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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/Cura__the_nice_3D_print_slicer__is_now_in_Debian_Unstable.html">Cura, the nice 3D print slicer, is now in Debian Unstable</a>
  26       </div>
  27       <div class="date">
  28         17th December 2017
  29       </div>
  30       <div class="body">
  31         <p>After several months of working and waiting, I am happy to report
  32 that the nice and user friendly 3D printer slicer software Cura just
  33 entered Debian Unstable.  It consist of five packages,
  34 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura">cura</a>,
  35 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura-engine">cura-engine</a>,
  36 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libarcus">libarcus</a>,
  37 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/fdm-materials">fdm-materials</a>,
  38 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libsavitar">libsavitar</a> and
  39 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/uranium">uranium</a>.  The last
  40 two, uranium and cura, entered Unstable yesterday.  This should make
  41 it easier for Debian users to print on at least the Ultimaker class of
  42 3D printers.  My nearest 3D printer is an Ultimaker 2+, so it will
  43 make life easier for at least me. :)</p>
  44
  45 <p>The work to make this happen was done by Gregor Riepl, and I was
  46 happy to assist him in sponsoring the packages.  With the introduction
  47 of Cura, Debian is up to three 3D printer slicers at your service,
  48 Cura, Slic3r and Slic3r Prusa.  If you own or have access to a 3D
  49 printer, give it a go. :)</p>
  50
  51 <p>The 3D printer software is maintained by the 3D printer Debian
  52 team, flocking together on the
  53 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/3dprinter-general">3dprinter-general</a>
  54 mailing list and the
  55 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-3dprinting">#debian-3dprinting</a>
  56 IRC channel.</p>
  57
  58 <p>The next step for Cura in Debian is to update the cura package to
  59 version 3.0.3 and then update the entire set of packages to version
  60 3.1.0 which showed up the last few days.</p>
  61
  62       </div>
  63       <div class="tags">
  64
  65
  66         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>.
  67
  68
  69       </div>
  70     </div>
  71     <div class="padding"></div>
  72
  73     <div class="entry">
  74       <div class="title">
  75         <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>
  76       </div>
  77       <div class="date">
  78          9th October 2017
  79       </div>
  80       <div class="body">
  81         <p>At my nearby maker space,
  82 <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Sonen</a>, I heard the story that it
  83 was easier to generate gcode files for theyr 3D printers (Ultimake 2+)
  84 on Windows and MacOS X than Linux, because the software involved had
  85 to be manually compiled and set up on Linux while premade packages
  86 worked out of the box on Windows and MacOS X.  I found this annoying,
  87 as the software involved,
  88 <a href="https://github.com/Ultimaker/Cura">Cura</a>, is free software
  89 and should be trivial to get up and running on Linux if someone took
  90 the time to package it for the relevant distributions.  I even found
  91 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/706656">a request for adding into
  92 Debian</a> from 2013, which had seem some activity over the years but
  93 never resulted in the software showing up in Debian.  So a few days
  94 ago I offered my help to try to improve the situation.</p>
  95
  96 <p>Now I am very happy to see that all the packages required by a
  97 working Cura in Debian are uploaded into Debian and waiting in the NEW
  98 queue for the ftpmasters to have a look.  You can track the progress
  99 on
 100 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?email=3dprinter-general%40lists.alioth.debian.org">the
 101 status page for the 3D printer team</a>.</p>
 102
 103 <p>The uploaded packages are a bit behind upstream, and was uploaded
 104 now to get slots in <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW
 105 queue</a> while we work up updating the packages to the latest
 106 upstream version.</p>
 107
 108 <p>On a related note, two competitors for Cura, which I found harder
 109 to use and was unable to configure correctly for Ultimaker 2+ in the
 110 short time I spent on it, are already in Debian.  If you are looking
 111 for 3D printer "slicers" and want something already available in
 112 Debian, check out
 113 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r">slic3r</a> and
 114 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r-prusa">slic3r-prusa</a>.
 115 The latter is a fork of the former.</p>
 116
 117 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 118 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 119 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 120
 121       </div>
 122       <div class="tags">
 123
 124
 125         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>.
 126
 127
 128       </div>
 129     </div>
 130     <div class="padding"></div>
 131
 132     <div class="entry">
 133       <div class="title">
 134         <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>
 135       </div>
 136       <div class="date">
 137         29th September 2017
 138       </div>
 139       <div class="body">
 140         <p>Every mobile phone announce its existence over radio to the nearby
 141 mobile cell towers.  And this radio chatter is available for anyone
 142 with a radio receiver capable of receiving them.  Details about the
 143 mobile phones with very good accuracy is of course collected by the
 144 phone companies, but this is not the topic of this blog post.  The
 145 mobile phone radio chatter make it possible to figure out when a cell
 146 phone is nearby, as it include the SIM card ID (IMSI).  By paying
 147 attention over time, one can see when a phone arrive and when it leave
 148 an area.  I believe it would be nice to make this information more
 149 available to the general public, to make more people aware of how
 150 their phones are announcing their whereabouts to anyone that care to
 151 listen.</p>
 152
 153 <p>I am very happy to report that we managed to get something
 154 visualizing this information up and running for
 155 <a href="http://norwaymakers.org/osf17">Oslo Skaperfestival 2017</a>
 156 (Oslo Makers Festival) taking place today and tomorrow at Deichmanske
 157 library.  The solution is based on the
 158 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Easier_recipe_to_observe_the_cell_phones_around_you.html">simple
 159 recipe for listening to GSM chatter</a> I posted a few days ago, and
 160 will show up at the stand of <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Åpen
 161 Sone from the Computer Science department of the University of
 162 Oslo</a>.  The presentation will show the nearby mobile phones (aka
 163 IMSIs) as dots in a web browser graph, with lines to the dot
 164 representing mobile base station it is talking to. It was working in
 165 the lab yesterday, and was moved into place this morning.</p>
 166
 167 <p>We set up a fairly powerful desktop machine using Debian
 168 Buster/Testing with several (five, I believe) RTL2838 DVB-T receivers
 169 connected and visualize the visible cell phone towers using an
 170 <a href="https://github.com/marlow925/hopglass">English version of
 171 Hopglass</a>.  A fairly powerfull machine is needed as the
 172 grgsm_livemon_headless processes from
 173 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a> converting
 174 the radio signal to data packages is quite CPU intensive.</p>
 175
 176 <p>The frequencies to listen to, are identified using a slightly
 177 patched scan-and-livemon (to set the --args values for each receiver),
 178 and the Hopglass data is generated using the
 179 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/IMSI-catcher/tree/meshviewer-output">patches
 180 in my meshviewer-output branch</a>.  For some reason we could not get
 181 more than four SDRs working.  There is also a geographical map trying
 182 to show the location of the base stations, but I believe their
 183 coordinates are hardcoded to some random location in Germany, I
 184 believe.  The code should be replaced with code to look up location in
 185 a text file, a sqlite database or one of the online databases
 186 mentioned in
 187 <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher/issues/14">the github
 188 issue for the topic</a>.
 189
 190 <p>If this sound interesting, visit the stand at the festival!</p>
 191
 192       </div>
 193       <div class="tags">
 194
 195
 196         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>.
 197
 198
 199       </div>
 200     </div>
 201     <div class="padding"></div>
 202
 203     <div class="entry">
 204       <div class="title">
 205         <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>
 206       </div>
 207       <div class="date">
 208         24th September 2017
 209       </div>
 210       <div class="body">
 211         <p>A little more than a month ago I wrote
 212 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simpler_recipe_on_how_to_make_a_simple__7_IMSI_Catcher_using_Debian.html">how
 213 to observe the SIM card ID (aka IMSI number) of mobile phones talking
 214 to nearby mobile phone base stations using Debian GNU/Linux and a
 215 cheap USB software defined radio</a>, and thus being able to pinpoint
 216 the location of people and equipment (like cars and trains) with an
 217 accuracy of a few kilometer.  Since then we have worked to make the
 218 procedure even simpler, and it is now possible to do this without any
 219 manual frequency tuning and without building your own packages.</p>
 220
 221 <p>The <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a>
 222 package is now included in Debian testing and unstable, and the
 223 IMSI-catcher code no longer require root access to fetch and decode
 224 the GSM data collected using gr-gsm.</p>
 225
 226 <p>Here is an updated recipe, using packages built by Debian and a git
 227 clone of two python scripts:</p>
 228
 229 <ol>
 230
 231 <li>Start with a Debian machine running the Buster version (aka
 232   testing).</li>
 233
 234 <li>Run '<tt>apt install gr-gsm python-numpy python-scipy
 235   python-scapy</tt>' as root to install required packages.</li>
 236
 237 <li>Fetch the code decoding GSM packages using '<tt>git clone
 238   github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher.git</tt>'.</li>
 239
 240 <li>Insert USB software defined radio supported by GNU Radio.</li>
 241
 242 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
 243   scan-and-livemon</tt>' to locate the frequency of nearby base
 244   stations and start listening for GSM packages on one of them.</li>
 245
 246 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
 247   simple_IMSI-catcher.py</tt>' to display the collected information.</li>
 248
 249 </ol>
 250
 251 <p>Note, due to a bug somewhere the scan-and-livemon program (actually
 252 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/issues/336">its underlying
 253 program grgsm_scanner</a>) do not work with the HackRF radio.  It does
 254 work with RTL 8232 and other similar USB radio receivers you can get
 255 very cheaply
 256 (<a href="https://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=rtl+2832">for example
 257 from ebay</a>), so for now the solution is to scan using the RTL radio
 258 and only use HackRF for fetching GSM data.</p>
 259
 260 <p>As far as I can tell, a cell phone only show up on one of the
 261 frequencies at the time, so if you are going to track and count every
 262 cell phone around you, you need to listen to all the frequencies used.
 263 To listen to several frequencies, use the --numrecv argument to
 264 scan-and-livemon to use several receivers.  Further, I am not sure if
 265 phones using 3G or 4G will show as talking GSM to base stations, so
 266 this approach might not see all phones around you.  I typically see
 267 0-400 IMSI numbers an hour when looking around where I live.</p>
 268
 269 <p>I've tried to run the scanner on a
 270 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi 2 and 3
 271 running Debian Buster</a>, but the grgsm_livemon_headless process seem
 272 to be too CPU intensive to keep up.  When GNU Radio print 'O' to
 273 stdout, I am told there it is caused by a buffer overflow between the
 274 radio and GNU Radio, caused by the program being unable to read the
 275 GSM data fast enough.  If you see a stream of 'O's from the terminal
 276 where you started scan-and-livemon, you need a give the process more
 277 CPU power.  Perhaps someone are able to optimize the code to a point
 278 where it become possible to set up RPi3 based GSM sniffers?  I tried
 279 using Raspbian instead of Debian, but there seem to be something wrong
 280 with GNU Radio on raspbian, causing glibc to abort().</p>
 281
 282       </div>
 283       <div class="tags">
 284
 285
 286         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>.
 287
 288
 289       </div>
 290     </div>
 291     <div class="padding"></div>
 292
 293     <div class="entry">
 294       <div class="title">
 295         <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>
 296       </div>
 297       <div class="date">
 298          9th August 2017
 299       </div>
 300       <div class="body">
 301         <p>On friday, I came across an interesting article in the Norwegian
 302 web based ICT news magazine digi.no on
 303 <a href="https://www.digi.no/artikler/sikkerhetsforsker-lagde-enkel-imsi-catcher-for-60-kroner-na-kan-mobiler-kartlegges-av-alle/398588">how
 304 to collect the IMSI numbers of nearby cell phones</a> using the cheap
 305 DVB-T software defined radios.  The article refered to instructions
 306 and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjwgNd_as30">a recipe by
 307 Keld Norman on Youtube on how to make a simple $7 IMSI Catcher</a>, and I decided to test them out.</p>
 308
 309 <p>The instructions said to use Ubuntu, install pip using apt (to
 310 bypass apt), use pip to install pybombs (to bypass both apt and pip),
 311 and the ask pybombs to fetch and build everything you need from
 312 scratch.  I wanted to see if I could do the same on the most recent
 313 Debian packages, but this did not work because pybombs tried to build
 314 stuff that no longer build with the most recent openssl library or
 315 some other version skew problem.  While trying to get this recipe
 316 working, I learned that the apt->pip->pybombs route was a long detour,
 317 and the only piece of software dependency missing in Debian was the
 318 gr-gsm package.  I also found out that the lead upstream developer of
 319 gr-gsm (the name stand for GNU Radio GSM) project already had a set of
 320 Debian packages provided in an Ubuntu PPA repository.  All I needed to
 321 do was to dget the Debian source package and built it.</p>
 322
 323 <p>The IMSI collector is a python script listening for packages on the
 324 loopback network device and printing to the terminal some specific GSM
 325 packages with IMSI numbers in them.  The code is fairly short and easy
 326 to understand.  The reason this work is because gr-gsm include a tool
 327 to read GSM data from a software defined radio like a DVB-T USB stick
 328 and other software defined radios, decode them and inject them into a
 329 network device on your Linux machine (using the loopback device by
 330 default).  This proved to work just fine, and I've been testing the
 331 collector for a few days now.</p>
 332
 333 <p>The updated and simpler recipe is thus to</p>
 334
 335 <ol>
 336
 337 <li>start with a Debian machine running Stretch or newer,</li>
 338
 339 <li>build and install the gr-gsm package available from
 340 <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>
 341
 342 <li>clone the git repostory from <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher">https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher</a>,</li>
 343
 344 <li>run grgsm_livemon and adjust the frequency until the terminal
 345 where it was started is filled with a stream of text (meaning you
 346 found a GSM station).</li>
 347
 348 <li>go into the IMSI-catcher directory and run 'sudo python simple_IMSI-catcher.py' to extract the IMSI numbers.</li>
 349
 350 </ol>
 351
 352 <p>To make it even easier in the future to get this sniffer up and
 353 running, I decided to package
 354 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/">the gr-gsm project</a>
 355 for Debian (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/871055">WNPP
 356 #871055</a>), and the package was uploaded into the NEW queue today.
 357 Luckily the gnuradio maintainer has promised to help me, as I do not
 358 know much about gnuradio stuff yet.</p>
 359
 360 <p>I doubt this "IMSI cacher" is anywhere near as powerfull as
 361 commercial tools like
 362 <a href="https://www.thespyphone.com/portable-imsi-imei-catcher/">The
 363 Spy Phone Portable IMSI / IMEI Catcher</a> or the
 364 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_phone_tracker">Harris
 365 Stingray</a>, but I hope the existance of cheap alternatives can make
 366 more people realise how their whereabouts when carrying a cell phone
 367 is easily tracked.  Seeing the data flow on the screen, realizing that
 368 I live close to a police station and knowing that the police is also
 369 wearing cell phones, I wonder how hard it would be for criminals to
 370 track the position of the police officers to discover when there are
 371 police near by, or for foreign military forces to track the location
 372 of the Norwegian military forces, or for anyone to track the location
 373 of government officials...</p>
 374
 375 <p>It is worth noting that the data reported by the IMSI-catcher
 376 script mentioned above is only a fraction of the data broadcasted on
 377 the GSM network.  It will only collect one frequency at the time,
 378 while a typical phone will be using several frequencies, and not all
 379 phones will be using the frequencies tracked by the grgsm_livemod
 380 program.  Also, there is a lot of radio chatter being ignored by the
 381 simple_IMSI-catcher script, which would be collected by extending the
 382 parser code.  I wonder if gr-gsm can be set up to listen to more than
 383 one frequency?</p>
 384
 385       </div>
 386       <div class="tags">
 387
 388
 389         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>.
 390
 391
 392       </div>
 393     </div>
 394     <div class="padding"></div>
 395
 396     <div class="entry">
 397       <div class="title">
 398         <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>
 399       </div>
 400       <div class="date">
 401         25th July 2017
 402       </div>
 403       <div class="body">
 404         <p align="center"><img align="center" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-07-25-debian-handbook-nb-testprint.png"/></p>
 405
 406 <p>I finally received a copy of the Norwegian Bokmål edition of
 407 "<a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian Administrator's
 408 Handbook</a>".  This test copy arrived in the mail a few days ago, and
 409 I am very happy to hold the result in my hand.   We spent around one and a half year translating it. This paperbook edition
 410 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/#norwegian">is available
 411 from lulu.com</a>.  If you buy it quickly, you save 25% on the list
 412 price.  The book is also available for download in electronic form as
 413 PDF, EPUB and Mobipocket, as can be
 414 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/browse/nb-NO/stable/">read online
 415 as a web page</a>.</p>
 416
 417 <p>This is the second book I publish (the first was the book
 418 "<a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a>" by Lawrence Lessig
 419 in
 420 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22440520.html">English</a>,
 421 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/culture-libre/paperback/product-22645082.html">French</a>
 422 and
 423 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/fri-kultur/paperback/product-22441576.html">Norwegian
 424 Bokmål</a>), and I am very excited to finally wrap up this
 425 project.  I hope
 426 "<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
 427 for Debian-administratoren</a>" will be well received.</p>
 428
 429       </div>
 430       <div class="tags">
 431
 432
 433         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>.
 434
 435
 436       </div>
 437     </div>
 438     <div class="padding"></div>
 439
 440     <div class="entry">
 441       <div class="title">
 442         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/N_r_nynorskoversettelsen_svikter_til_eksamen___.html">Når nynorskoversettelsen svikter til eksamen...</a>
 443       </div>
 444       <div class="date">
 445          3rd June 2017
 446       </div>
 447       <div class="body">
 448         <p><a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/norge/Krever-at-elever-ma-fa-annullert-eksamen-etter-rot-med-oppgavetekster-622459b.html">Aftenposten
 449 melder i dag</a> om feil i eksamensoppgavene for eksamen i politikk og
 450 menneskerettigheter, der teksten i bokmåls og nynorskutgaven ikke var
 451 like.  Oppgaveteksten er gjengitt i artikkelen, og jeg ble nysgjerring
 452 på om den fri oversetterløsningen
 453 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium</a> ville gjort en bedre
 454 jobb enn Utdanningsdirektoratet.  Det kan se slik ut.</p>
 455
 456 <p>Her er bokmålsoppgaven fra eksamenen:</p>
 457
 458 <blockquote>
 459 <p>Drøft utfordringene knyttet til nasjonalstatenes og andre aktørers
 460 rolle og muligheter til å håndtere internasjonale utfordringer, som
 461 for eksempel flykningekrisen.</p>
 462
 463 <p>Vedlegge er eksempler på tekster som kan gi relevante perspektiver
 464 på temaet:</p>
 465 <ol>
 466 <li>Flykningeregnskapet 2016, UNHCR og IDMC
 467 <li>«Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015
 468 </ol>
 469
 470 </blockquote>
 471
 472 <p>Dette oversetter Apertium slik:</p>
 473
 474 <blockquote>
 475 <p>Drøft utfordringane knytte til nasjonalstatane sine og rolla til
 476 andre aktørar og høve til å handtera internasjonale utfordringar, som
 477 til dømes *flykningekrisen.</p>
 478
 479 <p>Vedleggja er døme på tekster som kan gje relevante perspektiv på
 480 temaet:</p>
 481
 482 <ol>
 483 <li>*Flykningeregnskapet 2016, *UNHCR og *IDMC</li>
 484 <li>«*Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015</li>
 485 </ol>
 486
 487 </blockquote>
 488
 489 <p>Ord som ikke ble forstått er markert med stjerne (*), og trenger
 490 ekstra språksjekk.  Men ingen ord er forsvunnet, slik det var i
 491 oppgaven elevene fikk presentert på eksamen.  Jeg mistenker dog at
 492 "andre aktørers rolle og muligheter til ..." burde vært oversatt til
 493 "rolla til andre aktørar og deira høve til ..." eller noe slikt, men
 494 det er kanskje flisespikking.  Det understreker vel bare at det alltid
 495 trengs korrekturlesning etter automatisk oversettelse.</p>
 496
 497       </div>
 498       <div class="tags">
 499
 500
 501         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>.
 502
 503
 504       </div>
 505     </div>
 506     <div class="padding"></div>
 507
 508     <div class="entry">
 509       <div class="title">
 510         <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>
 511       </div>
 512       <div class="date">
 513          9th March 2017
 514       </div>
 515       <div class="body">
 516         <p>Over the years, administrating thousand of NFS mounting linux
 517 computers at the time, I often needed a way to detect if the machine
 518 was experiencing NFS hang.  If you try to use <tt>df</tt> or look at a
 519 file or directory affected by the hang, the process (and possibly the
 520 shell) will hang too.  So you want to be able to detect this without
 521 risking the detection process getting stuck too.  It has not been
 522 obvious how to do this.  When the hang has lasted a while, it is
 523 possible to find messages like these in dmesg:</p>
 524
 525 <p><blockquote>
 526 nfs: server nfsserver not responding, still trying
 527 <br>nfs: server nfsserver OK
 528 </blockquote></p>
 529
 530 <p>It is hard to know if the hang is still going on, and it is hard to
 531 be sure looking in dmesg is going to work.  If there are lots of other
 532 messages in dmesg the lines might have rotated out of site before they
 533 are noticed.</p>
 534
 535 <p>While reading through the nfs client implementation in linux kernel
 536 code, I came across some statistics that seem to give a way to detect
 537 it.  The om_timeouts sunrpc value in the kernel will increase every
 538 time the above log entry is inserted into dmesg.  And after digging a
 539 bit further, I discovered that this value show up in
 540 /proc/self/mountstats on Linux.</p>
 541
 542 <p>The mountstats content seem to be shared between files using the
 543 same file system context, so it is enough to check one of the
 544 mountstats files to get the state of the mount point for the machine.
 545 I assume this will not show lazy umounted NFS points, nor NFS mount
 546 points in a different process context (ie with a different filesystem
 547 view), but that does not worry me.</p>
 548
 549 <p>The content for a NFS mount point look similar to this:</p>
 550
 551 <p><blockquote><pre>
 552 [...]
 553 device /dev/mapper/Debian-var mounted on /var with fstype ext3
 554 device nfsserver:/mnt/nfsserver/home0 mounted on /mnt/nfsserver/home0 with fstype nfs statvers=1.1
 555         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
 556         age:    7863311
 557         caps:   caps=0x3fe7,wtmult=4096,dtsize=8192,bsize=0,namlen=255
 558         sec:    flavor=1,pseudoflavor=1
 559         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
 560         bytes:  166253035039 219519120027 0 0 40783504807 185466229638 11677877 45561809
 561         RPC iostats version: 1.0  p/v: 100003/3 (nfs)
 562         xprt:   tcp 925 1 6810 0 0 111505412 111480497 109 2672418560317 0 248 53869103 22481820
 563         per-op statistics
 564                 NULL: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
 565              GETATTR: 61063106 61063108 0 9621383060 6839064400 453650 77291321 78926132
 566              SETATTR: 463469 463470 0 92005440 66739536 63787 603235 687943
 567               LOOKUP: 17021657 17021657 0 3354097764 4013442928 57216 35125459 35566511
 568               ACCESS: 14281703 14290009 5 2318400592 1713803640 1709282 4865144 7130140
 569             READLINK: 125 125 0 20472 18620 0 1112 1118
 570                 READ: 4214236 4214237 0 715608524 41328653212 89884 22622768 22806693
 571                WRITE: 8479010 8494376 22 187695798568 1356087148 178264904 51506907 231671771
 572               CREATE: 171708 171708 0 38084748 46702272 873 1041833 1050398
 573                MKDIR: 3680 3680 0 773980 993920 26 23990 24245
 574              SYMLINK: 903 903 0 233428 245488 6 5865 5917
 575                MKNOD: 80 80 0 20148 21760 0 299 304
 576               REMOVE: 429921 429921 0 79796004 61908192 3313 2710416 2741636
 577                RMDIR: 3367 3367 0 645112 484848 22 5782 6002
 578               RENAME: 466201 466201 0 130026184 121212260 7075 5935207 5961288
 579                 LINK: 289155 289155 0 72775556 67083960 2199 2565060 2585579
 580              READDIR: 2933237 2933237 0 516506204 13973833412 10385 3190199 3297917
 581          READDIRPLUS: 1652839 1652839 0 298640972 6895997744 84735 14307895 14448937
 582               FSSTAT: 6144 6144 0 1010516 1032192 51 9654 10022
 583               FSINFO: 2 2 0 232 328 0 1 1
 584             PATHCONF: 1 1 0 116 140 0 0 0
 585               COMMIT: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
 586
 587 device binfmt_misc mounted on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc with fstype binfmt_misc
 588 [...]
 589 </pre></blockquote></p>
 590
 591 <p>The key number to look at is the third number in the per-op list.
 592 It is the number of NFS timeouts experiences per file system
 593 operation.  Here 22 write timeouts and 5 access timeouts.  If these
 594 numbers are increasing, I believe the machine is experiencing NFS
 595 hang.  Unfortunately the timeout value do not start to increase right
 596 away.  The NFS operations need to time out first, and this can take a
 597 while.  The exact timeout value depend on the setup.  For example the
 598 defaults for TCP and UDP mount points are quite different, and the
 599 timeout value is affected by the soft, hard, timeo and retrans NFS
 600 mount options.</p>
 601
 602 <p>The only way I have been able to get working on Debian and RedHat
 603 Enterprise Linux for getting the timeout count is to peek in /proc/.
 604 But according to
 605 <ahref="http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19253-01/816-4555/netmonitor-12/index.html">Solaris
 606 10 System Administration Guide: Network Services</a>, the 'nfsstat -c'
 607 command can be used to get these timeout values.  But this do not work
 608 on Linux, as far as I can tell.  I
 609 <ahref="http://bugs.debian.org/857043">asked Debian about this</a>,
 610 but have not seen any replies yet.</p>
 611
 612 <p>Is there a better way to figure out if a Linux NFS client is
 613 experiencing NFS hangs?  Is there a way to detect which processes are
 614 affected?  Is there a way to get the NFS mount going quickly once the
 615 network problem causing the NFS hang has been cleared?  I would very
 616 much welcome some clues, as we regularly run into NFS hangs.</p>
 617
 618       </div>
 619       <div class="tags">
 620
 621
 622         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>.
