boot and once per night.  The network setup is
12021 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
12022 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines.  This is useful
12023 to update the DHCP configuration.</p>
12024
12025 <p>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
12026 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary.  Run
12027 this on the collector host:</p>
12028
12029 <blockquote><pre>
12030 perl -MSiteSummary -e 'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(" ", get_macaddresses(shift)), "\n"; });'
12031 </pre></blockquote>
12032
12033 <p>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
12034 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.</p>
12035
12036 <p>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
12037 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
12038 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
12039 tables in LDAP using this information.  Such tool is unfortunately not
12040 written yet.</p>
12041
12042       </div>
12043       <div class="tags">
12044
12045
12046         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary</a>.
12047
12048
12049       </div>
12050     </div>
12051     <div class="padding"></div>
12052
12053     <div class="entry">
12054       <div class="title">
12055         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html">systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart</a>
12056       </div>
12057       <div class="date">
12058         13th May 2010
12059       </div>
12060       <div class="body">
12061         <p>The last few days a new boot system called
12062 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd">systemd</a>
12063 has been
12064 <a href="http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html">introduced</a>
12065
12066 to the free software world.  I have not yet had time to play around
12067 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
12068 <a href="http://upstart.ubuntu.com/">upstart</a>, and might prove to be
12069 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
12070 based boot system.  Tollef is
12071 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/580814">in the process</a> of getting
12072 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work.  I
12073 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
12074 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
12075 at the moment do not.</p>
12076
12077 <p>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
12078 platform support.  It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
12079 some new kernel features enabled to function properly.  This means
12080 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
12081 system.  Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
12082 way forward.</p>
12083
12084 <p>In the mean time, based on the
12085 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
12086 on debian-devel@</a> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
12087 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
12088 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
12089 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies.  A
12090 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
12091 already in experimental.  If all go well, Squeeze will be released
12092 with parallel booting enabled by default.</p>
12093
12094       </div>
12095       <div class="tags">
12096
12097
12098         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
12099
12100
12101       </div>
12102     </div>
12103     <div class="padding"></div>
12104
12105     <div class="entry">
12106       <div class="title">
12107         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellizing_the_boot_in_Debian_Squeeze___ready_for_wider_testing.html">Parallellizing the boot in Debian Squeeze - ready for wider testing</a>
12108       </div>
12109       <div class="date">
12110          6th May 2010
12111       </div>
12112       <div class="body">
12113         <p>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
12114 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
12115 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies.  If you want
12116 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
12117 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12118 based boot sequencing</a> is enabled, and add this line to
12119 /etc/default/rcS:</p>
12120
12121 <blockquote><pre>
12122 CONCURRENCY=makefile
12123 </pre></blockquote>
12124
12125 <p>That is it.  It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
12126 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
12127 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
12128 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts.  Startpar is configured
12129 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
12130 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
12131 make this happen.</p>
12132
12133 <p>Give it a try, and see if you like the result.  If some services
12134 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
12135 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
12136 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies).  Report bugs and get
12137 the package maintainers to fix it. :)</p>
12138
12139 <p>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
12140 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct.  I
12141 expect we will get there in Squeeze+1, if we get manage to test and
12142 fix the remaining issues.</p>
12143
12144 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12145 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12146 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12147 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12148
12149       </div>
12150       <div class="tags">
12151
12152
12153         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12154
12155
12156       </div>
12157     </div>
12158     <div class="padding"></div>
12159
12160     <div class="entry">
12161       <div class="title">
12162         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_has_switched_to_dependency_based_boot_sequencing.html">Debian has switched to dependency based boot sequencing</a>
12163       </div>
12164       <div class="date">
12165         27th July 2009
12166       </div>
12167       <div class="body">
12168         <p>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2,
12169 and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable
12170 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing.  This