 623
 624
 625       </div>
 626     </div>
 627     <div class="padding"></div>
 628
 629     <div class="entry">
 630       <div class="title">
 631         <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>
 632       </div>
 633       <div class="date">
 634          3rd March 2017
 635       </div>
 636       <div class="body">
 637         <p>For almost a year now, we have been working on making a Norwegian
 638 Bokmål edition of <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian
 639 Administrator's Handbook</a>.  Now, thanks to the tireless effort of
 640 Ole-Erik, Ingrid and Andreas, the initial translation is complete, and
 641 we are working on the proof reading to ensure consistent language and
 642 use of correct computer science terms.  The plan is to make the book
 643 available on paper, as well as in electronic form.  For that to
 644 happen, the proof reading must be completed and all the figures need
 645 to be translated.  If you want to help out, get in touch.</p>
 646
 647 <p><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-handbook/debian-handbook-nb-NO.pdf">A
 648
 649 fresh PDF edition</a> in A4 format (the final book will have smaller
 650 pages) of the book created every morning is available for
 651 proofreading.  If you find any errors, please
 652 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">visit
 653 Weblate and correct the error</a>.  The
 654 <a href="http://l.github.io/debian-handbook/stat/nb-NO/index.html">state
 655 of the translation including figures</a> is a useful source for those
 656 provide Norwegian bokmål screen shots and figures.</p>
 657
 658       </div>
 659       <div class="tags">
 660
 661
 662         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>.
 663
 664
 665       </div>
 666     </div>
 667     <div class="padding"></div>
 668
 669     <div class="entry">
 670       <div class="title">
 671         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlimited_randomness_with_the_ChaosKey_.html">Unlimited randomness with the ChaosKey?</a>
 672       </div>
 673       <div class="date">
 674          1st March 2017
 675       </div>
 676       <div class="body">
 677         <p>A few days ago I ordered a small batch of
 678 <a href="http://altusmetrum.org/ChaosKey/">the ChaosKey</a>, a small
 679 USB dongle for generating entropy created by Bdale Garbee and Keith
 680 Packard.  Yesterday it arrived, and I am very happy to report that it
 681 work great!  According to its designers, to get it to work out of the
 682 box, you need the Linux kernel version 4.1 or later.  I tested on a
 683 Debian Stretch machine (kernel version 4.9), and there it worked just
 684 fine, increasing the available entropy very quickly.  I wrote a small
 685 test oneliner to test.  It first print the current entropy level,
 686 drain /dev/random, and then print the entropy level for five seconds.
 687 Here is the situation without the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
 688
 689 <blockquote><pre>
 690 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 691   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
 692   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
 693      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 694      sleep 1; \
 695   done
 696 300
 697 0+1 oppføringer inn
 698 0+1 oppføringer ut
 699 28 byte kopiert, 0,000264565 s, 106 kB/s
 700 4
 701 8
 702 12
 703 17
 704 21
 705 %
 706 </pre></blockquote>
 707
 708 <p>The entropy level increases by 3-4 every second.  In such case any
 709 application requiring random bits (like a HTTPS enabled web server)
 710 will halt and wait for more entrpy.  And here is the situation with
 711 the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
 712
 713 <blockquote><pre>
 714 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 715   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
 716   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
 717      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
 718      sleep 1; \
 719   done
 720 1079
 721 0+1 oppføringer inn
 722 0+1 oppføringer ut
 723 104 byte kopiert, 0,000487647 s, 213 kB/s
 724 433
 725 1028
 726 1031
 727 1035
 728 1038
 729 %
 730 </pre></blockquote>
 731
 732 <p>Quite the difference. :) I bought a few more than I need, in case
 733 someone want to buy one here in Norway. :)</p>
 734
 735 <p>Update: The dongle was presented at Debconf last year.  You might
 736 find <a href="https://debconf16.debconf.org/talks/94/">the talk
 737 recording illuminating</a>.  It explains exactly what the source of
 738 randomness is, if you are unable to spot it from the schema drawing
 739 available from the ChaosKey web site linked at the start of this blog
 740 post.</p>
 741
 742       </div>
 743       <div class="tags">
 744
 745
 746         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>.
 747
 748
 749       </div>
 750     </div>
 751     <div class="padding"></div>
 752
 753     <div class="entry">
 754       <div class="title">
 755         <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>
 756       </div>
 757       <div class="date">
 758          9th January 2017
 759       </div>
 760       <div class="body">
 761         <p>Did you ever wonder where the web trafic really flow to reach the
 762 web servers, and who own the network equipment it is flowing through?
 763 It is possible to get a glimpse of this from using traceroute, but it
 764 is hard to find all the details.  Many years ago, I wrote a system to
 765 map the Norwegian Internet (trying to figure out if our plans for a
 766 network game service would get low enough latency, and who we needed
 767 to talk to about setting up game servers close to the users.  Back
 768 then I used traceroute output from many locations (I asked my friends
 769 to run a script and send me their traceroute output) to create the
 770 graph and the map.  The output from traceroute typically look like
 771 this:
 772
 773 <p><pre>
 774 traceroute to www.stortinget.no (85.88.67.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
 775  1  uio-gw10.uio.no (129.240.202.1)  0.447 ms  0.486 ms  0.621 ms
 776  2  uio-gw8.uio.no (129.240.24.229)  0.467 ms  0.578 ms  0.675 ms
 777  3  oslo-gw1.uninett.no (128.39.65.17)  0.385 ms  0.373 ms  0.358 ms
 778  4  te3-1-2.br1.fn3.as2116.net (193.156.90.3)  1.174 ms  1.172 ms  1.153 ms
 779  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
 780  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
 781  7  89.191.10.146 (89.191.10.146)  0.931 ms  0.917 ms  0.955 ms
 782  8  * * *
 783  9  * * *
 784 [...]
 785 </pre></p>
 786
 787 <p>This show the DNS names and IP addresses of (at least some of the)
 788 network equipment involved in getting the data traffic from me to the
 789 www.stortinget.no server, and how long it took in milliseconds for a
 790 package to reach the equipment and return to me.  Three packages are
 791 sent, and some times the packages do not follow the same path.  This
 792 is shown for hop 5, where three different IP addresses replied to the
 793 traceroute request.</p>
 794
 795 <p>There are many ways to measure trace routes.  Other good traceroute
 796 implementations I use are traceroute (using ICMP packages) mtr (can do
 797 both ICMP, UDP and TCP) and scapy (python library with ICMP, UDP, TCP
 798 traceroute and a lot of other capabilities).  All of them are easily
 799 available in <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>.</p>
 800
 801 <p>This time around, I wanted to know the geographic location of
 802 different route points, to visualize how visiting a web page spread
 803 information about the visit to a lot of servers around the globe.  The
 804 background is that a web site today often will ask the browser to get
 805 from many servers the parts (for example HTML, JSON, fonts,
 806 JavaScript, CSS, video) required to display the content.  This will
 807 leak information about the visit to those controlling these servers
 808 and anyone able to peek at the data traffic passing by (like your ISP,
 809 the ISPs backbone provider, FRA, GCHQ, NSA and others).</p>
 810
 811 <p>Lets pick an example, the Norwegian parliament web site
 812 www.stortinget.no.  It is read daily by all members of parliament and
 813 their staff, as well as political journalists, activits and many other
 814 citizens of Norway.  A visit to the www.stortinget.no web site will
 815 ask your browser to contact 8 other servers: ajax.googleapis.com,
 816 insights.hotjar.com, script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com,
 817 stats.g.doubleclick.net, www.google-analytics.com,
 818 www.googletagmanager.com and www.netigate.se.  I extracted this by
 819 asking <a href="http://phantomjs.org/">PhantomJS</a> to visit the
 820 Stortinget web page and tell me all the URLs PhantomJS downloaded to
 821 render the page (in HAR format using
 822 <a href="https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/blob/master/examples/netsniff.js">their
 823 netsniff example</a>.  I am very grateful to Gorm for showing me how
 824 to do this).  My goal is to visualize network traces to all IP
 825 addresses behind these DNS names, do show where visitors personal
 826 information is spread when visiting the page.</p>
 827
 828 <p align="center"><a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml"><img
 829 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>
 830
 831 <p>When I had a look around for options, I could not find any good
 832 free software tools to do this, and decided I needed my own traceroute
 833 wrapper outputting KML based on locations looked up using GeoIP.  KML
 834 is easy to work with and easy to generate, and understood by several
 835 of the GIS tools I have available.  I got good help from by NUUG
 836 colleague Anders Einar with this, and the result can be seen in
 837 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/kmltraceroute">my
 838 kmltraceroute git repository</a>.  Unfortunately, the quality of the
 839 free GeoIP databases I could find (and the for-pay databases my
 840 friends had access to) is not up to the task.  The IP addresses of
 841 central Internet infrastructure would typically be placed near the
 842 controlling companies main office, and not where the router is really
 843 located, as you can see from <a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml">the
 844 KML file I created</a> using the GeoLite City dataset from MaxMind.
 845
 846 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg"><img
 847 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>
 848
 849 <p>I also had a look at the visual traceroute graph created by
 850 <a href="http://www.secdev.org/projects/scapy/">the scrapy project</a>,
 851 showing IP network ownership (aka AS owner) for the IP address in
 852 question.
 853 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg">The
 854 graph display a lot of useful information about the traceroute in SVG
 855 format</a>, and give a good indication on who control the network
 856 equipment involved, but it do not include geolocation.  This graph
 857 make it possible to see the information is made available at least for
 858 UNINETT, Catchcom, Stortinget, Nordunet, Google, Amazon, Telia, Level
 859 3 Communications and NetDNA.</p>
 860
 861 <p align="center"><a href="https://geotraceroute.com/index.php?node=4&host=www.stortinget.no"><img
 862 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>
 863
 864 <p>In the process, I came across the
 865 <a href="https://geotraceroute.com/">web service GeoTraceroute</a> by
 866 Salim Gasmi.  Its methology of combining guesses based on DNS names,
 867 various location databases and finally use latecy times to rule out
 868 candidate locations seemed to do a very good job of guessing correct
 869 geolocation.  But it could only do one trace at the time, did not have
 870 a sensor in Norway and did not make the geolocations easily available
 871 for postprocessing.  So I contacted the developer and asked if he
 872 would be willing to share the code (he refused until he had time to
 873 clean it up), but he was interested in providing the geolocations in a
 874 machine readable format, and willing to set up a sensor in Norway.  So
 875 since yesterday, it is possible to run traces from Norway in this
 876 service thanks to a sensor node set up by
 877 <a href="https://www.nuug.no/">the NUUG assosiation</a>, and get the
 878 trace in KML format for further processing.</p>
 879
 880 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.kml"><img
 881 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>
 882
 883 <p>Here we can see a lot of trafic passes Sweden on its way to
 884 Denmark, Germany, Holland and Ireland.  Plenty of places where the
 885 Snowden confirmations verified the traffic is read by various actors
 886 without your best interest as their top priority.</p>
 887
 888 <p>Combining KML files is trivial using a text editor, so I could loop
 889 over all the hosts behind the urls imported by www.stortinget.no and
 890 ask for the KML file from GeoTraceroute, and create a combined KML
 891 file with all the traces (unfortunately only one of the IP addresses
 892 behind the DNS name is traced this time.  To get them all, one would
 893 have to request traces using IP number instead of DNS names from
 894 GeoTraceroute).  That might be the next step in this project.</p>
 895
 896 <p>Armed with these tools, I find it a lot easier to figure out where
 897 the IP traffic moves and who control the boxes involved in moving it.
 898 And every time the link crosses for example the Swedish border, we can
 899 be sure Swedish Signal Intelligence (FRA) is listening, as GCHQ do in
 900 Britain and NSA in USA and cables around the globe.  (Hm, what should
 901 we tell them? :) Keep that in mind if you ever send anything
 902 unencrypted over the Internet.</p>
 903
 904 <p>PS: KML files are drawn using
 905 <a href="http://ivanrublev.me/kml/">the KML viewer from Ivan
 906 Rublev<a/>, as it was less cluttered than the local Linux application
 907 Marble.  There are heaps of other options too.</p>
 908
 909 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 910 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 911 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 912
 913       </div>
 914       <div class="tags">
 915
 916
 917         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>.
 918
 919
 920       </div>
 921     </div>
 922     <div class="padding"></div>
 923
 924     <div class="entry">
 925       <div class="title">
 926         <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>
 927       </div>
 928       <div class="date">
 929         23rd December 2016
 930       </div>
 931       <div class="body">
 932         <p>I received a very nice Christmas present today.  As my regular
 933 readers probably know, I have been working on the
 934 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the Isenkram
 935 system</a> for many years.  The goal of the Isenkram system is to make
 936 it easier for users to figure out what to install to get a given piece
 937 of hardware to work in Debian, and a key part of this system is a way
 938 to map hardware to packages.  Isenkram have its own mapping database,
 939 and also uses data provided by each package using the AppStream
 940 metadata format.  And today,
 941 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/appstream">AppStream</a> in
 942 Debian learned to look up hardware the same way Isenkram is doing it,
 943 ie using fnmatch():</p>
 944
 945 <p><pre>
 946 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias \
 947   usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
 948 Identifier: pymissile [generic]
 949 Name: pymissile
 950 Summary: Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher
 951 Package: pymissile
 952 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias usb:v0694p0002d0000
 953 Identifier: libnxt [generic]
 954 Name: libnxt
 955 Summary: utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NXT brick
 956 Package: libnxt
 957 ---
 958 Identifier: t2n [generic]
 959 Name: t2n
 960 Summary: Simple command-line tool for Lego NXT
 961 Package: t2n
 962 ---
 963 Identifier: python-nxt [generic]
 964 Name: python-nxt
 965 Summary: Python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot
 966 Package: python-nxt
 967 ---
 968 Identifier: nbc [generic]
 969 Name: nbc
 970 Summary: C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks
 971 Package: nbc
 972 %
 973 </pre></p>
 974
 975 <p>A similar query can be done using the combined AppStream and
 976 Isenkram databases using the isenkram-lookup tool:</p>
 977
 978 <p><pre>
 979 % isenkram-lookup usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
 980 pymissile
 981 % isenkram-lookup usb:v0694p0002d0000
 982 libnxt
 983 nbc
 984 python-nxt
 985 t2n
 986 %
 987 </pre></p>
 988
 989 <p>You can find modalias values relevant for your machine using
 990 <tt>cat $(find /sys/devices/ -name modalias)</tt>.
 991
 992 <p>If you want to make this system a success and help Debian users
 993 make the most of the hardware they have, please
 994 help<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add
 995 AppStream metadata for your package following the guidelines</a>
 996 documented in the wiki.  So far only 11 packages provide such
 997 information, among the several hundred hardware specific packages in
 998 Debian. The Isenkram database on the other hand contain 101 packages,
 999 mostly related to USB dongles.  Most of the packages with hardware
1000 mapping in AppStream are LEGO Mindstorms related, because I have, as
1001 part of my involvement in
1002 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the Debian LEGO
1003 team</a> given priority to making sure LEGO users get proposed the
1004 complete set of packages in Debian for that particular hardware.  The
1005 team also got a nice Christmas present today.  The
1006 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/nxt-firmware">nxt-firmware
1007 package</a> made it into Debian.  With this package in place, it is
1008 now possible to use the LEGO Mindstorms NXT unit with only free
1009 software, as the nxt-firmware package contain the source and firmware
1010 binaries for the NXT brick.</p>
1011
1012 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1013 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1014 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1015
1016       </div>
1017       <div class="tags">
1018
1019
1020         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>.
1021
1022
1023       </div>
1024     </div>
1025     <div class="padding"></div>
1026
1027     <div class="entry">
1028       <div class="title">
1029         <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>
1030       </div>
1031       <div class="date">
1032         20th December 2016
1033       </div>
1034       <div class="body">
1035         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
1036 system</a> I wrote two years ago to make it easier in Debian to find
1037 and install packages to get your hardware dongles to work, is still
1038 going strong.  It is a system to look up the hardware present on or
1039 connected to the current system, and map the hardware to Debian
1040 packages.  It can either be done using the tools in isenkram-cli or
1041 using the user space daemon in the isenkram package.  The latter will
1042 notify you, when inserting new hardware, about what packages to
1043 install to get the dongle working.  It will even provide a button to
1044 click on to ask packagekit to install the packages.</p>
1045
1046 <p>Here is an command line example from my Thinkpad laptop:</p>
1047
1048 <p><pre>
1049 % isenkram-lookup
1050 bluez
1051 cheese
1052 ethtool
1053 fprintd
1054 fprintd-demo
1055 gkrellm-thinkbat
1056 hdapsd
1057 libpam-fprintd
1058 pidgin-blinklight
1059 thinkfan
1060 tlp
1061 tp-smapi-dkms
1062 tp-smapi-source
1063 tpb
1064 %
1065 </pre></p>
1066
1067 <p>It can also list the firware package providing firmware requested
1068 by the load kernel modules, which in my case is an empty list because
1069 I have all the firmware my machine need:
1070
1071 <p><pre>
1072 % /usr/sbin/isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
1073 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
1074 %
1075 </pre></p>
1076
1077 <p>The last few days I had a look at several of the around 250
1078 packages in Debian with udev rules.  These seem like good candidates
1079 to install when a given hardware dongle is inserted, and I found
1080 several that should be proposed by isenkram.  I have not had time to
1081 check all of them, but am happy to report that now there are 97
1082 packages packages mapped to hardware by Isenkram.  11 of these
1083 packages provide hardware mapping using AppStream, while the rest are
1084 listed in the modaliases file provided in isenkram.</p>
1085
1086 <p>These are the packages with hardware mappings at the moment.  The
1087 <strong>marked packages</strong> are also announcing their hardware
1088 support using AppStream, for everyone to use:</p>
1089
1090 <p>air-quality-sensor, alsa-firmware-loaders, argyll,
1091 <strong>array-info</strong>, avarice, avrdude, b43-fwcutter,
1092 bit-babbler, bluez, bluez-firmware, <strong>brltty</strong>,
1093 <strong>broadcom-sta-dkms</strong>, calibre, cgminer, cheese, colord,
1094 <strong>colorhug-client</strong>, dahdi-firmware-nonfree, dahdi-linux,
1095 dfu-util, dolphin-emu, ekeyd, ethtool, firmware-ipw2x00, fprintd,
1096 fprintd-demo, <strong>galileo</strong>, gkrellm-thinkbat, gphoto2,
1097 gpsbabel, gpsbabel-gui, gpsman, gpstrans, gqrx-sdr, gr-fcdproplus,
1098 gr-osmosdr, gtkpod, hackrf, hdapsd, hdmi2usb-udev, hpijs-ppds, hplip,
1099 ipw3945-source, ipw3945d, kde-config-tablet, kinect-audio-setup,
1100 <strong>libnxt</strong>, libpam-fprintd, <strong>lomoco</strong>,
1101 madwimax, minidisc-utils, mkgmap, msi-keyboard, mtkbabel,
1102 <strong>nbc</strong>, <strong>nqc</strong>, nut-hal-drivers, ola,
1103 open-vm-toolbox, open-vm-tools, openambit, pcgminer, pcmciautils,
1104 pcscd, pidgin-blinklight, printer-driver-splix,
1105 <strong>pymissile</strong>, python-nxt, qlandkartegt,
1106 qlandkartegt-garmin, rosegarden, rt2x00-source, sispmctl,
1107 soapysdr-module-hackrf, solaar, squeak-plugins-scratch, sunxi-tools,
1108 <strong>t2n</strong>, thinkfan, thinkfinger-tools, tlp, tp-smapi-dkms,
1109 tp-smapi-source, tpb, tucnak, uhd-host, usbmuxd, viking,
1110 virtualbox-ose-guest-x11, w1retap, xawtv, xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse,
1111 xserver-xorg-input-wacom, xserver-xorg-video-qxl,
1112 xserver-xorg-video-vmware, yubikey-personalization and
1113 zd1211-firmware</p>
1114
1115 <p>If you know of other packages, please let me know with a wishlist
1116 bug report against the isenkram-cli package, and ask the package
1117 maintainer to
1118 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add AppStream
1119 metadata according to the guidelines</a> to provide the information
1120 for everyone.  In time, I hope to get rid of the isenkram specific
1121 hardware mapping and depend exclusively on AppStream.</p>
1122
1123 <p>Note, the AppStream metadata for broadcom-sta-dkms is matching too
1124 much hardware, and suggest that the package with with any ethernet
1125 card.  See <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/838735">bug #838735</a> for
1126 the details.  I hope the maintainer find time to address it soon.  In
1127 the mean time I provide an override in isenkram.</p>
1128
1129       </div>
1130       <div class="tags">
1131
1132
1133         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>.
1134
1135
1136       </div>
1137     </div>
1138     <div class="padding"></div>
1139
1140     <div class="entry">
1141       <div class="title">
1142         <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>
1143       </div>
1144       <div class="date">
1145         11th December 2016
1146       </div>
1147       <div class="body">
1148         <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-12-11-nice-oolite.png"/></p>
1149
1150 <p>In my early years, I played
1151 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Classic_Elite">the epic game
1152 Elite</a> on my PC.  I spent many months trading and fighting in
1153 space, and reached the 'elite' fighting status before I moved on.  The
1154 original Elite game was available on Commodore 64 and the IBM PC
1155 edition I played had a 64 KB executable.  I am still impressed today
1156 that the authors managed to squeeze both a 3D engine and details about
1157 more than 2000 planet systems across 7 galaxies into a binary so
1158 small.</p>
1159
1160 <p>I have known about <a href="http://www.oolite.org/">the free
1161 software game Oolite inspired by Elite</a> for a while, but did not
1162 really have time to test it properly until a few days ago.  It was
1163 great to discover that my old knowledge about trading routes were
1164 still valid.  But my fighting and flying abilities were gone, so I had
1165 to retrain to be able to dock on a space station.  And I am still not
1166 able to make much resistance when I am attacked by pirates, so I
1167 bougth and mounted the most powerful laser in the rear to be able to
1168 put up at least some resistance while fleeing for my life. :)</p>
1169
1170 <p>When playing Elite in the late eighties, I had to discover
1171 everything on my own, and I had long lists of prices seen on different
1172 planets to be able to decide where to trade what.  This time I had the
1173 advantages of the
1174 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Main_Page">Elite wiki</a>,
1175 where information about each planet is easily available with common
1176 price ranges and suggested trading routes.  This improved my ability
1177 to earn money and I have been able to earn enough to buy a lot of
1178 useful equipent in a few days.  I believe I originally played for
1179 months before I could get a docking computer, while now I could get it
1180 after less then a week.</p>
1181
1182 <p>If you like science fiction and dreamed of a life as a vagabond in
1183 space, you should try out Oolite.  It is available for Linux, MacOSX
1184 and Windows, and is included in Debian and derivatives since 2011.</p>
1185
1186 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1187 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1188 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1189
1190       </div>
1191       <div class="tags">
1192
1193
1194         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>.
1195
1196
1197       </div>
1198     </div>
1199     <div class="padding"></div>
1200
1201     <div class="entry">
1202       <div class="title">
1203         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Quicker_Debian_installations_using_eatmydata.html">Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</a>
1204       </div>
1205       <div class="date">
1206         25th November 2016
1207       </div>
1208       <div class="body">
1209         <p>Two years ago, I did some experiments with eatmydata and the Debian
1210 installation system, observing how using
1211 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">eatmydata
1212 could speed up the installation</a> quite a bit.  My testing measured
1213 speedup around 20-40 percent for Debian Edu, where we install around
1214 1000 packages from within the installer.  The eatmydata package
1215 provide a way to disable/delay file system flushing.  This is a bit
1216 risky in the general case, as files that should be stored on disk will
1217 stay only in memory a bit longer than expected, causing problems if a
1218 machine crashes at an inconvenient time.  But for an installation, if
1219 the machine crashes during installation the process is normally
1220 restarted, and avoiding disk operations as much as possible to speed
1221 up the process make perfect sense.
1222
1223 <p>I added code in the Debian Edu specific installation code to enable
1224 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libeatmydata">eatmydata</a>,
1225 but did not have time to push it any further.  But a few months ago I
1226 picked it up again and worked with the libeatmydata package maintainer
1227 Mattia Rizzolo to make it easier for everyone to get this installation
1228 speedup in Debian.  Thanks to our cooperation There is now an
1229 eatmydata-udeb package in Debian testing and unstable, and simply
1230 enabling/installing it in debian-installer (d-i) is enough to get the
1231 quicker installations.  It can be enabled using preseeding.  The
1232 following untested kernel argument should do the trick:</p>
1233
1234 <blockquote><pre>
1235 preseed/early_command="anna-install eatmydata-udeb"
1236 </pre></blockquote>
1237
1238 <p>This should ask d-i to install the package inside the d-i
1239 environment early in the installation sequence.  Having it installed
1240 in d-i in turn will make sure the relevant scripts are called just
1241 after debootstrap filled /target/ with the freshly installed Debian
1242 system to configure apt to run dpkg with eatmydata.  This is enough to
1243 speed up the installation process.  There is a proposal to
1244 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/841153">extend the idea a bit further
1245 by using /etc/ld.so.preload instead of apt.conf</a>, but I have not
1246 tested its impact.</p>
1247
1248
1249       </div>
1250       <div class="tags">
1251
1252
1253         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>.
1254
1255
1256       </div>
1257     </div>
1258     <div class="padding"></div>
1259
1260     <div class="entry">
1261       <div class="title">
1262         <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>
1263       </div>
1264       <div class="date">
1265         24th November 2016
1266       </div>
1267       <div class="body">
1268         <p>I Norge er det mange som trenger å skrive både bokmål og nynorsk.
1269 Eksamensoppgaver, offentlige brev og nyheter er eksempler på tekster
1270 der det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skoleoppgavene som
1271 elever over det ganske land skal levere inn hvert år.  Det mange ikke
1272 vet er at selv om de kommersielle alternativene
1273 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google Translate</a> og
1274 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing Translator</a> ikke kan
1275 bidra med å oversette mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finnes det et
1276 utmerket fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Oversetterverktøyet
1277 Apertium har støtte for en rekke språkkombinasjoner, og takket være
1278 den utrettelige innsatsen til blant annet Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
1279 en bruke webtjenesten til å fylle inn en tekst på bokmål eller
1280 nynorsk, og få den automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
1281 Resultatet er ikke perfekt, men et svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og til
1282 er resultatet så bra at det kan benyttes uten endringer.  Jeg vet
1283 f.eks. at store deler av Joomla ble oversatt til nynorsk ved hjelp
1284 Apertium.  Høres det ut som noe du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så fall
1285 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
1286 teksten din i webskjemaet der.
1287
1288 <p>Hvis du trenger maskinell tilgang til den bakenforliggende
1289 teknologien kan du enten installere pakken
1290 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">apertium-nno-nob</a>
1291 på en Debian-maskin eller bruke web-API-et tilgjengelig fra
1292 api.apertium.org.  Se
1293 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">API-dokumentasjonen</a>
1294 for detaljer om web-API-et.  Her kan du se hvordan resultatet blir for
1295 denne teksten som ble skrevet på bokmål over maskinoversatt til
1296 nynorsk.</p>
1297
1298 <hr/>
1299
1300 <p>I Noreg er det mange som treng å skriva både bokmål og nynorsk.
1301 Eksamensoppgåver, offentlege brev og nyhende er døme på tekster der
1302 det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skuleoppgåvene som
1303 elevar over det ganske land skal levera inn kvart år.  Det mange ikkje
1304 veit er at sjølv om dei kommersielle alternativa
1305 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google *Translate</a> og
1306 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing *Translator</a> ikkje
1307 kan bidra med å omsetja mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finst det eit
1308 utmerka fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Omsetjarverktøyet
1309 *Apertium har støtte for ei rekkje språkkombinasjonar, og takka vera
1310 den utrøyttelege innsatsen til blant anna Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
1311 ein bruka *webtjenesten til å fylla inn ei tekst på bokmål eller
1312 nynorsk, og få den *automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
1313 Resultatet er ikkje perfekt, men eit svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og
1314 til er resultatet så bra at det kan nyttast utan endringar.  Eg veit
1315 t.d. at store delar av *Joomla vart omsett til nynorsk ved hjelp
1316 *Apertium.  Høyrast det ut som noko du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så
1317 fall <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">*Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
1318 teksta di i *webskjemaet der.
1319
1320 <p>Viss du treng *maskinell tilgjenge til den *bakenforliggende
1321 teknologien kan du anten installera pakken
1322 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">*apertium-*nno-*nob</a>
1323 på ein *Debian-maskin eller bruka *web-*API-eit tilgjengeleg frå
1324 *api.*apertium.org.  Sjå
1325 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">*API-dokumentasjonen</a>
1326 for detaljar om *web-*API-eit.  Her kan du sjå korleis resultatet vert
1327 for denne teksta som vart skreva på bokmål over *maskinoversatt til
1328 nynorsk.</p>
1329
1330       </div>
1331       <div class="tags">
1332
1333
1334         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>.
1335
1336
1337       </div>
1338     </div>
1339     <div class="padding"></div>
1340
1341     <div class="entry">
1342       <div class="title">
1343         <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>
1344       </div>
1345       <div class="date">
1346         13th November 2016
1347       </div>
1348       <div class="body">
1349         <p><a href="http://coz-profiler.org/">The Coz profiler</a>, a nice
1350 profiler able to run benchmarking experiments on the instrumented
1351 multi-threaded program, finally
1352 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/coz-profiler">made it into
1353 Debian unstable yesterday</A>.  Lluís Vilanova and I have spent many
1354 months since
1355 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">I
1356 blogged about the coz tool</a> in August working with upstream to make
1357 it suitable for Debian.  There are still issues with clang
1358 compatibility, inline assembly only working x86 and minimized
1359 JavaScript libraries.</p>
1360
1361 <p>To test it, install 'coz-profiler' using apt and run it like this:</p>
1362
1363 <p><blockquote>
1364 <tt>coz run --- /path/to/binary-with-debug-info</tt>
1365 </blockquote></p>
1366
1367 <p>This will produce a profile.coz file in the current working
1368 directory with the profiling information.  This is then given to a
1369 JavaScript application provided in the package and available from
1370 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">a project web page</a>.
1371 To start the local copy, invoke it in a browser like this:</p>
1372
1373 <p><blockquote>
1374 <tt>sensible-browser /usr/share/coz-profiler/viewer/index.htm</tt>
1375 </blockquote></p>
1376
1377 <p>See the project home page and the
1378 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">USENIX
1379 ;login: article on Coz</a> for more information on how it is
1380 working.</p>
1381
1382       </div>
1383       <div class="tags">
1384
1385
1386         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>.
1387
1388
1389       </div>
1390     </div>
1391     <div class="padding"></div>
1392
1393     <div class="entry">
1394       <div class="title">
1395         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_own_self_balancing_Lego_Segway.html">My own self balancing Lego Segway</a>
1396       </div>
1397       <div class="date">
1398          4th November 2016
1399       </div>
1400       <div class="body">
1401         <p>A while back I received a Gyro sensor for the NXT
1402 <a href="mindstorms.lego.com">Mindstorms</a> controller as a birthday
1403 present.  It had been on my wishlist for a while, because I wanted to
1404 build a Segway like balancing lego robot.  I had already built
1405 <a href="http://www.nxtprograms.com/NXT2/segway/">a simple balancing
1406 robot</a> with the kids, using the light/color sensor included in the
1407 NXT kit as the balance sensor, but it was not working very well.  It
1408 could balance for a while, but was very sensitive to the light
1409 condition in the room and the reflective properties of the surface and
1410 would fall over after a short while.  I wanted something more robust,
1411 and had
1412 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=NGY1044">the
1413 gyro sensor from HiTechnic</a> I believed would solve it on my
1414 wishlist for some years before it suddenly showed up as a gift from my
1415 loved ones. :)</p>
1416
1417 <p>Unfortunately I have not had time to sit down and play with it
1418 since then.  But that changed some days ago, when I was searching for
1419 lego segway information and came across a recipe from HiTechnic for
1420 building
1421 <a href="http://www.hitechnic.com/blog/gyro-sensor/htway/">the
1422 HTWay</a>, a segway like balancing robot.  Build instructions and
1423 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/upload/786-HTWayC.nxc">source
1424 code</a> was included, so it was just a question of putting it all
1425 together.  And thanks to the great work of many Debian developers, the
1426 compiler needed to build the source for the NXT is already included in
1427 Debian, so I was read to go in less than an hour.  The resulting robot
1428 do not look very impressive in its simplicity:</p>
1429
1430 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-robot.jpeg"></p>
1431
1432 <p>Because I lack the infrared sensor used to control the robot in the
1433 design from HiTechnic, I had to comment out the last task
1434 (taskControl).  I simply placed /* and */ around it get the program
1435 working without that sensor present.  Now it balances just fine until
1436 the battery status run low:</p>
1437
1438 <p align="center"><video width="70%" controls="true">
1439    <source src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-balancing.ogv" type="video/ogg">
1440 </video></p>
1441
1442 <p>Now we would like to teach it how to follow a line and take remote
1443 control instructions using the included Bluetooth receiver in the NXT.</p>
1444
1445 <p>If you, like me, love LEGO and want to make sure we find the tools
1446 they need to work with LEGO in Debian and all our derivative
1447 distributions like Ubuntu, check out
1448 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the LEGO designers
1449 project page</a> and join the Debian LEGO team.  Personally I own a
1450 RCX and NXT controller (no EV3), and would like to make sure the
1451 Debian tools needed to program the systems I own work as they
1452 should.</p>
1453
1454       </div>
1455       <div class="tags">
1456
1457
1458         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/lego">lego</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
1459
1460
1461       </div>
1462     </div>
1463     <div class="padding"></div>
1464
1465     <div class="entry">
1466       <div class="title">
1467         <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>
1468       </div>
1469       <div class="date">
1470         10th October 2016
1471       </div>
1472       <div class="body">
1473         <p>In July
1474 <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
1475 wrote how to get the Signal Chrome/Chromium app working</a> without
1476 the ability to receive SMS messages (aka without a cell phone).  It is
1477 time to share some experiences and provide an updated setup.</p>
1478
1479 <p>The Signal app have worked fine for several months now, and I use
1480 it regularly to chat with my loved ones.  I had a major snag at the
1481 end of my summer vacation, when the the app completely forgot my
1482 setup, identity and keys.  The reason behind this major mess was
1483 running out of disk space.  To avoid that ever happening again I have
1484 started storing everything in <tt>userdata/</tt> in git, to be able to
1485 roll back to an earlier version if the files are wiped by mistake.  I
1486 had to use it once after introducing the git backup.  When rolling
1487 back to an earlier version, one need to use the 'reset session' option
1488 in Signal to get going, and notify the people you talk with about the
1489 problem.  I assume there is some sequence number tracking in the
1490 protocol to detect rollback attacks.  The git repository is rather big
1491 (674 MiB so far), but I have not tried to figure out if some of the
1492 content can be added to a .gitignore file due to lack of spare
1493 time.</p>
1494
1495 <p>I've also hit the 90 days timeout blocking, and noticed that this
1496 make it impossible to send messages using Signal.  I could still
1497 receive them, but had to patch the code with a new timestamp to send.
1498 I believe the timeout is added by the developers to force people to
1499 upgrade to the latest version of the app, even when there is no
1500 protocol changes, to reduce the version skew among the user base and
1501 thus try to keep the number of support requests down.</p>
1502
1503 <p>Since my original recipe, the Signal source code changed slightly,
1504 making the old patch fail to apply cleanly.  Below is an updated
1505 patch, including the shell wrapper I use to start Signal.  The
1506 original version required a new user to locate the JavaScript console
1507 and call a function from there.  I got help from a friend with more
1508 JavaScript knowledge than me to modify the code to provide a GUI
1509 button instead.  This mean that to get started you just need to run
1510 the wrapper and click the 'Register without mobile phone' to get going
1511 now.  I've also modified the timeout code to always set it to 90 days
1512 in the future, to avoid having to patch the code regularly.</p>
1513
1514 <p>So, the updated recipe for Debian Jessie:</p>
1515
1516 <ol>
1517
1518 <li>First, install required packages to get the source code and the
1519 browser you need.  Signal only work with Chrome/Chromium, as far as I
1520 know, so you need to install it.
1521
1522 <pre>
1523 apt install git tor chromium
1524 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
1525 </pre></li>
1526
1527 <li>Modify the source code using command listed in the the patch
1528 block below.</li>
1529
1530 <li>Start Signal using the run-signal-app wrapper (for example using
1531 <tt>`pwd`/run-signal-app</tt>).
1532
1533 <li>Click on the 'Register without mobile phone', will in a phone
1534 number you can receive calls to the next minute, receive the
1535 verification code and enter it into the form field and press
1536 'Register'.  Note, the phone number you use will be user Signal
1537 username, ie the way others can find you on Signal.</li>
1538
1539 <li>You can now use Signal to contact others.  Note, new contacts do
1540 not show up in the contact list until you restart Signal, and there is
1541 no way to assign names to Contacts.  There is also no way to create or
1542 update chat groups.  I suspect this is because the web app do not have
1543 a associated contact database.</li>
1544
1545 </ol>
1546
1547 <p>I am still a bit uneasy about using Signal, because of the way its
1548 main author moxie0 reject federation and accept dependencies to major
1549 corporations like Google (part of the code is fetched from Google) and
1550 Amazon (the central coordination point is owned by Amazon).  See for
1551 example
1552 <a href="https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37">the
1553 LibreSignal issue tracker</a> for a thread documenting the authors
1554 view on these issues.  But the network effect is strong in this case,
1555 and several of the people I want to communicate with already use
1556 Signal.  Perhaps we can all move to <a href="https://ring.cx/">Ring</a>
1557 once it <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/830265">work on my
1558 laptop</a>?  It already work on Windows and Android, and is included
1559 in <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/ring">Debian</a> and
1560 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ring">Ubuntu</a>, but not
1561 working on Debian Stable.</p>
1562
1563 <p>Anyway, this is the patch I apply to the Signal code to get it
1564 working.  It switch to the production servers, disable to timeout,
1565 make registration easier and add the shell wrapper:</p>
1566
1567 <pre>
1568 cd Signal-Desktop; cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p1
1569 diff --git a/js/background.js b/js/background.js
1570 index 24b4c1d..579345f 100644
1571 --- a/js/background.js
1572 +++ b/js/background.js
1573 @@ -33,9 +33,9 @@
1574          });
1575      });
1576
1577 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
1578 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org';
1579      var SERVER_PORTS = [80, 4433, 8443];
1580 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
1581 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
1582      var messageReceiver;
1583      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
1584          if (messageReceiver) {
1585 diff --git a/js/expire.js b/js/expire.js
1586 index 639aeae..beb91c3 100644
1587 --- a/js/expire.js
1588 +++ b/js/expire.js
1589 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
1590  ;(function() {
1591      'use strict';
1592 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
1593 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = Date.now() + (90 * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
1594
1595      window.extension = window.extension || {};
1596
1597 diff --git a/js/views/install_view.js b/js/views/install_view.js
1598 index 7816f4f..1d6233b 100644
1599 --- a/js/views/install_view.js
1600 +++ b/js/views/install_view.js
1601 @@ -38,7 +38,8 @@
1602              return {
1603                  'click .step1': this.selectStep.bind(this, 1),
1604                  'click .step2': this.selectStep.bind(this, 2),
1605 -                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3)
1606 +                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3),
1607 +                'click .callreg': function() { extension.install('standalone') },
1608              };
1609          },
1610          clearQR: function() {
1611 diff --git a/options.html b/options.html
1612 index dc0f28e..8d709f6 100644
1613 --- a/options.html
1614 +++ b/options.html
1615 @@ -14,7 +14,10 @@
1616          &lt;div class='nav'>
1617            &lt;h1>{{ installWelcome }}&lt;/h1>
1618            &lt;p>{{ installTagline }}&lt;/p>
1619 -          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a> &lt;/div>
1620 +          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a>
1621 +           &lt;br> &lt;a class="button callreg">Register without mobile phone&lt;/a>
1622 +
1623 +         &lt;/div>
1624            &lt;span class='dot step1 selected'>&lt;/span>
1625            &lt;span class='dot step2'>&lt;/span>
1626            &lt;span class='dot step3'>&lt;/span>
1627 --- /dev/null   2016-10-07 09:55:13.730181472 +0200
1628 +++ b/run-signal-app   2016-10-10 08:54:09.434172391 +0200
1629 @@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
1630 +#!/bin/sh
1631 +set -e
1632 +cd $(dirname $0)
1633 +mkdir -p userdata
1634 +userdata="`pwd`/userdata"
1635 +if [ -d "$userdata" ] && [ ! -d "$userdata/.git" ] ; then
1636 +    (cd $userdata && git init)
1637 +fi
1638 +(cd $userdata && git add . && git commit -m "Current status." || true)
1639 +exec chromium \
1640 +  --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
1641 +  --user-data-dir=$userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
1642 EOF
1643 chmod a+rx run-signal-app
1644 </pre>
1645
1646 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1647 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1648 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1649
1650       </div>
1651       <div class="tags">
1652
1653
1654         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>.
1655
1656
1657       </div>
1658     </div>
1659     <div class="padding"></div>
1660
1661     <div class="entry">
1662       <div class="title">
1663         <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>
1664       </div>
1665       <div class="date">
1666          7th October 2016
1667       </div>
1668       <div class="body">
1669         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
1670 system</a> provide a practical and easy way to figure out which
1671 packages support the hardware in a given machine.  The command line
1672 tool <tt>isenkram-lookup</tt> and the tasksel options provide a
1673 convenient way to list and install packages relevant for the current
1674 hardware during system installation, both user space packages and
1675 firmware packages. The GUI background daemon on the other hand provide
1676 a pop-up proposing to install packages when a new dongle is inserted
1677 while using the computer.  For example, if you plug in a smart card
1678 reader, the system will ask if you want to install <tt>pcscd</tt> if
1679 that package isn't already installed, and if you plug in a USB video
1680 camera the system will ask if you want to install <tt>cheese</tt> if
1681 cheese is currently missing.  This already work just fine.</p>
1682
1683 <p>But Isenkram depend on a database mapping from hardware IDs to
1684 package names.  When I started no such database existed in Debian, so
1685 I made my own data set and included it with the isenkram package and
1686 made isenkram fetch the latest version of this database from git using
1687 http.  This way the isenkram users would get updated package proposals
1688 as soon as I learned more about hardware related packages.</p>
1689
1690 <p>The hardware is identified using modalias strings.  The modalias
1691 design is from the Linux kernel where most hardware descriptors are
1692 made available as a strings that can be matched using filename style
1693 globbing.  It handle USB, PCI, DMI and a lot of other hardware related
1694 identifiers.</p>
1695
1696 <p>The downside to the Isenkram specific database is that there is no
1697 information about relevant distribution / Debian version, making
1698 isenkram propose obsolete packages too.  But along came AppStream, a
1699 cross distribution mechanism to store and collect metadata about
1700 software packages.  When I heard about the proposal, I contacted the
1701 people involved and suggested to add a hardware matching rule using
1702 modalias strings in the specification, to be able to use AppStream for
1703 mapping hardware to packages.  This idea was accepted and AppStream is
1704 now a great way for a package to announce the hardware it support in a
1705 distribution neutral way.  I wrote
1706 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">a
1707 recipe on how to add such meta-information</a> in a blog post last
1708 December.  If you have a hardware related package in Debian, please
1709 announce the relevant hardware IDs using AppStream.</p>
1710
1711 <p>In Debian, almost all packages that can talk to a LEGO Mindestorms
1712 RCX or NXT unit, announce this support using AppStream.  The effect is
1713 that when you insert such LEGO robot controller into your Debian
1714 machine, Isenkram will propose to install the packages needed to get
1715 it working.  The intention is that this should allow the local user to
1716 start programming his robot controller right away without having to
1717 guess what packages to use or which permissions to fix.</p>
1718
1719 <p>But when I sat down with my son the other day to program our NXT
1720 unit using his Debian Stretch computer, I discovered something
1721 annoying.  The local console user (ie my son) did not get access to
1722 the USB device for programming the unit.  This used to work, but no
1723 longer in Jessie and Stretch.  After some investigation and asking
1724 around on #debian-devel, I discovered that this was because udev had
1725 changed the mechanism used to grant access to local devices.  The
1726 ConsoleKit mechanism from <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>
1727 no longer applied, because LDAP users no longer was added to the
1728 plugdev group during login.  Michael Biebl told me that this method
1729 was obsolete and the new method used ACLs instead.  This was good
1730 news, as the plugdev mechanism is a mess when using a remote user
1731 directory like LDAP.  Using ACLs would make sure a user lost device
1732 access when she logged out, even if the user left behind a background
1733 process which would retain the plugdev membership with the ConsoleKit
1734 setup.  Armed with this knowledge I moved on to fix the access problem
1735 for the LEGO Mindstorms related packages.</p>
1736
1737 <p>The new system uses a udev tag, 'uaccess'.  It can either be
1738 applied directly for a device, or is applied in
1739 /lib/udev/rules.d/70-uaccess.rules for classes of devices.  As the
1740 LEGO Mindstorms udev rules did not have a class, I decided to add the
1741 tag directly in the udev rules files included in the packages.  Here
1742 is one example.  For the nqc C compiler for the RCX, the
1743 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/60-nqc.rules</tt> file now look like this:
1744
1745 <p><pre>
1746 SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ACTION=="add", ATTR{idVendor}=="0694", ATTR{idProduct}=="0001", \
1747     SYMLINK+="rcx-%k", TAG+="uaccess"
1748 </pre></p>
1749
1750 <p>The key part is the 'TAG+="uaccess"' at the end.  I suspect all
1751 packages using plugdev in their /lib/udev/rules.d/ files should be
1752 changed to use this tag (either directly or indirectly via
1753 <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>).  Perhaps a lintian check should be created
1754 to detect this?</p>
1755
1756 <p>I've been unable to find good documentation on the uaccess feature.
1757 It is unclear to me if the uaccess tag is an internal implementation
1758 detail like the udev-acl tag used by
1759 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>.  If it is, I guess the
1760 indirect method is the preferred way.  Michael
1761 <a href="https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/4288">asked for more
1762 documentation from the systemd project</a> and I hope it will make
1763 this clearer.  For now I use the generic classes when they exist and
1764 is already handled by <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>, and add the tag
1765 directly if no such class exist.</p>
1766
1767 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
1768 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
1769 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
1770
1771 <p>To help out making life for LEGO constructors in Debian easier,
1772 please join us on our IRC channel
1773 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> and join
1774 the <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/debian-lego/">Debian
1775 LEGO team</a> in the Alioth project we created yesterday.  A mailing
1776 list is not yet created, but we are working on it. :)</p>
1777
1778 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1779 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1780 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1781
1782       </div>
1783       <div class="tags">
1784
1785
1786         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/lego">lego</a>.
1787
1788
1789       </div>
1790     </div>
1791     <div class="padding"></div>
1792
1793     <div class="entry">
1794       <div class="title">
1795         <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>
1796       </div>
1797       <div class="date">
1798         30th August 2016
1799       </div>
1800       <div class="body">
1801         <p>In April we
1802 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">started
1803 to work</a> on a Norwegian Bokmål edition of the "open access" book on
1804 how to set up and administrate a Debian system.  Today I am happy to
1805 report that the first draft is now publicly available.  You can find
1806 it on <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/">get the Debian
1807 Administrator's Handbook page</a> (under Other languages).  The first
1808 eight chapters have a first draft translation, and we are working on
1809 proofreading the content.  If you want to help out, please start
1810 contributing using
1811 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
1812 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
1813 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
1814 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
1815 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
1816 contributors</a>.  A good way to contribute is to proofread the text
1817 and update weblate if you find errors.</p>
1818
1819 <p>Our goal is still to make the Norwegian book available on paper as well as
1820 electronic form.</p>
1821
1822       </div>
1823       <div class="tags">
1824
1825
1826         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>.
1827
1828
1829       </div>
1830     </div>
1831     <div class="padding"></div>
1832
1833     <div class="entry">
1834       <div class="title">
1835         <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>
1836       </div>
1837       <div class="date">
1838         11th August 2016
1839       </div>
1840       <div class="body">
1841         <p>This summer, I read a great article
1842 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">coz:
1843 This Is the Profiler You're Looking For</a>" in USENIX ;login: about
1844 how to profile multi-threaded programs.  It presented a system for
1845 profiling software by running experiences in the running program,
1846 testing how run time performance is affected by "speeding up" parts of
1847 the code to various degrees compared to a normal run.  It does this by
1848 slowing down parallel threads while the "faster up" code is running
1849 and measure how this affect processing time.  The processing time is
1850 measured using probes inserted into the code, either using progress
1851 counters (COZ_PROGRESS) or as latency meters (COZ_BEGIN/COZ_END).  It
1852 can also measure unmodified code by measuring complete the program
1853 runtime and running the program several times instead.</p>
1854
1855 <p>The project and presentation was so inspiring that I would like to
1856 get the system into Debian.  I
1857 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=830708">created
1858 a WNPP request for it</a> and contacted upstream to try to make the
1859 system ready for Debian by sending patches.  The build process need to
1860 be changed a bit to avoid running 'git clone' to get dependencies, and
1861 to include the JavaScript web page used to visualize the collected
1862 profiling information included in the source package.
1863 But I expect that should work out fairly soon.</p>
1864
1865 <p>The way the system work is fairly simple.  To run an coz experiment
1866 on a binary with debug symbols available, start the program like this:
1867
1868 <p><blockquote><pre>
1869 coz run --- program-to-run
1870 </pre></blockquote></p>
1871
1872 <p>This will create a text file profile.coz with the instrumentation
1873 information.  To show what part of the code affect the performance
1874 most, use a web browser and either point it to
1875 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/</a>
1876 or use the copy from git (in the gh-pages branch).  Check out this web
1877 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
1878 profiling more useful you include &lt;coz.h&gt; and insert the
1879 COZ_PROGRESS or COZ_BEGIN and COZ_END at appropriate places in the
1880 code, rebuild and run the profiler.  This allow coz to do more
1881 targeted experiments.</p>
1882
1883 <p>A video published by ACM
1884 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE0V-p1odPg">presenting the
1885 Coz profiler</a> is available from Youtube.  There is also a paper
1886 from the 25th Symposium on Operating Systems Principles available
1887 titled
1888 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/conference/atc16/technical-sessions/presentation/curtsinger">Coz:
1889 finding code that counts with causal profiling</a>.</p>
1890
1891 <p><a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz">The source code</a>
1892 for Coz is available from github.  It will only build with clang
1893 because it uses a
1894 <a href="https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=55606">C++
1895 feature missing in GCC</a>, but I've submitted
1896 <a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz/pull/67">a patch to solve
1897 it</a> and hope it will be included in the upstream source soon.</p>
1898
1899 <p>Please get in touch if you, like me, would like to see this piece
1900 of software in Debian.  I would very much like some help with the
1901 packaging effort, as I lack the in depth knowledge on how to package
1902 C++ libraries.</p>
1903
1904       </div>
1905       <div class="tags">
1906
1907
1908         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>.
1909
1910
1911       </div>
1912     </div>
1913     <div class="padding"></div>
1914
1915     <div class="entry">
1916       <div class="title">
1917         <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>
1918       </div>
1919       <div class="date">
1920          7th July 2016
1921       </div>
1922       <div class="body">
1923         <p>Yesterday, I tried to unlock a HTC Desire HD phone, and it proved
1924 to be a slight challenge.  Here is the recipe if I ever need to do it
1925 again.  It all started by me wanting to try the recipe to set up
1926 <a href="https://blog.torproject.org/blog/mission-impossible-hardening-android-security-and-privacy">an
1927 hardened Android installation</a> from the Tor project blog on a
1928 device I had access to.  It is a old mobile phone with a broken
1929 microphone The initial idea had been to just
1930 <a href="http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Install_CM_for_ace">install
1931 CyanogenMod on it</a>, but did not quite find time to start on it
1932 until a few days ago.</p>
1933
1934 <p>The unlock process is supposed to be simple: (1) Boot into the boot
1935 loader (press volume down and power at the same time), (2) select
1936 'fastboot' before (3) connecting the device via USB to a Linux
1937 machine, (4) request the device identifier token by running 'fastboot
1938 oem get_identifier_token', (5) request the device unlocking key using
1939 the <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader/">HTC developer web
1940 site</a> and unlock the phone using the key file emailed to you.</p>
1941
1942 <p>Unfortunately, this only work fi you have hboot version 2.00.0029
1943 or newer, and the device I was working on had 2.00.0027.  This
1944 apparently can be easily fixed by downloading a Windows program and
1945 running it on your Windows machine, if you accept the terms Microsoft
1946 require you to accept to use Windows - which I do not.  So I had to
1947 come up with a different approach.  I got a lot of help from AndyCap
1948 on #nuug, and would not have been able to get this working without
1949 him.</p>
1950
1951 <p>First I needed to extract the hboot firmware from
1952 <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/ruu/PD9810000_Ace_Sense30_S_hboot_2.00.0029.exe">the
1953 windows binary for HTC Desire HD</a> downloaded as 'the RUU' from HTC.
1954 For this there is is <a href="https://github.com/kmdm/unruu/">a github
1955 project named unruu</a> using libunshield.  The unshield tool did not
1956 recognise the file format, but unruu worked and extracted rom.zip,
1957 containing the new hboot firmware and a text file describing which
1958 devices it would work for.</p>
1959
1960 <p>Next, I needed to get the new firmware into the device.  For this I
1961 followed some instructions
1962 <a href="http://www.htc1guru.com/2013/09/new-ruu-zips-posted/">available
1963 from HTC1Guru.com</a>, and ran these commands as root on a Linux
1964 machine with Debian testing:</p>
1965
1966 <p><pre>
1967 adb reboot-bootloader
1968 fastboot oem rebootRUU
1969 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
1970 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
1971 fastboot reboot
1972 </pre></p>
1973
1974 <p>The flash command apparently need to be done twice to take effect,
1975 as the first is just preparations and the second one do the flashing.