12171 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
12172 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
12173 installation.  Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
12174 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.</p>
12175
12176 <p>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
12177 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
12178 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.</p>
12179
12180       </div>
12181       <div class="tags">
12182
12183
12184         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
12185
12186
12187       </div>
12188     </div>
12189     <div class="padding"></div>
12190
12191     <div class="entry">
12192       <div class="title">
12193         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html">Taking over sysvinit development</a>
12194       </div>
12195       <div class="date">
12196         22nd July 2009
12197       </div>
12198       <div class="body">
12199         <p>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
12200 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
12201 take over the package and become the new upstream.  The number of
12202 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
12203 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
12204 the package up to date.</p>
12205
12206 <p>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
12207 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman.  About 10 days ago, I made
12208 a new upstream tarball with version number 2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
12209 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
12210 distributions.  We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
12211 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge.  Since the
12212 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
12213 upstream project at <a href="http://savannah.nongnu.org/">Savannah</a>, and continue
12214 development there.  The project is registered and currently waiting
12215 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
12216 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
12217 working on the future release.</p>
12218
12219 <p>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
12220 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.</p>
12221
12222       </div>
12223       <div class="tags">
12224
12225
12226         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
12227
12228
12229       </div>
12230     </div>
12231     <div class="padding"></div>
12232
12233     <div class="entry">
12234       <div class="title">
12235         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html">Debian boots quicker and quicker</a>
12236       </div>
12237       <div class="date">
12238         24th June 2009
12239       </div>
12240       <div class="body">
12241         <p>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
12242 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
12243 could find more ways to speed up the boot system.  This was an Ubuntu
12244 funded
12245 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint">developer
12246 gathering</a>. It was quite productive.  We also discussed the future
12247 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
12248 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
12249 asynchronous and event base.  The Ubuntu approach using udev and
12250 upstart might be a good way forward.  Time will show.</p>
12251
12252 <p>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
12253 process in Debian.  All of these should be applied to get a quick
12254 boot:</p>
12255
12256 <ul>
12257
12258 <li>Use dash as /bin/sh.</li>
12259
12260 <li>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
12261    clock is in UTC.</li>
12262
12263 <li>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
12264    <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12265    based boot sequencing</a>, and enable concurrent booting.</li>
12266
12267 </ul>
12268
12269 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
12270 <a href="http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/">Carlos
12271 Villegas</a>.
12272
12273 <p>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
12274 unstable yesterday.  When we tested it, we were able to cut 6 seconds
12275 from the boot sequence.  It depend on very correct dependency
12276 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
12277 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
12278 using this.</p>
12279
12280 <p>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
12281 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
12282 startup speed as well.  Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
12283 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
12284 possible to run a of them in the same process.  A quick way to test
12285 this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
12286 insserv'.  Will need to test if that work. :)</p>
12287
12288       </div>
12289       <div class="tags">
12290
12291
12292         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12293
12294
12295       </div>
12296     </div>
12297     <div class="padding"></div>
12298
12299     <div class="entry">
12300       <div class="title">
12301         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/BSAs_p_stander_om_piratkopiering_m_ter_motstand.html">BSAs påstander om piratkopiering møter motstand</a>
12302       </div>
12303       <div class="date">
12304         17th May 2009
12305       </div>
12306       <div class="body">
12307         <p>Hvert år de siste årene har BSA, lobbyfronten til de store
12308 programvareselskapene som Microsoft og Apple, publisert en rapport der
12309 de gjetter på hvor mye piratkopiering påfører i tapte inntekter i
12310 ulike land rundt om i verden.  Resultatene er tendensiøse.  For noen
12311 dager siden kom
12312 <a href="http://global.bsa.org/globalpiracy2008/studies/globalpiracy2008.pdf">siste
12313 rapport</a>, og det er flere kritiske kommentarer publisert de siste
12314 dagene.  Et spesielt interessant kommentar fra Sverige,
12315 <a href="http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.229795/bsa-hoftade-sverigesiffror">BSA
12316 höftade Sverigesiffror</a>, oppsummeres slik:</p>
12317
12318 <blockquote>
12319 I sin senaste rapport slår BSA fast att 25 procent av all mjukvara i
12320 Sverige är piratkopierad. Det utan att ha pratat med ett enda svenskt
12321 företag. "Man bör nog kanske inte se de här siffrorna som helt
12322 exakta", säger BSAs Sverigechef John Hugosson.