1976 The adb command is just to get to the boot loader menu, so turning the
1977 device on while holding volume down and the power button should work
1978 too.</p>
1979
1980 <p>With the new hboot version in place I could start following the
1981 instructions on the HTC developer web site.  I got the device token
1982 like this:</p>
1983
1984 <p><pre>
1985 fastboot oem get_identifier_token 2>&1 | sed 's/(bootloader) //'
1986 </pre>
1987
1988 <p>And once I got the unlock code via email, I could use it like
1989 this:</p>
1990
1991 <p><pre>
1992 fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin
1993 </pre></p>
1994
1995 <p>And with that final step in place, the phone was unlocked and I
1996 could start stuffing the software of my own choosing into the device.
1997 So far I only inserted a replacement recovery image to wipe the phone
1998 before I start.  We will see what happen next.  Perhaps I should
1999 install <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> on it. :)</p>
2000
2001       </div>
2002       <div class="tags">
2003
2004
2005         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>.
2006
2007
2008       </div>
2009     </div>
2010     <div class="padding"></div>
2011
2012     <div class="entry">
2013       <div class="title">
2014         <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>
2015       </div>
2016       <div class="date">
2017          3rd July 2016
2018       </div>
2019       <div class="body">
2020         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to test
2021 <a href="https://whispersystems.org/">the Signal app</a>, as it is
2022 said to provide end to end encrypted communication and several of my
2023 friends and family are already using it.  As I by choice do not own a
2024 mobile phone, this proved to be harder than expected.  And I wanted to
2025 have the source of the client and know that it was the code used on my
2026 machine.  But yesterday I managed to get it working.  I used the
2027 Github source, compared it to the source in
2028 <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/signal-private-messenger/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk?hl=en-US">the
2029 Signal Chrome app</a> available from the Chrome web store, applied
2030 patches to use the production Signal servers, started the app and
2031 asked for the hidden "register without a smart phone" form.  Here is
2032 the recipe how I did it.</p>
2033
2034 <p>First, I fetched the Signal desktop source from Github, using
2035
2036 <pre>
2037 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
2038 </pre>
2039
2040 <p>Next, I patched the source to use the production servers, to be
2041 able to talk to other Signal users:</p>
2042
2043 <pre>
2044 cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p0
2045 diff -ur ./js/background.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js
2046 --- ./js/background.js  2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
2047 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js    2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
2048 @@ -47,8 +47,8 @@
2049          });
2050      });
2051
2052 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
2053 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
2054 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org:4433';
2055 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
2056      var messageReceiver;
2057      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
2058          if (messageReceiver) {
2059 diff -ur ./js/expire.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js
2060 --- ./js/expire.js      2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
2061 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
2062 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
2063  ;(function() {
2064      'use strict';
2065 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
2066 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 1474492690000;
2067
2068      window.extension = window.extension || {};
2069
2070 EOF
2071 </pre>
2072
2073 <p>The first part is changing the servers, and the second is updating
2074 an expiration timestamp.  This timestamp need to be updated regularly.
2075 It is set 90 days in the future by the build process (Gruntfile.js).
2076 The value is seconds since 1970 times 1000, as far as I can tell.</p>
2077
2078 <p>Based on a tip and good help from the #nuug IRC channel, I wrote a
2079 script to launch Signal in Chromium.</p>
2080
2081 <pre>
2082 #!/bin/sh
2083 cd $(dirname $0)
2084 mkdir -p userdata
2085 exec chromium \
2086   --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
2087   --user-data-dir=`pwd`/userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
2088 </pre>
2089
2090 <p> The script start the app and configure Chromium to use the Tor
2091 SOCKS5 proxy to make sure those controlling the Signal servers (today
2092 Amazon and Whisper Systems) as well as those listening on the lines
2093 will have a harder time location my laptop based on the Signal
2094 connections if they use source IP address.</p>
2095
2096 <p>When the script starts, one need to follow the instructions under
2097 "Standalone Registration" in the CONTRIBUTING.md file in the git
2098 repository.  I right clicked on the Signal window to get up the
2099 Chromium debugging tool, visited the 'Console' tab and wrote
2100 'extension.install("standalone")' on the console prompt to get the
2101 registration form.  Then I entered by land line phone number and
2102 pressed 'Call'.  5 seconds later the phone rang and a robot voice
2103 repeated the verification code three times.  After entering the number
2104 into the verification code field in the form, I could start using
2105 Signal from my laptop.
2106
2107 <p>As far as I can tell, The Signal app will leak who is talking to
2108 whom and thus who know who to those controlling the central server,
2109 but such leakage is hard to avoid with a centrally controlled server
2110 setup.  It is something to keep in mind when using Signal - the
2111 content of your chats are harder to intercept, but the meta data
2112 exposing your contact network is available to people you do not know.
2113 So better than many options, but not great.  And sadly the usage is
2114 connected to my land line, thus allowing those controlling the server
2115 to associate it to my home and person.  I would prefer it if only
2116 those I knew could tell who I was on Signal.  There are options
2117 avoiding such information leakage, but most of my friends are not
2118 using them, so I am stuck with Signal for now.</p>
2119
2120 <p><strong>Update 2017-01-10</strong>: There is an updated blog post
2121 on this topic in
2122 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience
2123 and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile
2124 phone</a>.</p>
2125
2126       </div>
2127       <div class="tags">
2128
2129
2130         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>.
2131
2132
2133       </div>
2134     </div>
2135     <div class="padding"></div>
2136
2137     <div class="entry">
2138       <div class="title">
2139         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_new__best__multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?</a>
2140       </div>
2141       <div class="date">
2142          6th June 2016
2143       </div>
2144       <div class="body">
2145         <p>When I set out a few weeks ago to figure out
2146 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">which
2147 multimedia player in Debian claimed to support most file formats /
2148 MIME types</a>, I was a bit surprised how varied the sets of MIME types
2149 the various players claimed support for.  The range was from 55 to 130
2150 MIME types.  I suspect most media formats are supported by all
2151 players, but this is not really reflected in the MimeTypes values in
2152 their desktop files.  There are probably also some bogus MIME types
2153 listed, but it is hard to identify which one this is.</p>
2154
2155 <p>Anyway, in the mean time I got in touch with upstream for some of
2156 the players suggesting to add more MIME types to their desktop files,
2157 and decided to spend some time myself improving the situation for my
2158 favorite media player VLC.  The fixes for VLC entered Debian unstable
2159 yesterday. The complete list of MIME types can be seen on the
2160 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">Multimedia
2161 player MIME type support status</a> Debian wiki page.</p>
2162
2163 <p>The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?  It is VLC, followed by
2164 totem, parole, kplayer, gnome-mpv, mpv, smplayer, mplayer-gui and
2165 kmplayer.  I am sure some of the other players desktop files support
2166 several of the formats currently listed as working only with vlc,
2167 toten and parole.</p>
2168
2169 <p>A sad observation is that only 14 MIME types are listed as
2170 supported by all the tested multimedia players in Debian in their
2171 desktop files: audio/mpeg, audio/vnd.rn-realaudio, audio/x-mpegurl,
2172 audio/x-ms-wma, audio/x-scpls, audio/x-wav, video/mp4, video/mpeg,
2173 video/quicktime, video/vnd.rn-realvideo, video/x-matroska,
2174 video/x-ms-asf, video/x-ms-wmv and video/x-msvideo.  Personally I find
2175 it sad that video/ogg and video/webm is not supported by all the media
2176 players in Debian.  As far as I can tell, all of them can handle both
2177 formats.</p>
2178
2179       </div>
2180       <div class="tags">
2181
2182
2183         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>.
2184
2185
2186       </div>
2187     </div>
2188     <div class="padding"></div>
2189
2190     <div class="entry">
2191       <div class="title">
2192         <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>
2193       </div>
2194       <div class="date">
2195          5th June 2016
2196       </div>
2197       <div class="body">
2198         <p>Many years ago, when koffice was fresh and with few users, I
2199 decided to test its presentation tool when making the slides for a
2200 talk I was giving for NUUG on Japhar, a free Java virtual machine.  I
2201 wrote the first draft of the slides, saved the result and went to bed
2202 the day before I would give the talk.  The next day I took a plane to
2203 the location where the meeting should take place, and on the plane I
2204 started up koffice again to polish the talk a bit, only to discover
2205 that kpresenter refused to load its own data file.  I cursed a bit and
2206 started making the slides again from memory, to have something to
2207 present when I arrived.  I tested that the saved files could be
2208 loaded, and the day seemed to be rescued.  I continued to polish the
2209 slides until I suddenly discovered that the saved file could no longer
2210 be loaded into kpresenter.  In the end I had to rewrite the slides
2211 three times, condensing the content until the talk became shorter and
2212 shorter.  After the talk I was able to pinpoint the problem &ndash;
2213 kpresenter wrote inline images in a way itself could not understand.
2214 Eventually that bug was fixed and kpresenter ended up being a great
2215 program to make slides.  The point I'm trying to make is that we
2216 expect a program to be able to load its own data files, and it is
2217 embarrassing to its developers if it can't.</p>
2218
2219 <p>Did you ever experience a program failing to load its own data
2220 files from the desktop file browser?  It is not a uncommon problem.  A
2221 while back I discovered that the screencast recorder
2222 gtk-recordmydesktop would save an Ogg Theora video file the KDE file
2223 browser would refuse to open.  No video player claimed to understand
2224 such file.  I tracked down the cause being <tt>file --mime-type</tt>
2225 returning the application/ogg MIME type, which no video player I had
2226 installed listed as a MIME type they would understand.  I asked for
2227 <a href="http://bugs.gw.com/view.php?id=382">file to change its
2228 behavour</a> and use the MIME type video/ogg instead.  I also asked
2229 several video players to add video/ogg to their desktop files, to give
2230 the file browser an idea what to do about Ogg Theora files.  After a
2231 while, the desktop file browsers in Debian started to handle the
2232 output from gtk-recordmydesktop properly.</p>
2233
2234 <p>But history repeats itself.  A few days ago I tested the music
2235 system Rosegarden again, and I discovered that the KDE and xfce file
2236 browsers did not know what to do with the Rosegarden project files
2237 (*.rg).  I've reported <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/825993">the
2238 rosegarden problem to BTS</a> and a fix is commited to git and will be
2239 included in the next upload.  To increase the chance of me remembering
2240 how to fix the problem next time some program fail to load its files
2241 from the file browser, here are some notes on how to fix it.</p>
2242
2243 <p>The file browsers in Debian in general operates on MIME types.
2244 There are two sources for the MIME type of a given file.  The output from
2245 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> mentioned above, and the content of the
2246 shared MIME type registry (under /usr/share/mime/).  The file MIME
2247 type is mapped to programs supporting the MIME type, and this
2248 information is collected from
2249 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/desktop-entry-spec/">the
2250 desktop files</a> available in /usr/share/applications/.  If there is
2251 one desktop file claiming support for the MIME type of the file, it is
2252 activated when asking to open a given file.  If there are more, one
2253 can normally select which one to use by right-clicking on the file and
2254 selecting the wanted one using 'Open with' or similar.  In general
2255 this work well.  But it depend on each program picking a good MIME
2256 type (preferably
2257 <a href="http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">a
2258 MIME type registered with IANA</a>), file and/or the shared MIME
2259 registry recognizing the file and the desktop file to list the MIME
2260 type in its list of supported MIME types.</p>
2261
2262 <p>The <tt>/usr/share/mime/packages/rosegarden.xml</tt> entry for
2263 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/shared-mime-info-spec">the
2264 Shared MIME database</a> look like this:</p>
2265
2266 <p><blockquote><pre>
2267 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
2268 &lt;mime-info xmlns="http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info"&gt;
2269   &lt;mime-type type="audio/x-rosegarden"&gt;
2270     &lt;sub-class-of type="application/x-gzip"/&gt;
2271     &lt;comment&gt;Rosegarden project file&lt;/comment&gt;
2272     &lt;glob pattern="*.rg"/&gt;
2273   &lt;/mime-type&gt;
2274 &lt;/mime-info&gt;
2275 </pre></blockquote></p>
2276
2277 <p>This states that audio/x-rosegarden is a kind of application/x-gzip
2278 (it is a gzipped XML file).  Note, it is much better to use an
2279 official MIME type registered with IANA than it is to make up ones own
2280 unofficial ones like the x-rosegarden type used by rosegarden.</p>
2281
2282 <p>The desktop file of the rosegarden program failed to list
2283 audio/x-rosegarden in its list of supported MIME types, causing the
2284 file browsers to have no idea what to do with *.rg files:</p>
2285
2286 <p><blockquote><pre>
2287 % grep Mime /usr/share/applications/rosegarden.desktop
2288 MimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition;audio/x-rosegarden-device;audio/x-rosegarden-project;audio/x-rosegarden-template;audio/midi;
2289 X-KDE-NativeMimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition
2290 %
2291 </pre></blockquote></p>
2292
2293 <p>The fix was to add "audio/x-rosegarden;" at the end of the
2294 MimeType= line.</p>
2295
2296 <p>If you run into a file which fail to open the correct program when
2297 selected from the file browser, please check out the output from
2298 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> for the file, ensure the file ending and
2299 MIME type is registered somewhere under /usr/share/mime/ and check
2300 that some desktop file under /usr/share/applications/ is claiming
2301 support for this MIME type.  If not, please report a bug to have it
2302 fixed. :)</p>
2303
2304       </div>
2305       <div class="tags">
2306
2307
2308         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>.
2309
2310
2311       </div>
2312     </div>
2313     <div class="padding"></div>
2314
2315     <div class="entry">
2316       <div class="title">
2317         <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>
2318       </div>
2319       <div class="date">
2320         25th May 2016
2321       </div>
2322       <div class="body">
2323         <p><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">The isenkram
2324 system</a> is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware
2325 related packages.  The idea is to have a database of mappings between
2326 hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to
2327 install the packages to use a given hardware dongle.  Some use cases
2328 are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software
2329 needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it
2330 proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader;
2331 and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to
2332 install the driver for it.  The system work well, and even have a few
2333 command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the
2334 hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).</p>
2335
2336 <p>The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found
2337 good documentation and example code on how to use it.  But aptdaemon
2338 is going away and is generally being replaced by
2339 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/">PackageKit</a>,
2340 so Isenkram needed a rewrite.  And today, thanks to the great patch
2341 from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the
2342 rewrite finally took place.  I've just uploaded a new version of
2343 Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default
2344 for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit.  To check it out,
2345 install the <tt>isenkram</tt> package and insert some hardware dongle
2346 and see if it is recognised.</p>
2347
2348 <p>If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for
2349 the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup
2350 program.  This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:</p>
2351
2352 <p><blockquote><pre>
2353 % isenkram-lookup
2354 bluez
2355 cheese
2356 fprintd
2357 fprintd-demo
2358 gkrellm-thinkbat
2359 hdapsd
2360 libpam-fprintd
2361 pidgin-blinklight
2362 thinkfan
2363 tleds
2364 tp-smapi-dkms
2365 tp-smapi-source
2366 tpb
2367 %p
2368 </pre></blockquote></p>
2369
2370 <p>The hardware mappings come from several places.  The preferred way
2371 is for packages to announce their hardware support using
2372 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
2373 cross distribution appstream system</a>.
2374 See
2375 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">previous
2376 blog posts about isenkram</a> to learn how to do that.</p>
2377
2378       </div>
2379       <div class="tags">
2380
2381
2382         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>.
2383
2384
2385       </div>
2386     </div>
2387     <div class="padding"></div>
2388
2389     <div class="entry">
2390       <div class="title">
2391         <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>
2392       </div>
2393       <div class="date">
2394         23rd May 2016
2395       </div>
2396       <div class="body">
2397         <p>Yesterday I updated the
2398 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats
2399 package in Debian</a> with a few patches sent to me by skilled and
2400 enterprising users.  There were some nice user and visible changes.
2401 First of all, both desktop menu entries now work.  A design flaw in
2402 one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was
2403 dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available.
2404 The script worked when called from the command line, but not when
2405 called from the desktop menu.  I changed this to look for a DISPLAY
2406 variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the
2407 graph window pop up as expected.</p>
2408
2409 <p>The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the
2410 graphs (the one showing the last few hours).  New is also the user of
2411 colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red.  The percentages
2412 of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design
2413 capacity.</p>
2414
2415 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-rate.png"/></p>
2416
2417 <p>The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery
2418 statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to
2419 visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time.  The red
2420 line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent:
2421
2422 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-history.png"/></p>
2423
2424 <p>In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80
2425 percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is
2426 shrinking. :(</p>
2427
2428 <p>The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle
2429 more hardware models.  On some hardware, Linux power supply
2430 information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the
2431 collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/.  Now
2432 both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the
2433 machine.</p>
2434
2435 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
2436 check out the
2437 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
2438 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
2439 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from <a
2440 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2441 Patches are very welcome.</p>
2442
2443 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2444 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2445 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2446
2447       </div>
2448       <div class="tags">
2449
2450
2451         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>.
2452
2453
2454       </div>
2455     </div>
2456     <div class="padding"></div>
2457
2458     <div class="entry">
2459       <div class="title">
2460         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_with_ZFS_on_Linux_included.html">Debian now with ZFS on Linux included</a>
2461       </div>
2462       <div class="date">
2463         12th May 2016
2464       </div>
2465       <div class="body">
2466         <p>Today, after many years of hard work from many people,
2467 <a href="http://zfsonlinux.org/">ZFS for Linux</a> finally entered
2468 Debian.  The package status can be seen on
2469 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/zfs-linux">the package tracker
2470 for zfs-linux</a>.  and
2471 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
2472 team status page</a>. If you want to help out, please join us.
2473 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">The
2474 source code</a> is available via git on Alioth.  It would also be
2475 great if you could help out with
2476 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/dkms">the dkms package</a>, as
2477 it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.</p>
2478
2479       </div>
2480       <div class="tags">
2481
2482
2483         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>.
2484
2485
2486       </div>
2487     </div>
2488     <div class="padding"></div>
2489
2490     <div class="entry">
2491       <div class="title">
2492         <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>
2493       </div>
2494       <div class="date">
2495          8th May 2016
2496       </div>
2497       <div class="body">
2498         <p><strong>Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in
2499 Debian claim support for most file formats.</strong></p>
2500
2501 <p>A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser
2502 plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian
2503 Edu.  I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types
2504 for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser
2505 plugin supported most file formats / media types.
2506 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">The
2507 result</a> can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have
2508 not been updated for a while.  But browser plugins are less relevant
2509 these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone
2510 players.</p>
2511
2512 <p>A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable
2513 player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National
2514 Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why.  The cause is a
2515 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/822245">missing MIME type in the VLC
2516 desktop file</a>.  In the process I wrote a script to compare the set
2517 of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin,
2518 only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the
2519 two for VLC.  This discovery made me dig up the script I used to
2520 compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files
2521 instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian
2522 support most file formats.</p>
2523
2524 <p>The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as
2525 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">a
2526 table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included
2527 in the table</a>, with the package supporting most MIME types being
2528 listed first in the table.</p>
2529
2530 </p>The best multimedia player in Debian?  It is totem, followed by
2531 parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and
2532 kmplayer.  Time for the other players to update their announced MIME
2533 support?</p>
2534
2535       </div>
2536       <div class="tags">
2537
2538
2539         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>.
2540
2541
2542       </div>
2543     </div>
2544     <div class="padding"></div>
2545
2546     <div class="entry">
2547       <div class="title">
2548         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Pyra___handheld_computer_with_Debian_preinstalled.html">The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled</a>
2549       </div>
2550       <div class="date">
2551          4th May 2016
2552       </div>
2553       <div class="body">
2554         A friend of mine made me aware of
2555 <a href="https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/">The Pyra</a>, a
2556 handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled.  I
2557 would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)</p>
2558
2559 <p>The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB
2560 plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5"
2561 LCD touch screen.  The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole
2562 day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests
2563 confirming this.  The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the
2564 last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before
2565 production started.</p>
2566
2567 <p>As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with
2568 Debian.  Please let me know if you know of any others.  Is it the
2569 first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?</p>
2570
2571       </div>
2572       <div class="tags">
2573
2574
2575         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>.
2576
2577
2578       </div>
2579     </div>
2580     <div class="padding"></div>
2581
2582     <div class="entry">
2583       <div class="title">
2584         <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>
2585       </div>
2586       <div class="date">
2587         10th April 2016
2588       </div>
2589       <div class="body">
2590         <p>During this weekends
2591 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Oslo__Takk_for_feilfiksingsfesten.shtml">bug
2592 squashing party and developer gathering</a>, we decided to do our part
2593 to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian
2594 Bokmål, and got in touch with the people behind the
2595 <a href="http://debian-handbook.info/">Debian Administrator's Handbook
2596 project</a> to get started.  If you want to help out, please start
2597 contributing using
2598 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
2599 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
2600 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
2601 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
2602 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
2603 contributors</a>.</p>
2604
2605 <p>The book is already available on paper in English, French and
2606 Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian
2607 Bokmål too.  In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and
2608 Mobi versions available.  And there are incomplete translations
2609 available for many more languages.</p>
2610
2611       </div>
2612       <div class="tags">
2613
2614
2615         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>.
2616
2617
2618       </div>
2619     </div>
2620     <div class="padding"></div>
2621
2622     <div class="entry">
2623       <div class="title">
2624         <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>
2625       </div>
2626       <div class="date">
2627          7th April 2016
2628       </div>
2629       <div class="body">
2630         <p>Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related
2631 packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found.  I use
2632 ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so.
2633 But I might be wrong.</p>
2634
2635 <p>According to
2636 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=spl-linux">the popcon
2637 results for spl-linux</a>, there are 1019 Debian installations, or
2638 0.53% of the population, with the package installed.  As far as I know
2639 the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS
2640 on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS
2641 installation on Linux in Debian.  In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian
2642 the ZFS feature is already available, and there
2643 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=zfsutils">the popcon
2644 results for zfsutils</a> show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of
2645 the population.  So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.</p>
2646
2647 <p>But even though the Debian project leader Lucas Nussbaum
2648 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2015/04/msg00006.html">announced
2649 in April 2015</a> that the legal obstacles blocking ZFS on Debian were
2650 cleared, the package is still not in Debian.  The package is again in
2651 the NEW queue.  Several uploads have been rejected so far because the
2652 debian/copyright file was incomplete or wrong, but there is no reason
2653 to give up.  The current status can be seen on
2654 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
2655 team status page</a>, and
2656 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">the
2657 source code</a> is available on Alioth.</p>
2658
2659 <p>As I want ZFS to be included in next version of Debian to make sure
2660 my home server can function in the future using only official Debian
2661 packages, and the current blocker is to get the debian/copyright file
2662 accepted by the FTP masters in Debian, I decided a while back to try
2663 to help out the team.  This was the background for my blog post about
2664 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">creating,
2665 updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>, and I
2666 used the techniques I explored there to try to find any errors in the
2667 copyright file.  It is not very easy to check every one of the around
2668 2000 files in the source package, but I hope we this time got it
2669 right.  If you want to help out, check out the git source and try to
2670 find missing entries in the debian/copyright file.</p>
2671
2672       </div>
2673       <div class="tags">
2674
2675
2676         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>.
2677
2678
2679       </div>
2680     </div>
2681     <div class="padding"></div>
2682
2683     <div class="entry">
2684       <div class="title">
2685         <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>
2686       </div>
2687       <div class="date">
2688         23rd March 2016
2689       </div>
2690       <div class="body">
2691         <p>Since this morning, the battery-stats package in Debian include an
2692 extended collector that will collect the complete battery history for
2693 later processing and graphing.  The original collector store the
2694 battery level as percentage of last full level, while the new
2695 collector also record battery vendor, model, serial number, design
2696 full level, last full level and current battery level.  This make it
2697 possible to predict the lifetime of the battery as well as visualise
2698 the energy flow when the battery is charging or discharging.</p>
2699
2700 <p>The new tools are available in <tt>/usr/share/battery-stats/</tt>
2701 in the version 0.5.1 package in unstable.  Get the new battery level graph
2702 and lifetime prediction by running:
2703
2704 <p><pre>
2705 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph /var/log/battery-stats.csv
2706 </pre></p>
2707
2708 <p>Or select the 'Battery Level Graph' from your application menu.</p>
2709
2710 <p>The flow in/out of the battery can be seen by running (no menu
2711 entry yet):</p>
2712
2713 <p><pre>
2714 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph-flow
2715 </pre></p>
2716
2717 <p>I'm not quite happy with the way the data is visualised, at least
2718 when there are few data points.  The graphs look a bit better with a
2719 few years of data.</p>
2720
2721 <p>A while back one important feature I use in the battery stats
2722 collector broke in Debian.  The scripts in
2723 <tt>/usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/</tt> were no longer executed.  I
2724 suspect it happened when Jessie started using systemd, but I do not
2725 know.  The issue is reported as
2726 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/818649">bug #818649</a> against
2727 pm-utils.  I managed to work around it by adding an udev rule to call
2728 the collector script every time the power connector is connected and
2729 disconnected.  With this fix in place it was finally time to make a
2730 new release of the package, and get it into Debian.</p>
2731
2732 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
2733 check out the
2734 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
2735 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
2736 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from
2737 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2738 As always, patches are very welcome.</p>
2739
2740       </div>
2741       <div class="tags">
2742
2743
2744         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>.
2745
2746
2747       </div>
2748     </div>
2749     <div class="padding"></div>
2750
2751     <div class="entry">
2752       <div class="title">
2753         <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>
2754       </div>
2755       <div class="date">
2756         15th March 2016
2757       </div>
2758       <div class="body">
2759         <p>Back in September, I blogged about
2760 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">the
2761 system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery</a>, and
2762 how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced).  I
2763 created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing,
2764 but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already
2765 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">a battery-stats
2766 package in Debian</a> that should do the same thing, and I did not see
2767 a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be
2768 fixed instead.  I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and
2769 hoped someone would step in and fix it.  But no-one did.</p>
2770
2771 <p>I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own
2772 hands.  The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of
2773 battery stats (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">available from github</a>) and part of the team maintaining
2774 battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally
2775 able to collect battery status using the <tt>/sys/class/power_supply/</tt>
2776 information provided by the Linux kernel.  If you install the
2777 battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a
2778 graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the
2779 status of the battery.  The source package build and work just fine in
2780 Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not
2781 tested).  The default graph you get for that system look like this:</p>
2782
2783 <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>
2784
2785 <p>My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the
2786 battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details
2787 about the battery.  The scripts are merged into the upstream
2788 battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work
2789 yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way.  Will have to test a
2790 bit more before I make a new release.</p>
2791
2792 <p>I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I
2793 suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it
2794 impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing
2795 and graphing.</p>
2796
2797 <p>If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop
2798 battery, check out the battery-stats package in
2799 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">Debian</a> and
2800 on
2801 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2802 I would love some help to improve the system further.</p>
2803
2804       </div>
2805       <div class="tags">
2806
2807
2808         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>.
2809
2810
2811       </div>
2812     </div>
2813     <div class="padding"></div>
2814
2815     <div class="entry">
2816       <div class="title">
2817         <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>
2818       </div>
2819       <div class="date">
2820         19th February 2016
2821       </div>
2822       <div class="body">
2823         <p>Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to
2824 details.  And one of the details is the content of the
2825 debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by
2826 the code in the package in question, preferably in
2827 <a href="https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/">machine
2828 readable DEP5 format</a>.</p>
2829
2830 <p>For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write
2831 and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the
2832 package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters.  So getting it right
2833 the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save
2834 both you and the ftpmasters some work..  Today, while trying to figure
2835 out what was wrong with
2836 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=686447">the
2837 zfsonlinux copyright file</a>, I decided to spend some time on
2838 figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least
2839 semi-automatically.</p>
2840
2841 <p>Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the
2842 file based on the code in the source package,
2843 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/debmake">debmake</a></tt>
2844 and <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cme">cme</a></tt>.  I'm
2845 not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to
2846 create a sensible draft file.  As far as I can tell, none of them can
2847 be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be
2848 polished a bit before the file is OK to upload.  I found the debmake
2849 option in
2850 <a href="http://goofying-with-debian.blogspot.com/2014/07/debmake-checking-source-against-dep-5.html">a
2851 blog posts from 2014</a>.
2852
2853 <p>To generate using debmake, use the -cc option:
2854
2855 <p><pre>
2856 debmake -cc > debian/copyright
2857 </pre></p>
2858
2859 <p>Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so
2860 this might not be the best option.</p>
2861
2862 <p>The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found
2863 this approach in
2864 <a href="https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2015/04/05/improving-creation-of-debian-copyright-file/">a
2865 blog post from 2015</a>.  To generate using cme, use the 'update
2866 dpkg-copyright' option:
2867
2868 <p><pre>
2869 cme update dpkg-copyright
2870 </pre></p>
2871
2872 <p>This will create or update debian/copyright.  The cme tool seem to
2873 handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.</p>
2874
2875 <p>When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to
2876 check if the file is correct.  For this I found two good options,
2877 <tt>debmake -k</tt> and <tt>license-reconcile</tt>.  The former seem
2878 to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect
2879 ineffective blocks in the copyright file.  The latter reports missing
2880 copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license
2881 names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0).  I suspect it is good to use both and
2882 fix all issues reported by them before uploading.  But I do not know
2883 if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a
2884 copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.</p>
2885
2886 <p>The devscripts tool <tt>licensecheck</tt> deserve mentioning.  It
2887 will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements.
2888 It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but
2889 can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.</p>
2890
2891 <p>Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update
2892 debian/copyright file.  Please let me know, or blog about it on
2893 planet.debian.org.</p>
2894
2895 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2896 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2897 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2898
2899 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-20</strong>: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel
2900 on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file
2901
2902 <p><pre>
2903 licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
2904   /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
2905 </pre></p>
2906
2907 <p>He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the
2908 version control system to make it easier to discover license and
2909 copyright changes in the upstream source.  I will try to do the same
2910 with my packages in the future.</p>
2911
2912 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-21</strong>: The cme author recommended
2913 against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed
2914 command line.</p>
2915
2916       </div>
2917       <div class="tags">
2918
2919
2920         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>.
2921
2922
2923       </div>
2924     </div>
2925     <div class="padding"></div>
2926
2927     <div class="entry">
2928       <div class="title">
2929         <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>
2930       </div>
2931       <div class="date">
2932          4th February 2016
2933       </div>
2934       <div class="body">
2935         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">appstream system</a>
2936 is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very
2937 convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given
2938 firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it.  This can
2939 be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog
2940 about. :)</p>
2941
2942 <p>Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware
2943 file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly
2944 picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian
2945 unstable.  In general you would be looking for the firmware requested
2946 by the kernel during kernel module loading.  To find the package
2947 providing the example file, do like this:</p>
2948
2949 <blockquote><pre>
2950 % apt install appstream
2951 [...]
2952 % apt update
2953 [...]
2954 % appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
2955   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
2956 firmware-qlogic
2957 %
2958 </pre></blockquote>
2959
2960 <p>See <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">the
2961 appstream wiki</a> page to learn how to embed the package metadata in
2962 a way appstream can use.</p>
2963
2964 <p>This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a
2965 given MIME type.  This is very useful when you get a file you do not
2966 know how to handle.  First find the mime type using <tt>file
2967 --mime-type</tt>, and next look up the package providing support for
2968 it.  Lets say you got an SVG file.  Its MIME type is image/svg+xml,
2969 and you can find all packages handling this type like this:</p>
2970
2971 <blockquote><pre>
2972 % apt install appstream
2973 [...]
2974 % apt update
2975 [...]
2976 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
2977   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
2978 bkchem
2979 phototonic
2980 inkscape
2981 shutter
2982 tetzle
2983 geeqie
2984 xia
2985 pinta
2986 gthumb
2987 karbon
2988 comix
2989 mirage
2990 viewnior
2991 postr
2992 ristretto
2993 kolourpaint4
2994 eog
2995 eom
2996 gimagereader
2997 midori
2998 %
2999 </pre></blockquote>
3000
3001 <p>I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for
3002 packages providing appstream metadata.</p>
3003
3004       </div>
3005       <div class="tags">
3006
3007
3008         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>.
3009
3010
3011       </div>
3012     </div>
3013     <div class="padding"></div>
3014
3015     <div class="entry">
3016       <div class="title">
3017         <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>
3018       </div>
3019       <div class="date">
3020         24th January 2016
3021       </div>
3022       <div class="body">
3023         <p>Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around
3024 with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their
3025 position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long
3026 time (like every time a SMS is received or sent).  And if their
3027 computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called
3028 mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often
3029 also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access
3030 during installation).  And when these programs send out information to
3031 central collection points, the location is often included, unless
3032 extra care is taken to not send the location.  The provided
3033 information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is
3034 good and bad, depend on your point of view).  What is certain, is that
3035 the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and
3036 perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way,
3037 when they share their whereabouts with private and public
3038 entities.</p>
3039
3040 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-01-24-nice-creepy-desktop-window.png"></p>
3041
3042 <p>The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out
3043 when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing.  It is
3044 unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government
3045 officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from
3046 unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information.  But the
3047 public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software
3048 tool to do so is called
3049 <a href="http://www.geocreepy.com/">Creepy or Cree.py</a>.  I
3050 discovered it when I read
3051 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Slik-kan-du-bli-overvaket-pa-Twitter-og-Instagram-uten-a-ane-det-7787884.html">an
3052 article about Creepy</a> in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i
3053 November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian.
3054 The python program was in Debian, but
3055 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/creepy">the version in
3056 Debian</a> was completely broken and practically unmaintained.  I
3057 uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not
3058 have time to fix it then.  This Christmas I decided to finally try to
3059 get Creepy operational in Debian.  Now a fixed version is available in
3060 Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches
3061 are now included
3062 <a href="https://github.com/jkakavas/creepy">upstream</a>.</p>
3063
3064 <p>The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from
3065 Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a
3066 complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a
3067 given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all
3068 these services.  Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at
3069 least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these
3070 days it is impossible.  This mean that to use Creepy, you need to
3071 configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide
3072 information to them about your search interests.  This should be taken
3073 into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information
3074 about yourself with the services.</p>
3075
3076 <p>The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least
3077 geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital
3078 of Norway.  One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at
3079 information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the
3080 information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area.
3081 I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in
3082 twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a
3083 Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time,
3084 making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other
3085 things.  A similar technique have been
3086 <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl">used
3087 to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine</a>, and it is both a powerful
3088 tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people
3089 understand the value of the private information they provide to the
3090 public.</p>
3091
3092 <p>The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as
3093 it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at
3094 least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and
3095 python-requests-toolbelt).</p>
3096
3097 <p>(I have uploaded
3098 <a href="https://screenshots.debian.net/package/creepy">the image to
3099 screenshots.debian.net</a> and licensed it under the same terms as the
3100 Creepy program in Debian.)</p>
3101
3102       </div>
3103       <div class="tags">
3104
3105
3106         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>.
3107
3108
3109       </div>
3110     </div>
3111     <div class="padding"></div>
3112
3113     <div class="entry">
3114       <div class="title">
3115         <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>
3116       </div>
3117       <div class="date">
3118         15th January 2016
3119       </div>
3120       <div class="body">
3121         <p>During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum
3122 <a href="https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/meeting/331/what-is-to-be-done/">observed
3123 that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to
3124 believe a computer have a given security hole</a> if it download a
3125 security fix from a Debian mirror.  This is a good reason to always
3126 use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those
3127 listening do not know which IP address to attack.  In August, Richard
3128 Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible
3129 to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that
3130 download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and
3131 <a href="http://richardhartmann.de/blog/posts/2015/08/24-Tor-enabled_Debian_mirror/">proposed
3132 to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror</a>.  He
3133 was not the first to propose this, as the
3134 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/apt-transport-tor">apt-transport-tor</a></tt>
3135 package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt
3136 to use <a href="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</a>, but I was not
3137 aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.</p>
3138
3139 <p>Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian
3140 sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central
3141 Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making
3142 it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes,
3143 making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.</p>
3144
3145 <p>Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by
3146 installing <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> and replacing http and https
3147 urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead
3148 of the official Debian mirror site.  I recommend installing
3149 <tt>etckeeper</tt> before you start to have a history of the changes
3150 done in /etc/.</p>
3151
3152 <blockquote><pre>
3153 apt install apt-transport-tor
3154 sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
3155 sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
3156 </pre></blockquote>
3157
3158 <p>If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run
3159 the sed commands for these too.  The sed command is assuming your are
3160 using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror.  Adjust the command (or just
3161 edit the file manually) to match your mirror.</p>
3162
3163 <p>This work in Debian Jessie and later.  Note that tools like
3164 <tt>apt-file</tt> only recently started using the apt transport
3165 system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs.  For
3166 <tt>apt-file</tt> you need the version currently in experimental,
3167 which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable.  So if you
3168 need a working <tt>apt-file</tt>, this is not for you.</p>
3169
3170 <p>Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start
3171 using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you
3172 update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus
3173 masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine.  Using Tor will
3174 become normal for the machine in question.</p>
3175
3176 <p>On <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox</a>, APT
3177 is set up by default to use <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> when Tor is
3178 enabled.  It would be great if it was the default on any Debian
3179 system.</p>
3180
3181       </div>
3182       <div class="tags">
3183
3184
3185         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>.
3186
3187
3188       </div>
3189     </div>
3190     <div class="padding"></div>
3191
3192     <div class="entry">
3193       <div class="title">
3194         <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>
3195       </div>
3196       <div class="date">
3197         23rd December 2015
3198       </div>
3199       <div class="body">
3200         <p>When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to
3201 call the car license plate numbers in those days.  I would write the
3202 numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids
3203 to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some
3204 exotic or special region codes and numbers.  It was a fun game to pass
3205 time, as we kids have plenty of it.</p>
3206
3207 <p>A few days I came across
3208 <a href="https://github.com/openalpr/openalpr">the OpenALPR
3209 project</a>, a free software project to automatically discover and
3210 report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the
3211 "car numbers" in a machine readable format.  I've been looking for
3212 such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the
3213 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition">automatic
3214 number plate recognition</a> tool only is available in the hands of
3215 the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to
3216 even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance.  I
3217 discovered the developer
3218 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/747509">wanted to get the tool into
3219 Debian</a>, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to
3220 help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian
3221 archive.</p>
3222
3223 <p>Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded
3224 it into Debian, where it currently
3225 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org//new/openalpr_2.2.1-1.html">waits
3226 in the NEW queue</a> for review by the Debian ftpmasters.</p>
3227
3228 <p>I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful
3229 for the common folks, ie those not running a large government
3230 surveillance system?  Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike
3231 and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified
3232 when number plates on my watch list are discovered.  Another use case
3233 was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home
3234 to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his
3235 car.  When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone
3236 capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to
3237 open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway.  I
3238 guess for such use case it make sense.  I am sure there are other use
3239 cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.</p>
3240
3241 <p>If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check
3242 out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/
3243 before running "debuild" to build the source.  Or wait a bit until the
3244 package show up in unstable.</p>
3245
3246       </div>
3247       <div class="tags">
3248
3249
3250         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>.
3251
3252
3253       </div>
3254     </div>
3255     <div class="padding"></div>
3256
3257     <div class="entry">
3258       <div class="title">
3259         <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>
3260       </div>
3261       <div class="date">
3262         20th December 2015
3263       </div>
3264       <div class="body">
3265         <p>Around three years ago, I created
3266 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the isenkram
3267 system</a> to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing
3268 hardware related packages.  A GUI system in the isenkram package will
3269 present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by
3270 relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine.  The same
3271 lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line
3272 tools in the isenkram-cli package.  In addition to mapping hardware,
3273 it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to
3274 install needed firmware packages automatically.  The key for this
3275 system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other
3276 words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work
3277 with.</p>
3278
3279 <p>I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and
3280 adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run
3281 time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available.
3282 I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in
3283 the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I
3284 was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings,
3285 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
3286 appstream system</a> was announced.  I got in touch and suggested to
3287 add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use
3288 appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the
3289 Debian version of appstream.</p>
3290
3291 <p>A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible,
3292 and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for
3293 appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages.  The only
3294 package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my
3295 pymissile package.  I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out
3296 how do add the required
3297 <a href="https://appstream.debian.org/html/sid/main/metainfo/pymissile.html">metadata
3298 in pymissile</a>.  I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with
3299 this content:</p>
3300
3301 <blockquote><pre>
3302 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
3303 &lt;component&gt;
3304   &lt;id&gt;pymissile&lt;/id&gt;
3305   &lt;metadata_license&gt;MIT&lt;/metadata_license&gt;
3306   &lt;name&gt;pymissile&lt;/name&gt;
3307   &lt;summary&gt;Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher&lt;/summary&gt;
3308   &lt;description&gt;
3309     &lt;p&gt;
3310       Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
3311       Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
3312       motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
3313       launcher.
3314     &lt;/p&gt;
3315   &lt;/description&gt;
3316   &lt;provides&gt;
3317     &lt;modalias&gt;usb:v1130p0202d*&lt;/modalias&gt;
3318   &lt;/provides&gt;
3319 &lt;/component&gt;
3320 </pre></blockquote>
3321
3322 <p>The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value,
3323 which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings
3324 (modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel.  In this case, it
3325 will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code
3326 0202.</p>
3327
3328 <p>Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files
3329 are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide
3330 appstream files.  Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for
3331 these files.  A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as
3332 it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions
3333 (in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use).  But
3334 it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as
3335 upstream for this project is dormant.</p>
3336
3337 <p>To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the
3338 mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the
3339 appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary
3340 package under /usr/share/appdata/.  I did this by adding the following
3341 line to debian/pymissile.install:</p>
3342
3343 <blockquote><pre>
3344 debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
3345 </pre></blockquote>
3346
3347 <p>With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list
3348 all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI
3349 pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already
3350 installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in
3351 question.</p>
3352
3353 <p>Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the
3354 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a> proposal.</p>
3355
3356 <p>To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine,
3357 try running this command on the command line:</p>
3358
3359 <blockquote><pre>
3360 cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
3361 </pre></blockquote>
3362
3363 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
3364 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
3365 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
3366
3367       </div>
3368       <div class="tags">
3369
3370
3371         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>.
3372
3373
3374       </div>
3375     </div>
3376     <div class="padding"></div>
3377
3378     <div class="entry">
3379       <div class="title">
3380         <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>
3381       </div>
3382       <div class="date">
3383         30th November 2015
3384       </div>
3385       <div class="body">
3386         <p>A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled
3387 "<a href="http://bonedaddy.net/pabs3/log/2015/11/27/sfc-supporter/">The
3388 GPL is not magic pixie dust</a>" explain the importance of making sure
3389 the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GPL</a> is enforced.
3390 I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:<p>
3391
3392 <blockquote>
3393
3394 <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>
3395
3396 <blockquote>
3397 The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.<br/>
3398
3399 The first step is to choose a
3400 <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft</a> license for your
3401 code.<br/>
3402
3403 The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license,
3404 <b>it must be enforced</b><br/>
3405
3406 and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of
3407 work<br/>
3408
3409 is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do.
3410 </blockquote>
3411
3412 <p><small>-- <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/">Bradley Kuhn</a>, in
3413 <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in Freedom">FaiF</a>
3414 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode
3415 0x57</a></small></p>
3416
3417 <p>As the Debian Website
3418 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/794116">used</a>
3419 <a href="https://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/webwml/webwml/english/intro/free.wml?r1=1.24&amp;r2=1.25">to</a>
3420 imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to
3421 the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful
3422 software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or
3423 software products.  Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created
3424 to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but
3425 such licenses are not enough.  With the ongoing adoption of Free
3426 Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's
3427 expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of
3428 ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always.  As Karen
3429 and Bradley explained in <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in
3430 Freedom">FaiF</a>
3431 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode 0x57</a>,
3432 copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court
3433 to protect it.  The reality of today's world is that legal
3434 representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming.  With
3435 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/">gpl-violations.org</a> in hiatus
3436 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/news/20151027-homepage-recovers/">until</a>
3437 some time in 2016, the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software
3438 Freedom Conservancy</a> (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender
3439 of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations.
3440 In March the SFC supported a
3441 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">lawsuit
3442 by Christoph Hellwig</a> against VMware for refusing to
3443 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/vmware-lawsuit-faq.html">comply
3444 with the GPL</a> in relation to their use of parts of the Linux
3445 kernel.  Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and
3446 conferences
3447 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">blocked
3448 or cancelled their talks</a>.  As a result they have decided to rely
3449 less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of
3450 individuals who support Free Software and copyleft.  So the SFC has
3451 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/23/2015fundraiser/">launched</a>
3452 a <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">campaign</a> to create
3453 a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by
3454 supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free
3455 Software.</p>
3456
3457 <p>If you support Free Software,
3458 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/26/like-what-I-do/">like</a>
3459 what the SFC do, agree with their
3460 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">compliance
3461 principles</a>, are happy about their
3462 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">successes</a> in 2015,
3463 work on a project that is an SFC
3464 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/members/current/">member</a> and or
3465 just want to stand up for copyleft, please join
3466 <a href="https://identi.ca/cwebber/image/JQGPA4qbTyyp3-MY8QpvuA">Christopher
3467 Allan Webber</a>,
3468 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">Carol
3469 Smith</a>,
3470 <a href="http://www.jonobacon.org/2015/11/25/supporting-software-freedom-conservancy/">Jono
3471 Bacon</a>, myself and
3472 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/sponsors/#supporters">others</a> in
3473 becoming a
3474 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">supporter</a>.  For the
3475 next week your donation will be
3476 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/27/black-friday/">matched</a>
3477 by an anonymous donor.  Please also consider asking your employer to
3478 match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC.  Don't forget to
3479 spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or
3480 social media accounts.</p>
3481
3482 </blockquote>
3483
3484 <p>I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter
3485 of Software Freedom Conservancy myself.  Perhaps you should be a
3486 supporter too?</p>
3487
3488       </div>
3489       <div class="tags">
3490
3491
3492         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>.
3493
3494
3495       </div>
3496     </div>
3497     <div class="padding"></div>
3498
3499     <div class="entry">
3500       <div class="title">
3501         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/PGP_key_transition_statement_for_key_EE4E02F9.html">PGP key transition statement for key EE4E02F9</a>
3502       </div>
3503       <div class="date">
3504         17th November 2015
3505       </div>
3506       <div class="body">
3507         <p>I've needed a new OpenPGP key for a while, but have not had time to
3508 set it up properly.  I wanted to generate it offline and have it
3509 available on <a href="http://shop.kernelconcepts.de/#openpgp">a OpenPGP
3510 smart card</a> for daily use, and learning how to do it and finding
3511 time to sit down with an offline machine almost took forever.  But
3512 finally I've been able to complete the process, and have now moved
3513 from my old GPG key to a new GPG key.  See
3514 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-11-17-new-gpg-key-transition.txt">the
3515 full transition statement, signed with both my old and new key</a> for
3516 the details.  This is my new key:</p>
3517
3518 <pre>
3519 pub   3936R/<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/111D6B29EE4E02F9.html">111D6B29EE4E02F9</a> 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-14]
3520       Key fingerprint = 3AC7 B2E3 ACA5 DF87 78F1  D827 111D 6B29 EE4E 02F9
3521 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
3522 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@debian.org&gt;
3523 sub   4096R/87BAFB0E 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
3524 sub   4096R/F91E6DE9 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
3525 sub   4096R/A0439BAB 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
3526 </pre>
3527
3528 <p>The key can be downloaded from the OpenPGP key servers, signed by
3529 my old key.</p>
3530
3531 <p>If you signed my old key
3532 (<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/DB4CCC4B2A30D729.html">DB4CCC4B2A30D729</a>),
3533 I'd very much appreciate a signature on my new key, details and
3534 instructions in the transition statement. I m happy to reciprocate if
3535 you have a similarly signed transition statement to present.</p>
3536
3537       </div>
3538       <div class="tags">
3539
3540
3541         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>.
3542
3543
3544       </div>
3545     </div>
3546     <div class="padding"></div>
3547
3548     <div class="entry">
3549       <div class="title">
3550         <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>
3551       </div>
3552       <div class="date">
3553         24th September 2015
3554       </div>
3555       <div class="body">
3556         <p>When I get a new laptop, the battery life time at the start is OK.
3557 But this do not last.  The last few laptops gave me a feeling that
3558 within a year, the life time is just a fraction of what it used to be,
3559 and it slowly become painful to use the laptop without power connected
3560 all the time.  Because of this, when I got a new Thinkpad X230 laptop
3561 about two years ago, I decided to monitor its battery state to have
3562 more hard facts when the battery started to fail.</p>
3563
3564 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-24-laptop-battery-graph.png"/>
3565
3566 <p>First I tried to find a sensible Debian package to record the
3567 battery status, assuming that this must be a problem already handled
3568 by someone else.  I found
3569 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>,
3570 which collects statistics from the battery, but it was completely
3571 broken.  I sent a few suggestions to the maintainer, but decided to
3572 write my own collector as a shell script while I waited for feedback
3573 from him.  Via
3574 <a href="http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html">a
3575 blog post about the battery development on a MacBook Air</a> I also
3576 discovered
3577 <a href="https://github.com/jradavenport/batlog.git">batlog</a>, not
3578 available in Debian.</p>
3579
3580 <p>I started my collector 2013-07-15, and it has been collecting
3581 battery stats ever since. Now my
3582 /var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log file contain around 115,000
3583 measurements, from the time the battery was working great until now,
3584 when it is unable to charge above 7% of original capacity.  My
3585 collector shell script is quite simple and look like this:</p>
3586
3587 <pre>
3588 #!/bin/sh
3589 # Inspired by
3590 # http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html
3591 # See also
3592 # http://blog.sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/01/02/debian-how-to-monitor-battery-capacity/
3593 logfile=/var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log
3594
3595 files="manufacturer model_name technology serial_number \
3596     energy_full energy_full_design energy_now cycle_count status"
3597
3598 if [ ! -e "$logfile" ] ; then
3599     (
3600         printf "timestamp,"
3601         for f in $files; do
3602             printf "%s," $f
3603         done
3604         echo
3605     ) > "$logfile"
3606 fi
3607
3608 log_battery() {
3609     # Print complete message in one echo call, to avoid race condition
3610     # when several log processes run in parallel.
3611     msg=$(printf "%s," $(date +%s); \
3612         for f in $files; do \
3613             printf "%s," $(cat $f); \
3614         done)
3615     echo "$msg"
3616 }
3617
3618 cd /sys/class/power_supply
3619
3620 for bat in BAT*; do
3621     (cd $bat && log_battery >> "$logfile")
3622 done
3623 </pre>
3624
3625 <p>The script is called when the power management system detect a
3626 change in the power status (power plug in or out), and when going into
3627 and out of hibernation and suspend.  In addition, it collect a value
3628 every 10 minutes.  This make it possible for me know when the battery
3629 is discharging, charging and how the maximum charge change over time.
3630 The code for the Debian package
3631 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-status">is now
3632 available on github</a>.</p>
3633
3634 <p>The collected log file look like this:</p>
3635
3636 <pre>
3637 timestamp,manufacturer,model_name,technology,serial_number,energy_full,energy_full_design,energy_now,cycle_count,status,
3638 1376591133,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,62800000,62160000,39050000,0,Discharging,
3639 [...]
3640 1443090528,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
3641 1443090601,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
3642 </pre>
3643
3644 <p>I wrote a small script to create a graph of the charge development
3645 over time.  This graph depicted above show the slow death of my laptop
3646 battery.</p>
3647
3648 <p>But why is this happening?  Why are my laptop batteries always
3649 dying in a year or two, while the batteries of space probes and
3650 satellites keep working year after year.  If we are to believe
3651 <a href="http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries">Battery
3652 University</a>, the cause is me charging the battery whenever I have a
3653 chance, and the fix is to not charge the Lithium-ion batteries to 100%
3654 all the time, but to stay below 90% of full charge most of the time.
3655 I've been told that the Tesla electric cars
3656 <a href="http://my.teslamotors.com/de_CH/forum/forums/battery-charge-limit">limit
3657 the charge of their batteries to 80%</a>, with the option to charge to
3658 100% when preparing for a longer trip (not that I would want a car
3659 like Tesla where rights to privacy is abandoned, but that is another
3660 story), which I guess is the option we should have for laptops on
3661 Linux too.</p>
3662
3663 <p>Is there a good and generic way with Linux to tell the battery to
3664 stop charging at 80%, unless requested to charge to 100% once in
3665 preparation for a longer trip?  I found
3666 <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/34452/how-can-i-limit-battery-charging-to-80-capacity">one
3667 recipe on askubuntu for Ubuntu to limit charging on Thinkpad to
3668 80%</a>, but could not get it to work (kernel module refused to
3669 load).</p>
3670
3671 <p>I wonder why the battery capacity was reported to be more than 100%
3672 at the start.  I also wonder why the "full capacity" increases some
3673 times, and if it is possible to repeat the process to get the battery
3674 back to design capacity.  And I wonder if the discharge and charge
3675 speed change over time, or if this stay the same.  I did not yet try
3676 to write a tool to calculate the derivative values of the battery
3677 level, but suspect some interesting insights might be learned from
3678 those.</p>
3679
3680 <p>Update 2015-09-24: I got a tip to install the packages
3681 acpi-call-dkms and tlp (unfortunately missing in Debian stable)
3682 packages instead of the tp-smapi-dkms package I had tried to use
3683 initially, and use 'tlp setcharge 40 80' to change when charging start
3684 and stop.  I've done so now, but expect my existing battery is toast
3685 and need to be replaced.  The proposal is unfortunately Thinkpad
3686 specific.</p>
3687
3688       </div>
3689       <div class="tags">
3690
3691
3692         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>.