12323 </blockquote>
12324
12325 <p>Mon tro om de er like metodiske når de gjetter på andelen piratkopiering i Norge?  To andre kommentarer er <a
12326 href="http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/comment/2242134/bsa-piracy-figures-shot-reality">BSA
12327 piracy figures need a shot of reality</a> og <a
12328 href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3958/125/">Does The WIPO
12329 Copyright Treaty Work?</a></p>
12330
12331 <p>Fant lenkene via <a
12332 href="http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/17/1632242">oppslag
12333 på Slashdot</a>.</p>
12334
12335       </div>
12336       <div class="tags">
12337
12338
12339         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>.
12340
12341
12342       </div>
12343     </div>
12344     <div class="padding"></div>
12345
12346     <div class="entry">
12347       <div class="title">
12348         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IDG_mener_linux_i_servermarkedet_vil_vokse_med_21__i_2009.html">IDG mener linux i servermarkedet vil vokse med 21% i 2009</a>
12349       </div>
12350       <div class="date">
12351          7th May 2009
12352       </div>
12353       <div class="body">
12354         <p>Kom over
12355 <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10216873-16.html">interessante
12356 tall</a> fra IDG om utviklingen av linuxservermarkedet.  Fikk meg til
12357 å tenke på antall tjenermaskiner ved Universitetet i Oslo der jeg
12358 jobber til daglig.  En rask opptelling forteller meg at vi har 490
12359 (61%) fysiske unix-tjener (mest linux men også noen solaris) og 196
12360 (25%) windowstjenere, samt 112 (14%) virtuelle unix-tjenere.  Med den
12361 bakgrunnskunnskapen kan jeg godt tro at IDG er inne på noe.</p>
12362
12363       </div>
12364       <div class="tags">
12365
12366
12367         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
12368
12369
12370       </div>
12371     </div>
12372     <div class="padding"></div>
12373
12374     <div class="entry">
12375       <div class="title">
12376         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kryptert_harddisk___naturligvis.html">Kryptert harddisk - naturligvis</a>
12377       </div>
12378       <div class="date">
12379          2nd May 2009
12380       </div>
12381       <div class="body">
12382         <p><a href="http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1658676.ece">Dagens
12383 IT melder</a> at Intel hevder at det er dyrt å miste en datamaskin,
12384 når en tar tap av arbeidstid, fortrolige dokumenter,
12385 personopplysninger og alt annet det innebærer.  Det er ingen tvil om
12386 at det er en kostbar affære å miste sin datamaskin, og det er årsaken
12387 til at jeg har kryptert harddisken på både kontormaskinen og min
12388 bærbare.  Begge inneholder personopplysninger jeg ikke ønsker skal
12389 komme på avveie, den første informasjon relatert til jobben min ved
12390 Universitetet i Oslo, og den andre relatert til blant annet
12391 foreningsarbeide.  Kryptering av diskene gjør at det er lite
12392 sannsynlig at dophoder som kan finne på å rappe maskinene får noe ut
12393 av dem.  Maskinene låses automatisk etter noen minutter uten bruk,
12394 og en reboot vil gjøre at de ber om passord før de vil starte opp.
12395 Jeg bruker Debian på begge maskinene, og installasjonssystemet der
12396 gjør det trivielt å sette opp krypterte disker.  Jeg har LVM på toppen
12397 av krypterte partisjoner, slik at alt av datapartisjoner er kryptert.