3693
3694
3695       </div>
3696     </div>
3697     <div class="padding"></div>
3698
3699     <div class="entry">
3700       <div class="title">
3701         <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>
3702       </div>
3703       <div class="date">
3704          5th July 2015
3705       </div>
3706       <div class="body">
3707         <p>Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my
3708 need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback.  I wish to
3709 thank every one of these.  Several pointed me to the possibility of
3710 fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to
3711 do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the
3712 machine.  But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it
3713 with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live
3714 for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement.  If I did
3715 not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts
3716 using <a href="http://www.francecrans.com/">FrancEcrans</a>, but it
3717 might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.</p>
3718
3719 <p>One tip I got was to use the
3720 <a href="https://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=nb">Skinflint</a> web service to
3721 compare laptop models.  It seem to have more models available than
3722 prisjakt.no.  Another tip I got from someone I know have similar
3723 keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not
3724 very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook
3725 keyboards I tested.  Because of this, I will not consider it any further.
3726
3727 <p>When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the
3728 newest Thinkpad X model.  The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons
3729 (which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with
3730 Debian Sid/Unstable according to
3731 <a href="http://www.corsac.net/X250/">Corsac.net</a>.  The reports I
3732 got on the keyboard quality are not consistent.  Some say the keyboard
3733 is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good.
3734 Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250
3735 keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I
3736 keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to
3737 replace it.  I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk
3738 activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230.  I'm
3739 also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit
3740 noisy.  In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian
3741 Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.</p>
3742
3743 <p>I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was
3744 <a href="http://pro-star.com">Pro-Star</a>, another was
3745 <a href="http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/product/libreboot-x200/">Libreboot</a>.
3746 The latter look very attractive to me.</p>
3747
3748 <p>Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback.  It help a lot
3749 as I keep looking for a replacement.</p>
3750
3751 <p>Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the
3752 <a href="">lapstore.de</a> web shop for used laptops.  They got several
3753 different
3754 <a href="http://www.lapstore.de/f.php/shop/lapstore/f/411/lang/x/kw/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X_Serie/">old
3755 thinkpad X models</a>, and provide one year warranty.</p>
3756
3757       </div>
3758       <div class="tags">
3759
3760
3761         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>.
3762
3763
3764       </div>
3765     </div>
3766     <div class="padding"></div>
3767
3768     <div class="entry">
3769       <div class="title">
3770         <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>
3771       </div>
3772       <div class="date">
3773          3rd July 2015
3774       </div>
3775       <div class="body">
3776         <p>My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a
3777 replacement soon.  The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230
3778 started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken
3779 cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the
3780 flickering.</p>
3781
3782 <p>My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is
3783 still as
3784 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">I
3785 described them in 2013</a>.  The last time I bought a laptop, I had
3786 good help from
3787 <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/category.php?k=353">prisjakt.no</a>
3788 where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin,
3789 wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually.  Three button mouse
3790 and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three
3791 laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and
3792 G2) lack three mouse buttons).  It is also unclear to me how good the
3793 keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are.  I hope Lenovo have not messed up
3794 the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have
3795 deteriorated since X41.</p>
3796
3797 <p>I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options
3798 seem sensible to me?  Are there better services around to search the
3799 set of available laptops for features?  Please send me an email if you
3800 have suggestions.</p>
3801
3802 <p>Update 2015-07-23: I got a suggestion to check out the FSF
3803 <a href="http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom">list
3804 of endorsed hardware</a>, which is useful background information.</p>
3805
3806       </div>
3807       <div class="tags">
3808
3809
3810         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>.
3811
3812
3813       </div>
3814     </div>
3815     <div class="padding"></div>
3816
3817     <div class="entry">
3818       <div class="title">
3819         <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>
3820       </div>
3821       <div class="date">
3822         22nd November 2014
3823       </div>
3824       <div class="body">
3825         <p>By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
3826 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
3827 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
3828 courtesy of
3829 <a href="http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html">Erich
3830 Schubert</a> and
3831 <a href="http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/">Simon
3832 McVittie</a>.
3833
3834 <p>If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
3835 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
3836 <tt>/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit</tt> with this content before
3837 you upgrade:</p>
3838
3839 <p><blockquote><pre>
3840 Package: systemd-sysv
3841 Pin: release o=Debian
3842 Pin-Priority: -1
3843 </pre></blockquote><p>
3844
3845 <p>This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
3846 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
3847 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
3848 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
3849 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.</p>
3850
3851 <p>If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
3852 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
3853 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
3854 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
3855 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
3856 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
3857
3858 <p><blockquote><pre>
3859 preseed/late_command="in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core"
3860 </pre></blockquote><p>
3861
3862 <p>Next, the line to use in a preseed file:</p>
3863
3864 <p><blockquote><pre>
3865 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
3866 </pre></blockquote><p>
3867
3868 <p>One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
3869 the sysvinit-core package.</p>
3870
3871 <p>I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
3872 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
3873 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
3874 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
3875 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
3876 Jessie is released.</p>
3877
3878 <p>Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
3879 <ahref="https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg">a
3880 blog post by Torsten Glaser</a>, added --purge to the preseed
3881 line.</p>
3882
3883       </div>
3884       <div class="tags">
3885
3886
3887         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>.
3888
3889
3890       </div>
3891     </div>
3892     <div class="padding"></div>
3893
3894     <div class="entry">
3895       <div class="title">
3896         <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>
3897       </div>
3898       <div class="date">
3899         10th November 2014
3900       </div>
3901       <div class="body">
3902         <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
3903 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
3904 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.</p>
3905
3906 <p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
3907 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
3908 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
3909 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
3910 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
3911 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
3912 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
3913 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed
3914 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a
3915 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
3916 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
3917 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
3918 <a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the
3919 Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems
3920 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p>
3921
3922 <p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
3923 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
3924 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
3925 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
3926 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
3927 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
3928 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
3929 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
3930 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
3931 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
3932 were fairly easy, and
3933 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the
3934 source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github.  I
3935 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
3936 useful approach.</p>
3937
3938 <p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
3939 mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to
3940 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
3941 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
3942 <tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow
3943 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
3944 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
3945 this:</p>
3946
3947 <p><blockquote><pre>
3948 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
3949   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
3950 </pre></blockquote></p>
3951
3952 <p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
3953 address with your own address to test your server. :)</p>
3954
3955 <p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
3956 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
3957 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
3958 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
3959 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
3960 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
3961 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
3962 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
3963 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
3964 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
3965 system.</p>
3966
3967 <p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
3968 <tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over
3969 SMTorP. :)</p>
3970
3971       </div>
3972       <div class="tags">
3973
3974
3975         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>.
3976
3977
3978       </div>
3979     </div>
3980     <div class="padding"></div>
3981
3982     <div class="entry">
3983       <div class="title">
3984         <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>
3985       </div>
3986       <div class="date">
3987         22nd October 2014
3988       </div>
3989       <div class="body">
3990         <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
3991 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
3992 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
3993 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
3994 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
3995 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
3996 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
3997 <a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the
3998 listadmin program</a>.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
3999 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
4000 lists I recently took over:</p>
4001
4002 <p><blockquote><pre>
4003 % time listadmin xiph
4004 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4005 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4006
4007 real    0m1.709s
4008 user    0m0.232s
4009 sys     0m0.012s
4010 %
4011 </pre></blockquote></p>
4012
4013 <p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
4014 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
4015 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
4016 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
4017 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
4018 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
4019 program.</p>
4020
4021 <p>If you install
4022 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin
4023 package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt>
4024 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p>
4025
4026 <p><blockquote><pre>
4027 username username@example.org
4028 spamlevel 23
4029 default discard
4030 discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
4031
4032 password secret
4033 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
4034 mailman-list@lists.example.com
4035
4036 password hidden
4037 other-list@otherserver.example.org
4038 </pre></blockquote></p>
4039
4040 <p>There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
4041 learn the details.</p>
4042
4043 <p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
4044 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
4045 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
4046 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p>
4047
4048 <p><blockquote><pre>
4049 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
4050 </pre></blockquote></p>
4051
4052 <p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
4053 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
4054 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
4055 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
4056 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
4057 email.</p>
4058
4059 <p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
4060 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
4061 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
4062 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
4063 software.</p>
4064
4065 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
4066 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
4067 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
4068
4069 <p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in
4070 configuration example.  Also, I've been told that the
4071 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
4072 sure why.</p>
4073
4074       </div>
4075       <div class="tags">
4076
4077
4078         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>.
4079
4080
4081       </div>
4082     </div>
4083     <div class="padding"></div>
4084
4085     <div class="entry">
4086       <div class="title">
4087         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html">Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</a>
4088       </div>
4089       <div class="date">
4090         17th October 2014
4091       </div>
4092       <div class="body">
4093         <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
4094 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
4095 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
4096 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
4097 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram
4098 package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
4099 to do this using simple preseeding.</p>
4100
4101 <p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
4102 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
4103 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
4104 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
4105 of this story.)</p>
4106
4107 <p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
4108 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
4109 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
4110 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
4111 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
4112 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
4113 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
4114 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
4115 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
4116 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p>
4117
4118 <p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
4119 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
4120 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
4121 hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p>
4122
4123 <p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
4124 firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p>
4125
4126 <p><blockquote><pre>
4127 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
4128 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
4129 </pre></blockquote></p>
4130
4131 <p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
4132 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
4133 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
4134 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
4135 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
4136 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
4137 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
4138 implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p>
4139
4140 <p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
4141 this recipe work for you. :)</p>
4142
4143 <p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
4144 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
4145 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
4146 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
4147 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p>
4148
4149 <p><blockquote><pre>
4150 Task: isenkram-packages
4151 Section: hardware
4152 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4153  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
4154  proposed.
4155 Test-new-install: show show
4156 Relevance: 8
4157 Packages: for-current-hardware
4158
4159 Task: isenkram-firmware
4160 Section: hardware
4161 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4162  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
4163  packages are proposed.
4164 Test-new-install: mark show
4165 Relevance: 8
4166 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
4167 </pre></blockquote></p>
4168
4169 <p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
4170 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
4171 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
4172 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
4173 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
4174
4175 <p><blockquote><pre>
4176 #!/bin/sh
4177 #
4178 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
4179 export PATH
4180 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
4181 </pre></blockquote></p>
4182
4183 <p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
4184 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p>
4185
4186 <p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
4187 installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
4188 --new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would
4189 install.</p>
4190
4191 <p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be
4192 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
4193 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p>
4194
4195       </div>
4196       <div class="tags">
4197
4198
4199         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>.
4200
4201
4202       </div>
4203     </div>
4204     <div class="padding"></div>
4205
4206     <div class="entry">
4207       <div class="title">
4208         <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>
4209       </div>
4210       <div class="date">
4211          4th October 2014
4212       </div>
4213       <div class="body">
4214         <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
4215 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
4216 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
4217 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p>
4218
4219 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p>
4220
4221 <p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
4222 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
4223 <a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p>
4224
4225       </div>
4226       <div class="tags">
4227
4228
4229         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>.
4230
4231
4232       </div>
4233     </div>
4234     <div class="padding"></div>
4235
4236     <div class="entry">
4237       <div class="title">
4238         <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>
4239       </div>
4240       <div class="date">
4241          4th October 2014
4242       </div>
4243       <div class="body">
4244         <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a>
4245 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
4246 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
4247 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
4248 Dibb.</p>
4249
4250 <p>I just wrapped up
4251 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a
4252 new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from
4253 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the
4254 download page</a>.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
4255 0.17.</p>
4256
4257 <ul>
4258
4259  <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li>
4260  <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
4261    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li>
4262  <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li>
4263  <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li>
4264  <li>Fix include orders</li>
4265  <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li>
4266  <li>Fix the chapter count</li>
4267  <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
4268    the palette size is the same.</li>
4269  <li>Fix array printing.</li>
4270  <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li>
4271  <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li>
4272  <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
4273    with more GCC compiler warnings.</li>
4274
4275 </ul>
4276
4277 <p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
4278 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
4279 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)</p>
4280
4281       </div>
4282       <div class="tags">
4283
4284
4285         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>.
4286
4287
4288       </div>
4289     </div>
4290     <div class="padding"></div>
4291
4292     <div class="entry">
4293       <div class="title">
4294         <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>
4295       </div>
4296       <div class="date">
4297         26th September 2014
4298       </div>
4299       <div class="body">
4300         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4301 project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
4302 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
4303 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
4304 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
4305 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
4306 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
4307 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
4308 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
4309 future.  The
4310 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current
4311 status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
4312 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
4313 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
4314 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p>
4315
4316 <p>First, download the test ISO via
4317 <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>,
4318 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a>
4319 or rsync (use
4320 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
4321 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
4322 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
4323 install with some tweaking.</p>
4324
4325 <p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
4326 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p>
4327
4328 <p><blockquote><pre>
4329 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
4330 </pre></blockquote></p>
4331
4332 <p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
4333 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
4334 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
4335 due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p>
4336
4337 <p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
4338 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
4339 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
4340 your need.</p>
4341
4342 <p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
4343 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
4344 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
4345 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
4346 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
4347 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
4348 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
4349 days.</p>
4350
4351 <p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
4352 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
4353 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
4354 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
4355 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
4356 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
4357 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
4358 provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>.
4359 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p>
4360
4361 <p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
4362 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
4363 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p>
4364
4365       </div>
4366       <div class="tags">
4367
4368
4369         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>.
4370
4371
4372       </div>
4373     </div>
4374     <div class="padding"></div>
4375
4376     <div class="entry">
4377       <div class="title">
4378         <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>
4379       </div>
4380       <div class="date">
4381         25th September 2014
4382       </div>
4383       <div class="body">
4384         <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a>
4385 to handle my fairly large DVD collection.  It is a nice command line
4386 tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length,
4387 etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format.  But lsdvd have not seen
4388 any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting
4389 its use with some DVDs.  Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I
4390 sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the
4391 project, without any reply.  But I use it regularly and would like to
4392 get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version
4393 into Debian</a>.  So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with
4394 the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that
4395 he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take
4396 over.  And yesterday, I became project admin.</p>
4397
4398 <p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian
4399 maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream
4400 project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly,
4401 collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place.
4402 I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git
4403 repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too.  If you got
4404 a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out
4405 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join
4406 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing
4407 list</a>. :)</p>
4408
4409       </div>
4410       <div class="tags">
4411
4412
4413         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>.
4414
4415
4416       </div>
4417     </div>
4418     <div class="padding"></div>
4419
4420     <div class="entry">
4421       <div class="title">
4422         <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>
4423       </div>
4424       <div class="date">
4425         16th September 2014
4426       </div>
4427       <div class="body">
4428         <p>The <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> installer could be
4429 a lot quicker.  When we install more than 2000 packages in
4430 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> using
4431 tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever.
4432 A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in
4433 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/613428">bug #613428</a> about too
4434 much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package
4435 responsible for unpacking the binary packages.  Other parts (like code
4436 executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during
4437 installation.  All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to
4438 me.  If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try
4439 to salvage the half installed system.  So the failure sync-ing is
4440 supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really
4441 relevant while the installer is running.</p>
4442
4443 <p>A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file
4444 system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to
4445 change the code in several packages.  The idea is not new, but I have
4446 not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before.  It
4447 depend on the small and clever package
4448 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/eatmydata">eatmydata</a>, which
4449 uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to
4450 disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live
4451 dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly.  Instead of
4452 modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the
4453 packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages),
4454 it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace
4455 them with a simple shell wrapper calling
4456 "eatmydata&nbsp;$program&nbsp;$@", to get the same effect.
4457 Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple
4458 implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.</p>
4459
4460 <p>The effect was stunning.  In my first test it reduced the running
4461 time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44
4462 minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell
4463 Latitude D505 machine.  I am not quite sure what the optimised time
4464 would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf
4465 priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during
4466 installation.  As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation
4467 along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the
4468 installation.  I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie,
4469 and got these results.  The time measured is the time stamp in
4470 /var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the
4471 "pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement
4472 yourself.  In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the
4473 timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel
4474 dialog.</p>
4475
4476 <p><table>
4477
4478 <tr>
4479 <th>Machine/setup</th>
4480 <th>Original tasksel</th>
4481 <th>Optimised tasksel</th>
4482 <th>Reduction</th>
4483 </tr>
4484
4485 <tr>
4486 <td>Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE</td>
4487 <td>64 min (07:46-08:50)</td>
4488 <td><44 min (11:27-12:11)</td>
4489 <td>>20 min 18%</td>
4490 </tr>
4491
4492 <tr>
4493 <td>Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE</td>
4494 <td>57 min (08:48-09:45)</td>
4495 <td>34 min (07:43-08:17)</td>
4496 <td>23 min 40%</td>
4497 </tr>
4498
4499 <tr>
4500 <td>Latitude D505 Minimal</td>
4501 <td>22 min (10:37-10:59)</td>
4502 <td>11 min (11:16-11:27)</td>
4503 <td>11 min 50%</td>
4504 </tr>
4505
4506 <tr>
4507 <td>Thinkpad X200 Minimal</td>
4508 <td>6 min (08:19-08:25)</td>
4509 <td>4 min (08:04-08:08)</td>
4510 <td>2 min 33%</td>
4511 </tr>
4512
4513 <tr>
4514 <td>Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE</td>
4515 <td>19 min (09:21-09:40)</td>
4516 <td>15 min (10:25-10:40)</td>
4517 <td>4 min 21%</td>
4518 </tr>
4519
4520 </table></p>
4521
4522 <p>The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the
4523 time is spent downloading packages.  The connection to the Internet
4524 was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a
4525 significant factor in the measurement.  Download typically took a few
4526 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being
4527 installed.</p>
4528
4529 <p>The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in
4530 <a href="https://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/">Debian
4531 Installer</a>, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the
4532 finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the
4533 installation.  I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the
4534 post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the
4535 eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in
4536 Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO.  The
4537 negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this
4538 optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i.  If the code is
4539 moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger
4540 for the entire installation.</p>
4541
4542 <p>I've implemented this in the
4543 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-install">debian-edu-install</a>
4544 git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the
4545 Debian Edu installation.  If you want to test this yourself, you can
4546 create two files in the installer (or in an udeb).  One shell script
4547 need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:</p>
4548
4549 <p><blockquote><pre>
4550 #!/bin/sh
4551 set -e
4552 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
4553 info() {
4554     logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
4555 }
4556 error() {
4557     logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
4558 }
4559 override_install() {
4560     apt-install eatmydata || true
4561     if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
4562         for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
4563             file=/usr/bin/$bin
4564             # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
4565             if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
4566                 info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
4567                 printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
4568                     > /target$file.edu
4569                 chmod 755 /target$file.edu
4570                 in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
4571                     --rename --quiet --add $file
4572                 ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
4573             else
4574                 error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
4575             fi
4576         done
4577     else
4578         error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
4579     fi
4580 }
4581
4582 override_install
4583 </pre></blockquote></p>
4584
4585 <p>To clean up, another shell script should go into
4586 /usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this:
4587
4588 <p><blockquote><pre>
4589 #! /bin/sh -e
4590 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
4591 error() {
4592     logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
4593 }
4594 remove_install_override() {
4595     for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
4596         file=/usr/bin/$bin
4597         if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
4598             rm /target$file
4599             in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
4600                 --rename --quiet --remove $file
4601             rm /target$file.edu
4602         else
4603             error "Missing divert for $file."
4604         fi
4605     done
4606     sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
4607 }
4608
4609 remove_install_override
4610 </pre></blockquote></p>
4611
4612 <p>In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script
4613 edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and
4614 finish-install.d scripts.</p>
4615
4616 <p>By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal
4617 Debian installer too?  I suspect it should, but am not sure the
4618 current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough.  It also
4619 depend on the side effects of the change.  I'm not aware of any, but I
4620 guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing.
4621 Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and
4622 fsync() having effect?  Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to
4623 allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting
4624 everyone.</p>
4625
4626 <p>Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization
4627 will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of
4628 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">bug #702711</a>.  An updated
4629 eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.</p>
4630
4631 <p>Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and
4632 the optimization work again.  And I have discovered that the
4633 dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly
4634 simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package.  See
4635 tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.</p>
4636
4637 <p>Update 2014-11-11: Unfortunately, a new
4638 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/765738">bug #765738</a> in eatmydata only
4639 triggering on i386 made it into testing, and broke this installation
4640 optimization again.  If <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/768893">unblock
4641 request 768893</a> is accepted, it should be working again.</p>
4642
4643       </div>
4644       <div class="tags">
4645
4646
4647         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>.
4648
4649
4650       </div>
4651     </div>
4652     <div class="padding"></div>
4653
4654     <div class="entry">
4655       <div class="title">
4656         <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>
4657       </div>
4658       <div class="date">
4659         10th September 2014
4660       </div>
4661       <div class="body">
4662         <p>Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk with the
4663 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> about
4664 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20140909-sks-keyservers/">the
4665 OpenPGP keyserver pool sks-keyservers.net</a>, and was very happy to
4666 learn that there is a large set of publicly available key servers to
4667 use when looking for peoples public key.  So far I have used
4668 subkeys.pgp.net, and some times wwwkeys.nl.pgp.net when the former
4669 were misbehaving, but those days are ended.  The servers I have used
4670 up until yesterday have been slow and some times unavailable.  I hope
4671 those problems are gone now.</p>
4672
4673 <p>Behind the round robin DNS entry of the
4674 <a href="https://sks-keyservers.net/">sks-keyservers.net</a> service
4675 there is a pool of more than 100 keyservers which are checked every
4676 day to ensure they are well connected and up to date.  It must be
4677 better than what I have used so far. :)</p>
4678
4679 <p>Yesterdays speaker told me that the service is the default
4680 keyserver provided by the default configuration in GnuPG, but this do
4681 not seem to be used in Debian.  Perhaps it should?</p>
4682
4683 <p>Anyway, I've updated my ~/.gnupg/options file to now include this
4684 line:</p>
4685
4686 <p><blockquote><pre>
4687 keyserver pool.sks-keyservers.net
4688 </pre></blockquote></p>
4689
4690 <p>With GnuPG version 2 one can also locate the keyserver using SRV
4691 entries in DNS.  Just for fun, I did just that at work, so now every
4692 user of GnuPG at the University of Oslo should find a OpenGPG
4693 keyserver automatically should their need it:</p>
4694
4695 <p><blockquote><pre>
4696 % host -t srv _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no
4697 _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no has SRV record 0 100 11371 pool.sks-keyservers.net.
4698 %
4699 </pre></blockquote></p>
4700
4701 <p>Now if only
4702 <a href="http://ietfreport.isoc.org/idref/draft-shaw-openpgp-hkp/">the
4703 HKP lookup protocol</a> supported finding signature paths, I would be
4704 very happy.  It can look up a given key or search for a user ID, but I
4705 normally do not want that, but to find a trust path from my key to
4706 another key.  Given a user ID or key ID, I would like to find (and
4707 download) the keys representing a signature path from my key to the
4708 key in question, to be able to get a trust path between the two keys.
4709 This is as far as I can tell not possible today.  Perhaps something
4710 for a future version of the protocol?</p>
4711
4712       </div>
4713       <div class="tags">
4714
4715
4716         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>.
4717
4718
4719       </div>
4720     </div>
4721     <div class="padding"></div>
4722
4723     <div class="entry">
4724       <div class="title">
4725         <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>
4726       </div>
4727       <div class="date">
4728         17th June 2014
4729       </div>
4730       <div class="body">
4731         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4732 project</a> provide an instruction manual for teachers, system
4733 administrators and other users that contain useful tips for setting up
4734 and maintaining a Debian Edu installation.  This text is about how the
4735 text processing of this manual is handled in the project.</p>
4736
4737 <p>One goal of the project is to provide information in the native
4738 language of its users, and for this we need to handle translations.
4739 But we also want to make sure each language contain the same
4740 information, so for this we need a good way to keep the translations
4741 in sync.  And we want it to be easy for our users to improve the
4742 documentation, avoiding the need to learn special formats or tools to
4743 contribute, and the obvious way to do this is to make it possible to
4744 edit the documentation using a web browser.  We also want it to be
4745 easy for translators to keep the translation up to date, and give them
4746 help in figuring out what need to be translated. Here is the list of
4747 tools and the process we have found trying to reach all these
4748 goals.</p>
4749
4750 <p>We maintain the authoritative source of our manual in the
4751 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">Debian
4752 wiki</a>, as several wiki pages written in English.  It consist of one
4753 front page with references to the different chapters, several pages
4754 for each chapter, and finally one "collection page" gluing all the
4755 chapters together into one large web page (aka
4756 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/AllInOne">the
4757 AllInOne page</a>).  The AllInOne page is the one used for further
4758 processing and translations.  Thanks to the fact that the
4759 <a href="http://moinmo.in/">MoinMoin</a> installation on
4760 wiki.debian.org support exporting pages in
4761 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">the Docbook format</a>, we can fetch
4762 the list of pages to export using the raw version of the AllInOne
4763 page, loop over each of them to generate a Docbook XML version of the
4764 manual.  This process also download images and transform image
4765 references to use the locally downloaded images.  The generated
4766 Docbook XML files are slightly broken, so some post-processing is done
4767 using the <tt>documentation/scripts/get_manual</tt> program, and the
4768 result is a nice Docbook XML file (debian-edu-wheezy-manual.xml) and
4769 a handfull of images.  The XML file can now be used to generate PDF, HTML
4770 and epub versions of the English manual.  This is the basic step of
4771 our process, making PDF (using dblatex), HTML (using xsltproc) and
4772 epub (using dbtoepub) version from Docbook XML, and the resulting files
4773 are placed in the debian-edu-doc-en binary package.</p>
4774
4775 <p>But English documentation is not enough for us.  We want translated
4776 documentation too, and we want to make it easy for translators to
4777 track the English original.  For this we use the
4778 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/poxml.html">poxml</a> package,
4779 which allow us to transform the English Docbook XML file into a
4780 translation file (a .pot file), usable with the normal gettext based
4781 translation tools used by those translating free software.  The pot
4782 file is used to create and maintain translation files (several .po
4783 files), which the translations update with the native language
4784 translations of all titles, paragraphs and blocks of text in the
4785 original.  The next step is combining the original English Docbook XML
4786 and the translation file (say debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.po), to
4787 create a translated Docbook XML file (in this case
4788 debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.xml).  This translated (or partly
4789 translated, if the translation is not complete) Docbook XML file can
4790 then be used like the original to create a PDF, HTML and epub version
4791 of the documentation.</p>
4792
4793 <p>The translators use different tools to edit the .po files.  We
4794 recommend using
4795 <a href="http://www.kde.org/applications/development/lokalize/">lokalize</a>,
4796 while some use emacs and vi, others can use web based editors like
4797 <a href="http://pootle.translatehouse.org/">Poodle</a> or
4798 <a href="https://www.transifex.com/">Transifex</a>.  All we care about
4799 is where the .po file end up, in our git repository.  Updated
4800 translations can either be committed directly to git, or submitted as
4801 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/src:debian-edu-doc">bug reports
4802 against the debian-edu-doc package</a>.</p>
4803
4804 <p>One challenge is images, which both might need to be translated (if
4805 they show translated user applications), and are needed in different
4806 formats when creating PDF and HTML versions (epub is a HTML version in
4807 this regard).  For this we transform the original PNG images to the
4808 needed density and format during build, and have a way to provide
4809 translated images by storing translated versions in
4810 images/$LANGUAGECODE/.  I am a bit unsure about the details here.  The
4811 package maintainers know more.</p>
4812
4813 <p>If you wonder what the result look like, we provide
4814 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">the content
4815 of the documentation packages on the web</a>.  See for example the
4816 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/it/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.pdf">Italian
4817 PDF version</a> or the
4818 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/de/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.html">German
4819 HTML version</a>.  We do not yet build the epub version by default,
4820 but perhaps it will be done in the future.</p>
4821
4822 <p>To learn more, check out
4823 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-edu-doc.html">the
4824 debian-edu-doc package</a>,
4825 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">the
4826 manual on the wiki</a> and
4827 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/Translations">the
4828 translation instructions</a> in the manual.</p>
4829
4830       </div>
4831       <div class="tags">
4832
4833
4834         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>.
4835
4836
4837       </div>
4838     </div>
4839     <div class="padding"></div>
4840
4841     <div class="entry">
4842       <div class="title">
4843         <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>
4844       </div>
4845       <div class="date">
4846         23rd April 2014
4847       </div>
4848       <div class="body">
4849         <p>It would be nice if it was easier in Debian to get all the hardware
4850 related packages relevant for the computer installed automatically.
4851 So I implemented one, using
4852 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">my Isenkram
4853 package</a>.  To use it, install the tasksel and isenkram packages and
4854 run tasksel as user root.  You should be presented with a new option,
4855 "Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)".  When you
4856 select it, tasksel will install the packages isenkram claim is fit for
4857 the current hardware, hot pluggable or not.<p>
4858
4859 <p>The implementation is in two files, one is the tasksel menu entry
4860 description, and the other is the script used to extract the list of
4861 packages to install.  The first part is in
4862 <tt>/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc</tt> and look like
4863 this:</p>
4864
4865 <p><blockquote><pre>
4866 Task: isenkram
4867 Section: hardware
4868 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4869  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
4870  proposed.
4871 Test-new-install: mark show
4872 Relevance: 8
4873 Packages: for-current-hardware
4874 </pre></blockquote></p>
4875
4876 <p>The second part is in
4877 <tt>/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/for-current-hardware</tt> and look like
4878 this:</p>
4879
4880 <p><blockquote><pre>
4881 #!/bin/sh
4882 #
4883 (
4884     isenkram-lookup
4885     isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
4886 ) | sort -u
4887 </pre></blockquote></p>
4888
4889 <p>All in all, a very short and simple implementation making it
4890 trivial to install the hardware dependent package we all may want to
4891 have installed on our machines.  I've not been able to find a way to
4892 get tasksel to tell you exactly which packages it plan to install
4893 before doing the installation.  So if you are curious or careful,
4894 check the output from the isenkram-* command line tools first.</p>
4895
4896 <p>The information about which packages are handling which hardware is
4897 fetched either from the isenkram package itself in
4898 /usr/share/isenkram/, from git.debian.org or from the APT package
4899 database (using the Modaliases header).  The APT package database
4900 parsing have caused a nasty resource leak in the isenkram daemon (bugs
4901 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/719837">#719837</a> and
4902 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/730704">#730704</a>).  The cause is in
4903 the python-apt code (bug
4904 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/745487">#745487</a>), but using a
4905 workaround I was able to get rid of the file descriptor leak and
4906 reduce the memory leak from ~30 MiB per hardware detection down to
4907 around 2 MiB per hardware detection.  It should make the desktop
4908 daemon a lot more useful.  The fix is in version 0.7 uploaded to
4909 unstable today.</p>
4910
4911 <p>I believe the current way of mapping hardware to packages in
4912 Isenkram is is a good draft, but in the future I expect isenkram to
4913 use the AppStream data source for this.  A proposal for getting proper
4914 AppStream support into Debian is floating around as
4915 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a>, and
4916 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2014/Projects#SummerOfCode2014.2FProjects.2FAppStreamDEP11Implementation.AppStream.2FDEP-11_for_the_Debian_Archive">GSoC
4917 project</a> will take place this summer to improve the situation.  I
4918 look forward to seeing the result, and welcome patches for isenkram to
4919 start using the information when it is ready.</p>
4920
4921 <p>If you want your package to map to some specific hardware, either
4922 add a "Xb-Modaliases" header to your control file like I did in
4923 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">the pymissile
4924 package</a> or submit a bug report with the details to the isenkram
4925 package.  See also
4926 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">all my
4927 blog posts tagged isenkram</a> for details on the notation.  I expect
4928 the information will be migrated to AppStream eventually, but for the
4929 moment I got no better place to store it.</p>
4930
4931       </div>
4932       <div class="tags">
4933
4934
4935         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>.
4936
4937
4938       </div>
4939     </div>
4940     <div class="padding"></div>
4941
4942     <div class="entry">
4943       <div class="title">
4944         <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>
4945       </div>
4946       <div class="date">
4947         15th April 2014
4948       </div>
4949       <div class="body">
4950         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
4951 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware to make
4952 it easy for non-technical people to host their data and communication
4953 at home, and being able to communicate with their friends and family
4954 encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It is still going strong, and
4955 today a major mile stone was reached.</p>
4956
4957 <p>Today, the last of the packages currently used by the project to
4958 created the system images were accepted into Debian Unstable.  It was
4959 the freedombox-setup package, which is used to configure the images
4960 during build and on the first boot.  Now all one need to get going is
4961 the build code from the freedom-maker git repository and packages from
4962 Debian.  And once the freedombox-setup package enter testing, we can
4963 build everything directly from Debian. :)</p>
4964
4965 <p>Some key packages used by Freedombox are
4966 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>,
4967 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/plinth">plinth</a>,
4968 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pagekite">pagekite</a>,
4969 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/tor">tor</a>,
4970 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>,
4971 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/owncloud">owncloud</a> and
4972 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/dnsmasq">dnsmasq</a>.  There
4973 are plans to integrate more packages into the setup.  User
4974 documentation is maintained on the Debian wiki.  Please
4975 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Manual/Jessie">check out
4976 the manual</a> and help us improve it.</p>
4977
4978 <p>To test for yourself and create boot images with the FreedomBox
4979 setup, run this on a Debian machine using a user with sudo rights to
4980 become root:</p>
4981
4982 <p><pre>
4983 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
4984   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
4985   u-boot-tools
4986 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
4987   freedom-maker
4988 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
4989 </pre></p>
4990
4991 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
4992 devices.  See the README in the freedom-maker git repo for more
4993 details on the build.  If you do not want all three images, trim the
4994 make line.  Note that the virtualbox-image target is not really
4995 virtualbox specific.  It create a x86 image usable in kvm, qemu,
4996 vmware and any other x86 virtual machine environment.  You might need
4997 the version of vmdebootstrap in Jessie to get the build working, as it
4998 include fixes for a race condition with kpartx.</p>
4999
5000 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
5001 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
5002 the preseed values:</p>
5003
5004 <p><pre>
5005 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
5006 </pre></p>
5007
5008 <p>I have not tested it myself the last few weeks, so I do not know if
5009 it still work.</p>
5010
5011 <p>If you wonder how to help, one task you could look at is using
5012 systemd as the boot system.  It will become the default for Linux in
5013 Jessie, so we need to make sure it is usable on the Freedombox.  I did
5014 a simple test a few weeks ago, and noticed dnsmasq failed to start
5015 during boot when using systemd.  I suspect there are other problems
5016 too. :) To detect problems, there is a test suite included, which can
5017 be run from the plinth web interface.</p>
5018
5019 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
5020 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
5021 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
5022 irc.debian.org)</a> and
5023 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
5024 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
5025
5026       </div>
5027       <div class="tags">
5028
5029
5030         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>.
5031
5032
5033       </div>
5034     </div>
5035     <div class="padding"></div>
5036
5037     <div class="entry">
5038       <div class="title">
5039         <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>
5040       </div>
5041       <div class="date">
5042          9th April 2014
5043       </div>
5044       <div class="body">
5045         <p>For a while now, I have been looking for a sensible offsite backup
5046 solution for use at home.  My requirements are simple, it must be
5047 cheap and locally encrypted (in other words, I keep the encryption
5048 keys, the storage provider do not have access to my private files).
5049 One idea me and my friends had many years ago, before the cloud
5050 storage providers showed up, was to use Google mail as storage,
5051 writing a Linux block device storing blocks as emails in the mail
5052 service provided by Google, and thus get heaps of free space.  On top
5053 of this one can add encryption, RAID and volume management to have
5054 lots of (fairly slow, I admit that) cheap and encrypted storage.  But
5055 I never found time to implement such system.  But the last few weeks I
5056 have looked at a system called
5057 <a href="https://bitbucket.org/nikratio/s3ql/">S3QL</a>, a locally
5058 mounted network backed file system with the features I need.</p>
5059
5060 <p>S3QL is a fuse file system with a local cache and cloud storage,
5061 handling several different storage providers, any with Amazon S3,
5062 Google Drive or OpenStack API.  There are heaps of such storage
5063 providers.  S3QL can also use a local directory as storage, which
5064 combined with sshfs allow for file storage on any ssh server.  S3QL
5065 include support for encryption, compression, de-duplication, snapshots
5066 and immutable file systems, allowing me to mount the remote storage as
5067 a local mount point, look at and use the files as if they were local,
5068 while the content is stored in the cloud as well.  This allow me to
5069 have a backup that should survive fire.  The file system can not be
5070 shared between several machines at the same time, as only one can
5071 mount it at the time, but any machine with the encryption key and
5072 access to the storage service can mount it if it is unmounted.</p>
5073
5074 <p>It is simple to use.  I'm using it on Debian Wheezy, where the
5075 package is included already.  So to get started, run <tt>apt-get
5076 install s3ql</tt>.  Next, pick a storage provider.  I ended up picking
5077 Greenqloud, after reading their nice recipe on
5078 <a href="https://greenqloud.zendesk.com/entries/44611757-How-To-Use-S3QL-to-mount-a-StorageQloud-bucket-on-Debian-Wheezy">how
5079 to use S3QL with their Amazon S3 service</a>, because I trust the laws
5080 in Iceland more than those in USA when it come to keeping my personal
5081 data safe and private, and thus would rather spend money on a company
5082 in Iceland.  Another nice recipe is available from the article
5083 <a href="http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/Articles/HPC-Cloud-Storage">S3QL
5084 Filesystem for HPC Storage</a> by Jeff Layton in the HPC section of
5085 Admin magazine.  When the provider is picked, figure out how to get
5086 the API key needed to connect to the storage API.  With Greencloud,
5087 the key did not show up until I had added payment details to my
5088 account.</p>
5089
5090 <p>Armed with the API access details, it is time to create the file
5091 system.  First, create a new bucket in the cloud.  This bucket is the
5092 file system storage area.  I picked a bucket name reflecting the
5093 machine that was going to store data there, but any name will do.
5094 I'll refer to it as <tt>bucket-name</tt> below.  In addition, one need
5095 the API login and password, and a locally created password.  Store it
5096 all in ~root/.s3ql/authinfo2 like this:
5097
5098 <p><blockquote><pre>
5099 [s3c]
5100 storage-url: s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5101 backend-login: API-login
5102 backend-password: API-password
5103 fs-passphrase: local-password
5104 </pre></blockquote></p>
5105
5106 <p>I create my local passphrase using <tt>pwget 50</tt> or similar,
5107 but any sensible way to create a fairly random password should do it.
5108 Armed with these details, it is now time to run mkfs, entering the API
5109 details and password to create it:</p>
5110
5111 <p><blockquote><pre>
5112 # mkdir -m 700 /var/lib/s3ql-cache
5113 # mkfs.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5114   --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5115 Enter backend login:
5116 Enter backend password:
5117 Before using S3QL, make sure to read the user's guide, especially
5118 the 'Important Rules to Avoid Loosing Data' section.
5119 Enter encryption password:
5120 Confirm encryption password:
5121 Generating random encryption key...
5122 Creating metadata tables...
5123 Dumping metadata...
5124 ..objects..
5125 ..blocks..
5126 ..inodes..
5127 ..inode_blocks..
5128 ..symlink_targets..
5129 ..names..
5130 ..contents..
5131 ..ext_attributes..
5132 Compressing and uploading metadata...
5133 Wrote 0.00 MB of compressed metadata.
5134 # </pre></blockquote></p>
5135
5136 <p>The next step is mounting the file system to make the storage available.
5137
5138 <p><blockquote><pre>
5139 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5140   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
5141 Using 4 upload threads.
5142 Downloading and decompressing metadata...
5143 Reading metadata...
5144 ..objects..
5145 ..blocks..
5146 ..inodes..
5147 ..inode_blocks..
5148 ..symlink_targets..
5149 ..names..
5150 ..contents..
5151 ..ext_attributes..
5152 Mounting filesystem...
5153 # df -h /s3ql
5154 Filesystem                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
5155 s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name  1.0T     0  1.0T   0% /s3ql
5156 #
5157 </pre></blockquote></p>
5158
5159 <p>The file system is now ready for use.  I use rsync to store my
5160 backups in it, and as the metadata used by rsync is downloaded at
5161 mount time, no network traffic (and storage cost) is triggered by
5162 running rsync.  To unmount, one should not use the normal umount
5163 command, as this will not flush the cache to the cloud storage, but
5164 instead running the umount.s3ql command like this:
5165
5166 <p><blockquote><pre>
5167 # umount.s3ql /s3ql
5168 #
5169 </pre></blockquote></p>
5170
5171 <p>There is a fsck command available to check the file system and
5172 correct any problems detected.  This can be used if the local server
5173 crashes while the file system is mounted, to reset the "already
5174 mounted" flag.  This is what it look like when processing a working
5175 file system:</p>
5176
5177 <p><blockquote><pre>
5178 # fsck.s3ql --force --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5179 Using cached metadata.
5180 File system seems clean, checking anyway.
5181 Checking DB integrity...
5182 Creating temporary extra indices...
5183 Checking lost+found...
5184 Checking cached objects...
5185 Checking names (refcounts)...
5186 Checking contents (names)...
5187 Checking contents (inodes)...
5188 Checking contents (parent inodes)...
5189 Checking objects (reference counts)...
5190 Checking objects (backend)...
5191 ..processed 5000 objects so far..
5192 ..processed 10000 objects so far..
5193 ..processed 15000 objects so far..
5194 Checking objects (sizes)...
5195 Checking blocks (referenced objects)...
5196 Checking blocks (refcounts)...
5197 Checking inode-block mapping (blocks)...
5198 Checking inode-block mapping (inodes)...
5199 Checking inodes (refcounts)...
5200 Checking inodes (sizes)...
5201 Checking extended attributes (names)...
5202 Checking extended attributes (inodes)...
5203 Checking symlinks (inodes)...
5204 Checking directory reachability...
5205 Checking unix conventions...
5206 Checking referential integrity...
5207 Dropping temporary indices...
5208 Backing up old metadata...
5209 Dumping metadata...
5210 ..objects..
5211 ..blocks..
5212 ..inodes..
5213 ..inode_blocks..
5214 ..symlink_targets..
5215 ..names..
5216 ..contents..
5217 ..ext_attributes..
5218 Compressing and uploading metadata...
5219 Wrote 0.89 MB of compressed metadata.
5220 #
5221 </pre></blockquote></p>
5222
5223 <p>Thanks to the cache, working on files that fit in the cache is very
5224 quick, about the same speed as local file access.  Uploading large
5225 amount of data is to me limited by the bandwidth out of and into my
5226 house.  Uploading 685 MiB with a 100 MiB cache gave me 305 kiB/s,
5227 which is very close to my upload speed, and downloading the same
5228 Debian installation ISO gave me 610 kiB/s, close to my download speed.
5229 Both were measured using <tt>dd</tt>.  So for me, the bottleneck is my
5230 network, not the file system code.  I do not know what a good cache
5231 size would be, but suspect that the cache should e larger than your
5232 working set.</p>
5233
5234 <p>I mentioned that only one machine can mount the file system at the
5235 time.  If another machine try, it is told that the file system is
5236 busy:</p>
5237
5238 <p><blockquote><pre>
5239 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5240   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
5241 Using 8 upload threads.
5242 Backend reports that fs is still mounted elsewhere, aborting.
5243 #
5244 </pre></blockquote></p>
5245
5246 <p>The file content is uploaded when the cache is full, while the
5247 metadata is uploaded once every 24 hour by default.  To ensure the
5248 file system content is flushed to the cloud, one can either umount the
5249 file system, or ask S3QL to flush the cache and metadata using
5250 s3qlctrl:
5251
5252 <p><blockquote><pre>
5253 # s3qlctrl upload-meta /s3ql
5254 # s3qlctrl flushcache /s3ql
5255 #
5256 </pre></blockquote></p>
5257
5258 <p>If you are curious about how much space your data uses in the
5259 cloud, and how much compression and deduplication cut down on the
5260 storage usage, you can use s3qlstat on the mounted file system to get
5261 a report:</p>
5262
5263 <p><blockquote><pre>
5264 # s3qlstat /s3ql
5265 Directory entries:    9141
5266 Inodes:               9143
5267 Data blocks:          8851
5268 Total data size:      22049.38 MB
5269 After de-duplication: 21955.46 MB (99.57% of total)
5270 After compression:    21877.28 MB (99.22% of total, 99.64% of de-duplicated)
5271 Database size:        2.39 MB (uncompressed)
5272 (some values do not take into account not-yet-uploaded dirty blocks in cache)
5273 #
5274 </pre></blockquote></p>
5275
5276 <p>I mentioned earlier that there are several possible suppliers of
5277 storage.  I did not try to locate them all, but am aware of at least
5278 <a href="https://www.greenqloud.com/">Greenqloud</a>,
5279 <a href="http://drive.google.com/">Google Drive</a>,
5280 <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/">Amazon S3 web serivces</a>,
5281 <a href="http://www.rackspace.com/">Rackspace</a> and
5282 <a href="http://crowncloud.net/">Crowncloud</A>.  The latter even
5283 accept payment in Bitcoin.  Pick one that suit your need.  Some of
5284 them provide several GiB of free storage, but the prize models are
5285 quite different and you will have to figure out what suits you
5286 best.</p>
5287
5288 <p>While researching this blog post, I had a look at research papers
5289 and posters discussing the S3QL file system.  There are several, which
5290 told me that the file system is getting a critical check by the
5291 science community and increased my confidence in using it.  One nice
5292 poster is titled
5293 "<a href="http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/adtsc/publications/science_highlights_2013/docs/pg68_69.pdf">An
5294 Innovative Parallel Cloud Storage System using OpenStack’s SwiftObject
5295 Store and Transformative Parallel I/O Approach</a>" by Hsing-Bung
5296 Chen, Benjamin McClelland, David Sherrill, Alfred Torrez, Parks Fields
5297 and Pamela Smith.  Please  have a look.</p>
5298
5299 <p>Given my problems with different file systems earlier, I decided to
5300 check out the mounted S3QL file system to see if it would be usable as
5301 a home directory (in other word, that it provided POSIX semantics when
5302 it come to locking and umask handling etc).  Running
5303 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">my
5304 test code to check file system semantics</a>, I was happy to discover that
5305 no error was found.  So the file system can be used for home
5306 directories, if one chooses to do so.</p>
5307
5308 <p>If you do not want a locally file system, and want something that
5309 work without the Linux fuse file system, I would like to mention the
5310 <a href="http://www.tarsnap.com/">Tarsnap service</a>, which also
5311 provide locally encrypted backup using a command line client.  It have
5312 a nicer access control system, where one can split out read and write
5313 access, allowing some systems to write to the backup and others to
5314 only read from it.</p>
5315
5316 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
5317 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
5318 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
5319
5320       </div>
5321       <div class="tags">
5322
5323
5324         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>.
5325
5326
5327       </div>
5328     </div>
5329     <div class="padding"></div>
5330
5331     <div class="entry">
5332       <div class="title">
5333         <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>
5334       </div>
5335       <div class="date">
5336         14th March 2014
5337       </div>
5338       <div class="body">
5339         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
5340 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware for
5341 making it easy for non-technical people to host their data and
5342 communication at home, and being able to communicate with their
5343 friends and family encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It has been
5344 going on for a while, and is slowly progressing towards a new test
5345 release (0.2).</p>
5346
5347 <p>And what day could be better than the Pi day to announce that the
5348 new version will provide "hard drive" / SD card / USB stick images for
5349 Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and VirtualBox (or any other virtualization
5350 system), and can also be installed using a Debian installer preseed
5351 file.  The Debian based Freedombox is now based on Debian Jessie,
5352 where most of the needed packages used are already present.  Only one,
5353 the freedombox-setup package, is missing.  To try to build your own
5354 boot image to test the current status, fetch the freedom-maker scripts
5355 and build using
5356 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/vmdebootstrap">vmdebootstrap</a>
5357 with a user with sudo access to become root:
5358
5359 <pre>
5360 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
5361   freedom-maker
5362 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
5363   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
5364   u-boot-tools
5365 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
5366 </pre>
5367
5368 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
5369 devices.  See the README for more details on the build. If you do not
5370 want all three images, trim the make line.  But note that thanks to <a
5371 href="https://bugs.debian.org/741407">a race condition in
5372 vmdebootstrap</a>, the build might fail without the patch to the
5373 kpartx call.</p>
5374
5375 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
5376 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
5377 the preseed values:</p>
5378
5379 <pre>
5380 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
5381 </pre>
5382
5383 <p>But note that due to <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/740673">a
5384 recently introduced bug in apt in Jessie</a>, the installer will
5385 currently hang while setting up APT sources.  Killing the
5386 '<tt>apt-cdrom ident</tt>' process when it hang a few times during the
5387 installation will get the installation going.  This affect all
5388 installations in Jessie, and I expect it will be fixed soon.</p>
5389
5390 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
5391 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
5392 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
5393 irc.debian.org)</a> and
5394 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
5395 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
5396
5397       </div>
5398       <div class="tags">
5399
5400
5401         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>.
5402
5403
5404       </div>
5405     </div>
5406     <div class="padding"></div>
5407
5408     <div class="entry">
5409       <div class="title">
5410         <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>
5411       </div>
5412       <div class="date">
5413         22nd February 2014
5414       </div>
5415       <div class="body">
5416         <p>Many years ago, I wrote a GPL licensed version of the netgroup and
5417 innetgr tools, because I needed them in
5418 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>.  I called the project
5419 ng-utils, and it has served me well.  I placed the project under the
5420 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/">Hungry Programmer</a> umbrella, and it was maintained in our CVS
5421 repository.  But many years ago, the CVS repository was dropped (lost,
5422 not migrated to new hardware, not sure), and the project have lacked a
5423 proper home since then.</p>
5424
5425 <p>Last summer, I had a look at the package and made a new release
5426 fixing a irritating crash bug, but was unable to store the changes in
5427 a proper source control system.  I applied for a project on
5428 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/">Alioth</a>, but did not have time
5429 to follow up on it.  Until today. :)</p>
5430
5431 <p>After many hours of cleaning and migration, the ng-utils project
5432 now have a new home, and a git repository with the highlight of the
5433 history of the project.  I published all release tarballs and imported
5434 them into the git repository.  As the project is really stable and not
5435 expected to gain new features any time soon, I decided to make a new
5436 release and call it 1.0.  Visit the new project home on
5437 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/">https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/</a>
5438 if you want to check it out.  The new version is also uploaded into
5439 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/ng-utils.html">Debian Unstable</a>.</p>
5440
5441       </div>
5442       <div class="tags">
5443
5444
5445         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>.
5446
5447
5448       </div>
5449     </div>
5450     <div class="padding"></div>
5451
5452     <div class="entry">
5453       <div class="title">
5454         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_sysvinit_from_experimental_in_Debian_Hurd.html">Testing sysvinit from experimental in Debian Hurd</a>
5455       </div>
5456       <div class="date">
5457          3rd February 2014
5458       </div>
5459       <div class="body">
5460         <p>A few days ago I decided to try to help the Hurd people to get
5461 their changes into sysvinit, to allow them to use the normal sysvinit
5462 boot system instead of their old one.  This follow up on the
5463 <a href="https://teythoon.cryptobitch.de//categories/gsoc.html">great
5464 Google Summer of Code work</a> done last summer by Justus Winter to
5465 get Debian on Hurd working more like Debian on Linux.  To get started,
5466 I downloaded a prebuilt hard disk image from
5467 <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>,
5468 and started it using virt-manager.</p>
5469
5470 <p>The first think I had to do after logging in (root without any
5471 password) was to get the network operational.  I followed
5472 <a href="https://www.debian.org/ports/hurd/hurd-install">the
5473 instructions on the Debian GNU/Hurd ports page</a> and ran these
5474 commands as root to get the machine to accept a IP address from the
5475 kvm internal DHCP server:</p>
5476
5477 <p><blockquote><pre>
5478 settrans -fgap /dev/netdde /hurd/netdde
5479 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[p]finet/ { print $2}')
5480 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[d]evnode/ { print $2}')
5481 dhclient /dev/eth0
5482 </pre></blockquote></p>
5483
5484 <p>After this, the machine had internet connectivity, and I could
5485 upgrade it and install the sysvinit packages from experimental and
5486 enable it as the default boot system in Hurd.</p>
5487
5488 <p>But before I did that, I set a password on the root user, as ssh is
5489 running on the machine it for ssh login to work a password need to be
5490 set.  Also, note that a bug somewhere in openssh on Hurd block
5491 compression from working.  Remember to turn that off on the client
5492 side.</p>
5493
5494 <p>Run these commands as root to upgrade and test the new sysvinit
5495 stuff:</p>
5496
5497 <p><blockquote><pre>
5498 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/experimental.list &lt;&lt;EOF
5499 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ experimental main
5500 EOF
5501 apt-get update
5502 apt-get dist-upgrade
5503 apt-get install -t experimental initscripts sysv-rc sysvinit \
5504     sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils
5505 update-alternatives --config runsystem
5506 </pre></blockquote></p>
5507
5508 <p>To reboot after switching boot system, you have to use
5509 <tt>reboot-hurd</tt> instead of just <tt>reboot</tt>, as there is not
5510 yet a sysvinit process able to receive the signals from the normal
5511 'reboot' command.  After switching to sysvinit as the boot system,
5512 upgrading every package and rebooting, the network come up with DHCP
5513 after boot as it should, and the settrans/pkill hack mentioned at the
5514 start is no longer needed.  But for some strange reason, there are no
5515 longer any login prompt in the virtual console, so I logged in using
5516 ssh instead.