12398 Jeg anbefaler alle å kryptere diskene på sine bærbare.  Kostnaden når
12399 det er gjort slik jeg gjør det er minimale, og gevinstene er
12400 betydelige.  En bør dog passe på passordet.  Hvis det går tapt, må
12401 maskinen reinstalleres og alt er tapt.</p>
12402
12403 <p>Krypteringen vil ikke stoppe kompetente angripere som f.eks. kjøler
12404 ned minnebrikkene før maskinen rebootes med programvare for å hente ut
12405 krypteringsnøklene.  Kostnaden med å forsvare seg mot slike angripere
12406 er for min del høyere enn gevinsten.  Jeg tror oddsene for at
12407 f.eks. etteretningsorganisasjoner har glede av å titte på mine
12408 maskiner er minimale, og ulempene jeg ville oppnå ved å forsøke å
12409 gjøre det vanskeligere for angripere med kompetanse og ressurser er
12410 betydelige.</p>
12411
12412       </div>
12413       <div class="tags">
12414
12415
12416         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
12417
12418
12419       </div>
12420     </div>
12421     <div class="padding"></div>
12422
12423     <div class="entry">
12424       <div class="title">
12425         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Two_projects_that_have_improved_the_quality_of_free_software_a_lot.html">Two projects that have improved the quality of free software a lot</a>
12426       </div>
12427       <div class="date">
12428          2nd May 2009
12429       </div>
12430       <div class="body">
12431         <p>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
12432 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
12433 do not yet know them.</p>
12434
12435 <p>The first one is <a href="http://valgrind.org/">valgrind</a>, a
12436 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
12437 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run 'valgrind program',
12438 and it will report any problems on stdout.  It is even better if the
12439 program include debug information.  With debug information, it is able
12440 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
12441 occurs.  It can report things like 'reading past memory block in file
12442 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M', and
12443 'using uninitialised value in control logic'.  This tool has made it
12444 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
12445 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
12446
12447 <p>The second one is
12448 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity">Coverity</a> which is
12449 a source code checker.  It is able to process the source of a program
12450 and find problems in the logic without running the program.  It
12451 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
12452 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel.  It is now a commercial tool
12453 and the company behind it is running
12454 <a href="http://www.scan.coverity.com/">a community service</a> for the
12455 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
12456 their source checked for free.  Several thousand defects have been
12457 found and fixed so far.  It can find errors like 'lock L taken in file
12458 X line N is never released if exiting in line M', or 'the code in file
12459 Y lines O to P can never be executed'.  The projects included in the
12460 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
12461 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.</p>
12462
12463 <p>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
12464 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
12465 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
12466 surrounded by today.</p>
12467
12468       </div>
12469       <div class="tags">
12470
12471
12472         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12473
12474
12475       </div>
12476     </div>
12477     <div class="padding"></div>
12478
12479     <div class="entry">
12480       <div class="title">
12481         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/No_patch_is_not_better_than_a_useless_patch.html">No patch is not better than a useless patch</a>
12482       </div>
12483       <div class="date">
12484         28th April 2009
12485       </div>
12486       <div class="body">
12487         <p>Julien Blache
12488 <a href="http://blog.technologeek.org/2009/04/12/214">claim that no
12489 patch is better than a useless patch</a>.  I completely disagree, as a
12490 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
12491 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
12492 time on fixing it.  No patch do not provide any of these positive
12493 properties.</p>
12494
12495       </div>
12496       <div class="tags">
12497
12498
12499         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
12500
12501
12502       </div>
12503     </div>
12504     <div class="padding"></div>
12505
12506     <div class="entry">
12507       <div class="title">
12508         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html">Standardize on protocols and formats, not vendors and applications</a>
12509       </div>
12510       <div class="date">
12511         30th March 2009
12512       </div>
12513       <div class="body">
12514         <p>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
12515 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
12516 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
12517 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
12518 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
12519 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
12520 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
12521 application.</p>
12522
12523 <p>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
12524 independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
12525 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
12526 protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
12527 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
12528 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
12529 blocked from doing so.</p>
12530
12531 <p>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
12532 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
12533 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
12534 requirements change.</p>
12535
12536 <p>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
12537 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
12538 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.</p>
12539
12540       </div>
12541       <div class="tags">
12542
12543
12544         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
12545
12546
12547       </div>
12548     </div>
12549     <div class="padding"></div>
12550
12551     <div class="entry">
12552       <div class="title">
12553         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html">Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering</a>
12554       </div>
12555       <div class="date">
12556         29th March 2009
12557       </div>
12558       <div class="body">
12559         <p>I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
12560 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering.  I got a bit done tuning the
12561 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
12562 implementation avahi.  It look like it could be useful for us.  Almost
12563 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
12564 get to know the Skolelinux system.  Walter Bender, involved in the
12565 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
12566 also helped me improve my OLPC installation.  He also showed me that
12567 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
12568 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian.  As a
12569 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu.  We also
12570 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
12571 proved to be too hard for us.  The application seem to need more work
12572 before it is ready for me.  I look forward to getting home and relax
12573 now. :)</p>
12574
12575       </div>
12576       <div class="tags">
12577
12578
12579         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
12580
12581
12582       </div>
12583     </div>
12584     <div class="padding"></div>
12585
12586     <div class="entry">
12587       <div class="title">
12588         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">Time for new  LDAP schemas replacing RFC 2307?</a>
12589       </div>
12590       <div class="date">
12591         29th March 2009
12592       </div>
12593       <div class="body">
12594         <p>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
12595 optimal.  There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
12596 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with
12597 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory.  The RFC
12598 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
12599 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.</p>
12600
12601 <p>In <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux</a>,
12602 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
12603 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
12604 and LTSP configuration in LDAP.  These objects have a lot in common,
12605 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
12606 object per entity.  For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
12607 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
12608 DNS information and another with DHCP information.  The schemas
12609 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
12610 object.  In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
12611 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
12612 It just do not scale.  I believe it is time for a few RFC
12613 specifications to cleam up this mess.</p>
12614
12615 <p>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
12616 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
12617 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
12618 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.</p>
12619
12620 <p>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
12621 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.</p>
12622
12623 <p>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
12624 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up.  Time to start a
12625 new IETF work group?</p>
12626
12627       </div>
12628       <div class="tags">
12629
12630
12631         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
12632
12633
12634       </div>
12635     </div>
12636     <div class="padding"></div>
12637
12638     <div class="entry">
12639       <div class="title">
12640         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Endelig_er_Debian_Lenny_gitt_ut.html">Endelig er Debian Lenny gitt ut</a>
12641       </div>
12642       <div class="date">
12643         15th February 2009
12644       </div>
12645       <div class="body">
12646         <p>Endelig er <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>
12647 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090214">Lenny</a> gitt ut.
12648 Et langt steg videre for Debian-prosjektet, og en rekke nye
12649 programpakker blir nå tilgjengelig for de av oss som bruker den
12650 stabile utgaven av Debian.  Neste steg er nå å få
12651 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> /
12652 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> ferdig
12653 oppdatert for den nye utgaven, slik at en oppdatert versjon kan
12654 slippes løs på skolene.  Takk til alle debian-utviklerne som har
12655 gjort dette mulig.  Endelig er f.eks. fungerende avhengighetsstyrt
12656 bootsekvens tilgjengelig i stabil utgave, vha pakken
12657 <tt>insserv</tt>.</p>
12658
12659       </div>
12660       <div class="tags">
12661
12662
12663         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>.
12664
12665
12666       </div>
12667     </div>
12668     <div class="padding"></div>
12669
12670     <div class="entry">
12671       <div class="title">
12672         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Devcamp_brought_us_closer_to_the_Lenny_based_Debian_Edu_release.html">Devcamp brought us closer to the Lenny based Debian Edu release</a>
12673       </div>
12674       <div class="date">
12675          7th December 2008
12676       </div>
12677       <div class="body">
12678         <p>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
12679 Oslo.  Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
12680 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
12681 LTSP installation.  LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network.
12682 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
12683 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box.  Was working on getting the
12684 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
12685 finish it before the weekend was up.</p>
12686
12687 <p>Did not find time to look at the 4 VGA cards in one box we got from
12688 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
12689 development gathering.  Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
12690 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
12691 of these cards.</p>
12692
12693       </div>
12694       <div class="tags">
12695
12696
12697         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp</a>.
12698
12699
12700       </div>
12701     </div>
12702     <div class="padding"></div>
12703
12704     <div class="entry">
12705       <div class="title">
12706         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_sorry_state_of_multimedia_browser_plugins_in_Debian.html">The sorry state of multimedia browser plugins in Debian</a>
12707       </div>
12708       <div class="date">
12709         25th November 2008
12710       </div>
12711       <div class="body">
12712         <p>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
12713 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
12714 default in Debian Edu.  We need an embedded video playing plugin with
12715 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
12716 all the multimedia content available on the web.  The test results and
12717 notes are available on
12718 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">the
12719 Debian wiki</a>.  I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
12720 fill this need.  My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
12721 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages.  A lot of the MIME
12722 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
12723 video/ogg), just do not work.  And simple formats like the
12724 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn't supported by the
12725 totem and vlc plugins.  I hope the situation will improve soon.  No
12726 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.</p>
12727
12728 <p>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin.  It seem to
12729 be the only one fitting our needs. :/</p>
12730
12731       </div>
12732       <div class="tags">
12733
12734
12735         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
12736
12737
12738       </div>
12739     </div>
12740     <div class="padding"></div>
12741
12742     <p style="text-align: right;"><a href="debian.rss"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/xml.gif" alt="RSS Feed" width="36" height="14" /></a></p>
12743     <div id="sidebar">
12744
12745
12746
12747 <h2>Archive</h2>
12748 <ul>
12749
12750 <li>2017
12751 <ul>
12752
12753 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/01/">January (4)</a></li>
12754
12755 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/02/">February (3)</a></li>
12756
12757 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/03/">March (5)</a></li>
12758
12759 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/04/">April (2)</a></li>
12760
12761 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/06/">June (5)</a></li>
12762
12763 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/07/">July (1)</a></li>
12764
12765 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/08/">August (1)</a></li>
12766
12767 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/09/">September (3)</a></li>
12768
12769 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/10/">October (5)</a></li>
12770
12771 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/11/">November (1)</a></li>
12772
12773 </ul></li>
12774
12775 <li>2016
12776 <ul>
12777
12778 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
12779
12780 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
12781
12782 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
12783
12784 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
12785
12786 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
12787
12788 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12789
12790 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/07/">July (2)</a></li>
12791
12792 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/08/">August (5)</a></li>
12793
12794 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/09/">September (2)</a></li>
12795
12796 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/10/">October (3)</a></li>
12797
12798 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/11/">November (8)</a></li>
12799
12800 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/12/">December (5)</a></li>
12801
12802 </ul></li>
12803
12804 <li>2015
12805 <ul>
12806
12807 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
12808
12809 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
12810
12811 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
12812
12813 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
12814
12815 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
12816
12817 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
12818
12819 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
12820
12821 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
12822
12823 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
12824
12825 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
12826
12827 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
12828
12829 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
12830
12831 </ul></li>
12832
12833 <li>2014
12834 <ul>
12835
12836 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
12837
12838 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
12839
12840 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
12841
12842 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
12843
12844 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
12845
12846 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12847
12848 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
12849
12850 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
12851
12852 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
12853
12854 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
12855
12856 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
12857
12858 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
12859
12860 </ul></li>
12861
12862 <li>2013
12863 <ul>
12864
12865 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
12866
12867 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
12868
12869 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
12870
12871 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
12872
12873 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
12874
12875 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
12876
12877 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
12878
12879 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
12880
12881 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
12882
12883 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
12884
12885 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
12886
12887 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
12888
12889 </ul></li>
12890
12891 <li>2012
12892 <ul>
12893
12894 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
12895
12896 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
12897
12898 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
12899
12900 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
12901
12902 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
12903
12904 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
12905
12906 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
12907
12908 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
12909
12910 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
12911
12912 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
12913
12914 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
12915
12916 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
12917
12918 </ul></li>
12919
12920 <li>2011
12921 <ul>
12922
12923 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
12924
12925 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
12926
12927 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
12928
12929 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
12930
12931 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
12932
12933 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12934
12935 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
12936
12937 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
12938
12939 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
12940
12941 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
12942
12943 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
12944
12945 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
12946
12947 </ul></li>
12948
12949 <li>2010
12950 <ul>
12951
12952 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
12953
12954 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
12955
12956 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
12957
12958 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
12959
12960 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
12961
12962 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
12963
12964 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
12965
12966 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
12967
12968 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
12969
12970 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
12971
12972 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
12973
12974 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
12975
12976 </ul></li>
12977
12978 <li>2009
12979 <ul>
12980
12981 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
12982
12983 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
12984
12985 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
12986
12987 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
12988
12989 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
12990
12991 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
12992
12993 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
12994
12995 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
12996
12997 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
12998
12999 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
13000
13001 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13002
13003 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
13004
13005 </ul></li>
13006
13007 <li>2008
13008 <ul>
13009
13010 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
13011
13012 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
13013
13014 </ul></li>
13015
13016 </ul>
13017
13018
13019
13020 <h2>Tags</h2>
13021 <ul>
13022
13023  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (14)</a></li>
13024
13025  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
13026
13027  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
13028
13029  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
13030
13031  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (9)</a></li>
13032
13033  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (16)</a></li>
13034
13035  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
13036
13037  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
13038
13039  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (154)</a></li>
13040
13041  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (158)</a></li>
13042
13043  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook (4)</a></li>
13044
13045  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
13046
13047  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (17)</a></li>
13048
13049  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (24)</a></li>
13050
13051  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
13052
13053  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (358)</a></li>
13054
13055  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
13056
13057  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (12)</a></li>
13058
13059  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (30)</a></li>
13060
13061  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
13062
13063  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (18)</a></li>
13064
13065  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
13066
13067  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
13068
13069  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (15)</a></li>
13070
13071  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (20)</a></li>
13072
13073  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
13074
13075  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
13076
13077  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
13078
13079  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
13080
13081  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
13082
13083  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (39)</a></li>
13084
13085  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (9)</a></li>
13086
13087  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (293)</a></li>
13088
13089  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (189)</a></li>
13090
13091  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (33)</a></li>
13092
13093  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
13094
13095  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (65)</a></li>
13096
13097  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (104)</a></li>
13098
13099  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (2)</a></li>
13100
13101  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
13102
13103  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
13104
13105  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
13106
13107  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (10)</a></li>
13108
13109  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
13110
13111  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (5)</a></li>
13112
13113  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
13114
13115  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (53)</a></li>
13116
13117  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
13118
13119  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (5)</a></li>
13120
13121  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (55)</a></li>
13122
13123  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (6)</a></li>
13124
13125  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (12)</a></li>
13126
13127  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (52)</a></li>
13128
13129  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (4)</a></li>
13130
13131  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
13132
13133  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (9)</a></li>
13134
13135  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (59)</a></li>
13136
13137  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
13138
13139  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (40)</a></li>
13140
13141 </ul>
13142
13143
13144     </div>
13145     <p style="text-align: right">
13146  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
13147 </p>
13148
13149   </body>
13150 </html>