5517
5518 <p>Note that there are some race conditions in Hurd making the boot
5519 fail some times.  No idea what the cause is, but hope the Hurd porters
5520 figure it out.  At least Justus said on IRC (#debian-hurd on
5521 irc.debian.org) that they are aware of the problem.  A way to reduce
5522 the impact is to upgrade to the Hurd packages built by Justus by
5523 adding this repository to the machine:</p>
5524
5525 <p><blockquote><pre>
5526 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/hurd-ci.list &lt;&lt;EOF
5527 deb http://darnassus.sceen.net/~teythoon/hurd-ci/ sid main
5528 EOF
5529 </pre></blockquote></p>
5530
5531 <p>At the moment the prebuilt virtual machine get some packages from
5532 http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian, because some of the packages in
5533 unstable do not yet include the required patches that are lingering in
5534 BTS.  This is the completely list of "unofficial" packages installed:</p>
5535
5536 <p><blockquote><pre>
5537 # aptitude search '?narrow(?version(CURRENT),?origin(Debian Ports))'
5538 i   emacs                   - GNU Emacs editor (metapackage)
5539 i   gdb                     - GNU Debugger
5540 i   hurd-recommended        - Miscellaneous translators
5541 i   isc-dhcp-client         - ISC DHCP client
5542 i   isc-dhcp-common         - common files used by all the isc-dhcp* packages
5543 i   libc-bin                - Embedded GNU C Library: Binaries
5544 i   libc-dev-bin            - Embedded GNU C Library: Development binaries
5545 i   libc0.3                 - Embedded GNU C Library: Shared libraries
5546 i A libc0.3-dbg             - Embedded GNU C Library: detached debugging symbols
5547 i   libc0.3-dev             - Embedded GNU C Library: Development Libraries and Hea
5548 i   multiarch-support       - Transitional package to ensure multiarch compatibilit
5549 i A x11-common              - X Window System (X.Org) infrastructure
5550 i   xorg                    - X.Org X Window System
5551 i A xserver-xorg            - X.Org X server
5552 i A xserver-xorg-input-all  - X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
5553 #
5554 </pre></blockquote></p>
5555
5556 <p>All in all, testing hurd has been an interesting experience. :)
5557 X.org did not work out of the box and I never took the time to follow
5558 the porters instructions to fix it.  This time I was interested in the
5559 command line stuff.<p>
5560
5561       </div>
5562       <div class="tags">
5563
5564
5565         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>.
5566
5567
5568       </div>
5569     </div>
5570     <div class="padding"></div>
5571
5572     <div class="entry">
5573       <div class="title">
5574         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html">New chrpath release 0.16</a>
5575       </div>
5576       <div class="date">
5577         14th January 2014
5578       </div>
5579       <div class="body">
5580         <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to
5581 find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code
5582 analysis.  It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very
5583 useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of
5584 the source.  The company behind it provide
5585 <a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as
5586 a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are
5587 already checked.  A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at
5588 the Coverity system, and discovered that the
5589 <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and
5590 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a>
5591 projects I am involved with was already registered.  But these are
5592 fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to
5593 check, and decided to <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request
5594 checking of the chrpath project</a>.  It was
5595 added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects.  Six of
5596 these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an
5597 error.  Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction
5598 of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it
5599 is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in
5600 the future end up in a library.  Having fixed all defects and added
5601 <a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a
5602 mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to
5603 publish a new release.  These are the release notes:</p>
5604
5605 <p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p>
5606
5607 <ul>
5608
5609   <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li>
5610   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li>
5611   <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li>
5612
5613 </ul>
5614
5615 <p>You can
5616 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
5617 new version 0.16 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
5618 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
5619 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
5620 include a test suite check.</p>
5621
5622       </div>
5623       <div class="tags">
5624
5625
5626         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>.
5627
5628
5629       </div>
5630     </div>
5631     <div class="padding"></div>
5632
5633     <div class="entry">
5634       <div class="title">
5635         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html">New chrpath release 0.15</a>
5636       </div>
5637       <div class="date">
5638         24th November 2013
5639       </div>
5640       <div class="body">
5641         <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that
5642 development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my
5643 acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath,
5644 the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already
5645 compiled ELF programs.  The update was triggered by the persistence of
5646 Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get
5647 support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he
5648 is working on.  I checked the
5649 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>,
5650 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and
5651 <a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a>
5652 packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from
5653 OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes.
5654 These are the release notes:</p>
5655
5656 <p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p>
5657
5658 <ul>
5659
5660   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work
5661    with newer architectures.  Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads
5662    up.</li>
5663
5664   <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li>
5665
5666   <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and
5667    Matthias Klose.</li>
5668
5669   <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by
5670    Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li>
5671
5672   <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in
5673    .dynamic is a NULL terminated string.  Based on patch found in
5674    Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li>
5675
5676 </ul>
5677
5678 <p>You can
5679 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
5680 new version 0.15 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
5681 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
5682 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
5683 include a testsuite check.</p>
5684
5685       </div>
5686       <div class="tags">
5687
5688
5689         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>.
5690
5691
5692       </div>
5693     </div>
5694     <div class="padding"></div>
5695
5696     <div class="entry">
5697       <div class="title">
5698         <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>
5699       </div>
5700       <div class="date">
5701          2nd November 2013
5702       </div>
5703       <div class="body">
5704         <p>If one of the points of switching to a new init system in Debian is
5705 <a href="http://thomas.goirand.fr/blog/?p=147">to get rid of huge
5706 init.d scripts</a>, I doubt we need to switch away from sysvinit and
5707 init.d scripts at all.  Here is an example init.d script, ie a rewrite
5708 of /etc/init.d/rsyslog:</p>
5709
5710 <p><pre>
5711 #!/lib/init/init-d-script
5712 ### BEGIN INIT INFO
5713 # Provides:          rsyslog
5714 # Required-Start:    $remote_fs $time
5715 # Required-Stop:     umountnfs $time
5716 # X-Stop-After:      sendsigs
5717 # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
5718 # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
5719 # Short-Description: enhanced syslogd
5720 # Description:       Rsyslog is an enhanced multi-threaded syslogd.
5721 #                    It is quite compatible to stock sysklogd and can be
5722 #                    used as a drop-in replacement.
5723 ### END INIT INFO
5724 DESC="enhanced syslogd"
5725 DAEMON=/usr/sbin/rsyslogd
5726 </pre></p>
5727
5728 <p>Pretty minimalistic to me... For the record, the original sysv-rc
5729 script was 137 lines, and the above is just 15 lines, most of it meta
5730 info/comments.</p>
5731
5732 <p>How to do this, you ask?  Well, one create a new script
5733 /lib/init/init-d-script looking something like this:
5734
5735 <p><pre>
5736 #!/bin/sh
5737
5738 # Define LSB log_* functions.
5739 # Depend on lsb-base (>= 3.2-14) to ensure that this file is present
5740 # and status_of_proc is working.
5741 . /lib/lsb/init-functions
5742
5743 #
5744 # Function that starts the daemon/service
5745
5746 #
5747 do_start()
5748 {
5749         # Return
5750         #   0 if daemon has been started
5751         #   1 if daemon was already running
5752         #   2 if daemon could not be started
5753         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON --test > /dev/null \
5754                 || return 1
5755         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON -- \
5756                 $DAEMON_ARGS \
5757                 || return 2
5758         # Add code here, if necessary, that waits for the process to be ready
5759         # to handle requests from services started subsequently which depend
5760         # on this one.  As a last resort, sleep for some time.
5761 }
5762
5763 #
5764 # Function that stops the daemon/service
5765 #
5766 do_stop()
5767 {
5768         # Return
5769         #   0 if daemon has been stopped
5770         #   1 if daemon was already stopped
5771         #   2 if daemon could not be stopped
5772         #   other if a failure occurred
5773         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --retry=TERM/30/KILL/5 --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
5774         RETVAL="$?"
5775         [ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2
5776         # Wait for children to finish too if this is a daemon that forks
5777         # and if the daemon is only ever run from this initscript.
5778         # If the above conditions are not satisfied then add some other code
5779         # that waits for the process to drop all resources that could be
5780         # needed by services started subsequently.  A last resort is to
5781         # sleep for some time.
5782         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --retry=0/30/KILL/5 --exec $DAEMON
5783         [ "$?" = 2 ] && return 2
5784         # Many daemons don't delete their pidfiles when they exit.
5785         rm -f $PIDFILE
5786         return "$RETVAL"
5787 }
5788
5789 #
5790 # Function that sends a SIGHUP to the daemon/service
5791 #
5792 do_reload() {
5793         #
5794         # If the daemon can reload its configuration without
5795         # restarting (for example, when it is sent a SIGHUP),
5796         # then implement that here.
5797         #
5798         start-stop-daemon --stop --signal 1 --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
5799         return 0
5800 }
5801
5802 SCRIPTNAME=$1
5803 scriptbasename="$(basename $1)"
5804 echo "SN: $scriptbasename"
5805 if [ "$scriptbasename" != "init-d-library" ] ; then
5806     script="$1"
5807     shift
5808     . $script
5809 else
5810     exit 0
5811 fi
5812
5813 NAME=$(basename $DAEMON)
5814 PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
5815
5816 # Exit if the package is not installed
5817 #[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0
5818
5819 # Read configuration variable file if it is present
5820 [ -r /etc/default/$NAME ] && . /etc/default/$NAME
5821
5822 # Load the VERBOSE setting and other rcS variables
5823 . /lib/init/vars.sh
5824
5825 case "$1" in
5826   start)
5827         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
5828         do_start
5829         case "$?" in
5830                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
5831                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
5832         esac
5833         ;;
5834   stop)
5835         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
5836         do_stop
5837         case "$?" in
5838                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
5839                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
5840         esac
5841         ;;
5842   status)
5843         status_of_proc "$DAEMON" "$NAME" && exit 0 || exit $?
5844         ;;
5845   #reload|force-reload)
5846         #
5847         # If do_reload() is not implemented then leave this commented out
5848         # and leave 'force-reload' as an alias for 'restart'.
5849         #
5850         #log_daemon_msg "Reloading $DESC" "$NAME"
5851         #do_reload
5852         #log_end_msg $?
5853         #;;
5854   restart|force-reload)
5855         #
5856         # If the "reload" option is implemented then remove the
5857         # 'force-reload' alias
5858         #
5859         log_daemon_msg "Restarting $DESC" "$NAME"
5860         do_stop
5861         case "$?" in
5862           0|1)
5863                 do_start
5864                 case "$?" in
5865                         0) log_end_msg 0 ;;
5866                         1) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Old process is still running
5867                         *) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Failed to start
5868                 esac
5869                 ;;
5870           *)
5871                 # Failed to stop
5872                 log_end_msg 1
5873                 ;;
5874         esac
5875         ;;
5876   *)
5877         echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|status|restart|force-reload}" >&2
5878         exit 3
5879         ;;
5880 esac
5881
5882 :
5883 </pre></p>
5884
5885 <p>It is based on /etc/init.d/skeleton, and could be improved quite a
5886 lot.  I did not really polish the approach, so it might not always
5887 work out of the box, but you get the idea.  I did not try very hard to
5888 optimize it nor make it more robust either.</p>
5889
5890 <p>A better argument for switching init system in Debian than reducing
5891 the size of init scripts (which is a good thing to do anyway), is to
5892 get boot system that is able to handle the kernel events sensibly and
5893 robustly, and do not depend on the boot to run sequentially.  The boot
5894 and the kernel have not behaved sequentially in years.</p>
5895
5896       </div>
5897       <div class="tags">
5898
5899
5900         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>.
5901
5902
5903       </div>
5904     </div>
5905     <div class="padding"></div>
5906
5907     <div class="entry">
5908       <div class="title">
5909         <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>
5910       </div>
5911       <div class="date">
5912          1st November 2013
5913       </div>
5914       <div class="body">
5915         <p><a href="http://www.spice-space.org/">The SPICE protocol</a> for
5916 remote display access is the preferred solution with oVirt and RedHat
5917 Enterprise Virtualization, and I was sad to discover the other day
5918 that the browser plugin needed to use these systems seamlessly was
5919 missing in Debian.  The <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/668284">request
5920 for a package</a> was from 2012-04-10 with no progress since
5921 2013-04-01, so I decided to wrap up a package based on the great work
5922 from Cajus Pollmeier and put it in a collab-maint maintained git
5923 repository to get a package I could use.  I would very much like
5924 others to help me maintain the package (or just take over, I do not
5925 mind), but as no-one had volunteered so far, I just uploaded it to
5926 NEW.  I hope it will be available in Debian in a few days.</p>
5927
5928 <p>The source is now available from
5929 <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>
5930
5931       </div>
5932       <div class="tags">
5933
5934
5935         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>.
5936
5937
5938       </div>
5939     </div>
5940     <div class="padding"></div>
5941
5942     <div class="entry">
5943       <div class="title">
5944         <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>
5945       </div>
5946       <div class="date">
5947         27th October 2013
5948       </div>
5949       <div class="body">
5950         <p>The
5951 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/v/vmdebootstrap.html">vmdebootstrap</a>
5952 program is a a very nice system to create virtual machine images.  It
5953 create a image file, add a partition table, mount it and run
5954 debootstrap in the mounted directory to create a Debian system on a
5955 stick.  Yesterday, I decided to try to teach it how to make images for
5956 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi</a>, as part
5957 of a plan to simplify the build system for
5958 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the FreedomBox
5959 project</a>.  The FreedomBox project already uses vmdebootstrap for
5960 the virtualbox images, but its current build system made multistrap
5961 based system for Dreamplug images, and it is lacking support for
5962 Raspberry Pi.</p>
5963
5964 <p>Armed with the knowledge on how to build "foreign" (aka non-native
5965 architecture) chroots for Raspberry Pi, I dived into the vmdebootstrap
5966 code and adjusted it to be able to build armel images on my amd64
5967 Debian laptop.  I ended up giving vmdebootstrap five new options,
5968 allowing me to replicate the image creation process I use to make
5969 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">Debian
5970 Jessie based mesh node images for the Raspberry Pi</a>.  First, the
5971 <tt>--foreign /path/to/binfm_handler</tt> option tell vmdebootstrap to
5972 call debootstrap with --foreign and to copy the handler into the
5973 generated chroot before running the second stage.  This allow
5974 vmdebootstrap to create armel images on an amd64 host.  Next I added
5975 two new options <tt>--bootsize size</tt> and <tt>--boottype
5976 fstype</tt> to teach it to create a separate /boot/ partition with the
5977 given file system type, allowing me to create an image with a vfat
5978 partition for the /boot/ stuff.  I also added a <tt>--variant
5979 variant</tt> option to allow me to create smaller images without the
5980 Debian base system packages installed.  Finally, I added an option
5981 <tt>--no-extlinux</tt> to tell vmdebootstrap to not install extlinux
5982 as a boot loader.  It is not needed on the Raspberry Pi and probably
5983 most other non-x86 architectures.  The changes were accepted by the
5984 upstream author of vmdebootstrap yesterday and today, and is now
5985 available from
5986 <a href="http://git.liw.fi/cgi-bin/cgit/cgit.cgi/vmdebootstrap/">the
5987 upstream project page</a>.</p>
5988
5989 <p>To use it to build a Raspberry Pi image using Debian Jessie, first
5990 create a small script (the customize script) to add the non-free
5991 binary blob needed to boot the Raspberry Pi and the APT source
5992 list:</p>
5993
5994 <p><pre>
5995 #!/bin/sh
5996 set -e # Exit on first error
5997 rootdir="$1"
5998 cd "$rootdir"
5999 cat &lt;&lt;EOF > etc/apt/sources.list
6000 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
6001 EOF
6002 # Install non-free binary blob needed to boot Raspberry Pi.  This
6003 # install a kernel somewhere too.
6004 wget https://raw.github.com/Hexxeh/rpi-update/master/rpi-update \
6005     -O $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
6006 chmod a+x $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
6007 mkdir -p $rootdir/lib/modules
6008 touch $rootdir/boot/start.elf
6009 chroot $rootdir rpi-update
6010 </pre></p>
6011
6012 <p>Next, fetch the latest vmdebootstrap script and call it like this
6013 to build the image:</p>
6014
6015 <pre>
6016 sudo ./vmdebootstrap \
6017     --variant minbase \
6018     --arch armel \
6019     --distribution jessie \
6020     --mirror http://http.debian.net/debian \
6021     --image test.img \
6022     --size 600M \
6023     --bootsize 64M \
6024     --boottype vfat \
6025     --log-level debug \
6026     --verbose \
6027     --no-kernel \
6028     --no-extlinux \
6029     --root-password raspberry \
6030     --hostname raspberrypi \
6031     --foreign /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static \
6032     --customize `pwd`/customize \
6033     --package netbase \
6034     --package git-core \
6035     --package binutils \
6036     --package ca-certificates \
6037     --package wget \
6038     --package kmod
6039 </pre></p>
6040
6041 <p>The list of packages being installed are the ones needed by
6042 rpi-update to make the image bootable on the Raspberry Pi, with the
6043 exception of netbase, which is needed by debootstrap to find
6044 /etc/hosts with the minbase variant.  I really wish there was a way to
6045 set up an Raspberry Pi using only packages in the Debian archive, but
6046 that is not possible as far as I know, because it boots from the GPU
6047 using a non-free binary blob.</p>
6048
6049 <p>The build host need debootstrap, kpartx and qemu-user-static and
6050 probably a few others installed.  I have not checked the complete
6051 build dependency list.</p>
6052
6053 <p>The resulting image will not use the hardware floating point unit
6054 on the Raspberry PI, because the armel architecture in Debian is not
6055 optimized for that use.  So the images created will be a bit slower
6056 than <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/">Raspbian</a> based images.</p>
6057
6058       </div>
6059       <div class="tags">
6060
6061
6062         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>.
6063
6064
6065       </div>
6066     </div>
6067     <div class="padding"></div>
6068
6069     <div class="entry">
6070       <div class="title">
6071         <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>
6072       </div>
6073       <div class="date">
6074         15th October 2013
6075       </div>
6076       <div class="body">
6077         <p>The last few days I came across a few good causes that should get
6078 wider attention.  I recommend signing and donating to each one of
6079 these. :)</p>
6080
6081 <p>Via <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2013/18/">Debian
6082 Project News for 2013-10-14</a> I came across the Outreach Program for
6083 Women program which is a Google Summer of Code like initiative to get
6084 more women involved in free software.  One debian sponsor has offered
6085 to match <a href="http://debian.ch/opw2013">any donation done to Debian
6086 earmarked</a> for this initiative.  I donated a few minutes ago, and
6087 hope you will to. :)</p>
6088
6089 <p>And the Electronic Frontier Foundation just announced plans to
6090 create <a href="https://supporters.eff.org/donate/nsa-videos">video
6091 documentaries about the excessive spying</a> on every Internet user that
6092 take place these days, and their need to fund the work.  I've already
6093 donated.  Are you next?</p>
6094
6095 <p>For my Norwegian audience, the organisation Studentenes og
6096 Akademikernes Internasjonale Hjelpefond is collecting signatures for a
6097 statement under the heading
6098 <a href="http://saih.no/Bloggers_United/">Bloggers United for Open
6099 Access</a> for those of us asking for more focus on open access in the
6100 Norwegian government.  So far 499 signatures.  I hope you will sign it
6101 too.</p>
6102
6103       </div>
6104       <div class="tags">
6105
6106
6107         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>.
6108
6109
6110       </div>
6111     </div>
6112     <div class="padding"></div>
6113
6114     <div class="entry">
6115       <div class="title">
6116         <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>
6117       </div>
6118       <div class="date">
6119         27th September 2013
6120       </div>
6121       <div class="body">
6122         <p>The <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox
6123 project</a> have been going on for a while, and have presented the
6124 vision, ideas and solution several places.  Here is a little
6125 collection of videos of talks and presentation of the project.</p>
6126
6127 <ul>
6128
6129 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukvUz5taxvA">FreedomBox -
6130 2,5 minute marketing film</a> (Youtube)</li>
6131
6132 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzW25QTVWsE">Eben Moglen
6133 discusses the Freedombox on CBS news 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
6134
6135 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae8SZbxfE0g">Eben Moglen -
6136 Freedom in the Cloud - Software Freedom, Privacy and and Security for
6137 Web 2.0 and Cloud computing at ISOC-NY Public Meeting 2010</a>
6138 (Youtube)</li>
6139
6140 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNaIji_3xBE">Fosdem 2011
6141 Keynote by Eben Moglen presenting the Freedombox</a> (Youtube)</li>
6142
6143 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bDDUyJSQ9s">Presentation of
6144 the Freedombox by James Vasile at Elevate in Gratz 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
6145
6146 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQTmnk27g9s"> Freedombox -
6147 Discovery, Identity, and Trust by Nick Daly at Freedombox Hackfest New
6148 York City in 2012</a> (Youtube)</li>
6149
6150 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbSB4Ba7Ck">Introduction
6151 to the Freedombox at Freedombox Hackfest New York City in 2012</a>
6152 (Youtube)</li>
6153
6154 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-P2Jaeg0aQ">Freedom, Out
6155 of the Box! by Bdale Garbee at linux.conf.au Ballarat, 2012</a> (Youtube) </li>
6156
6157 <li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/freedombox/">Freedombox
6158 1.0 by Eben Moglen and Bdale Garbee at Fosdem 2013</a> (FOSDEM) </li>
6159
6160 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LpYX2zVYg">What is the
6161 FreedomBox today by Bdale Garbee at Debconf13 in Vaumarcus
6162 2013</a> (Youtube)</li>
6163
6164 </ul>
6165
6166 <p>A larger list is available from
6167 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/TalksAndPresentations">the
6168 Freedombox Wiki</a>.</p>
6169
6170 <p>On other news, I am happy to report that Freedombox based on Debian
6171 Jessie is coming along quite well, and soon both Owncloud and using
6172 Tor should be available for testers of the Freedombox solution. :) In
6173 a few weeks I hope everything needed to test it is included in Debian.
6174 The withsqlite package is already in Debian, and the plinth package is
6175 pending in NEW.  The third and vital part of that puzzle is the
6176 metapackage/setup framework, which is still pending an upload.  Join
6177 us on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC
6178 (#freedombox on irc.debian.org)</a> and
6179 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6180 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6181
6182       </div>
6183       <div class="tags">
6184
6185
6186         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>.
6187
6188
6189       </div>
6190     </div>
6191     <div class="padding"></div>
6192
6193     <div class="entry">
6194       <div class="title">
6195         <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>
6196       </div>
6197       <div class="date">
6198         10th September 2013
6199       </div>
6200       <div class="body">
6201         <p>I was introduced to the
6202 <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox project</a>
6203 in 2010, when Eben Moglen presented his vision about serving the need
6204 of non-technical people to keep their personal information private and
6205 within the legal protection of their own homes.  The idea is to give
6206 people back the power over their network and machines, and return
6207 Internet back to its intended peer-to-peer architecture.  Instead of
6208 depending on a central service, the Freedombox will give everyone
6209 control over their own basic infrastructure.</p>
6210
6211 <p>I've intended to join the effort since then, but other tasks have
6212 taken priority.  But this summers nasty news about the misuse of trust
6213 and privilege exercised by the "western" intelligence gathering
6214 communities increased my eagerness to contribute to a point where I
6215 actually started working on the project a while back.</p>
6216
6217 <p>The <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/freedombox/">initial
6218 Debian initiative</a> based on the vision from Eben Moglen, is to
6219 create a simple and cheap Debian based appliance that anyone can hook
6220 up in their home and get access to secure and private services and
6221 communication.  The initial deployment platform have been the
6222 <a href="http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-dreamplugdetails.aspx">Dreamplug</a>,
6223 which is a piece of hardware I do not own.  So to be able to test what
6224 the current Freedombox setup look like, I had to come up with a way to install
6225 it on some hardware I do have access to.  I have rewritten the
6226 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedom-maker">freedom-maker</a>
6227 image build framework to use .deb packages instead of only copying
6228 setup into the boot images, and thanks to this rewrite I am able to
6229 set up any machine supported by Debian Wheezy as a Freedombox, using
6230 the previously mentioned deb (and a few support debs for packages
6231 missing in Debian).</p>
6232
6233 <p>The current Freedombox setup consist of a set of bootstrapping
6234 scripts
6235 (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>),
6236 and a administrative web interface
6237 (<a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/Plinth">plinth</a> + exmachina +
6238 withsqlite), as well as a privacy enhancing proxy based on
6239 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>
6240 (freedombox-privoxy).  There is also a web/javascript based XMPP
6241 client (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/jwchat">jwchat</a>)
6242 trying (unsuccessfully so far) to talk to the XMPP server
6243 (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/ejabberd">ejabberd</a>).  The
6244 web interface is pluggable, and the goal is to use it to enable OpenID
6245 services, mesh network connectivity, use of TOR, etc, etc.  Not much of
6246 this is really working yet, see
6247 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedombox-todos/blob/master/TODO">the
6248 project TODO</a> for links to GIT repositories.  Most of the code is
6249 on github at the moment.  The HTTP proxy is operational out of the
6250 box, and the admin web interface can be used to add/remove plinth
6251 users.  I've not been able to do anything else with it so far, but
6252 know there are several branches spread around github and other places
6253 with lots of half baked features.</p>
6254
6255 <p>Anyway, if you want to have a look at the current state, the
6256 following recipes should work to give you a test machine to poke
6257 at.</p>
6258
6259 <p><strong>Debian Wheezy amd64</strong></p>
6260
6261 <ol>
6262
6263 <li>Fetch normal Debian Wheezy installation ISO.</li>
6264 <li>Boot from it, either as CD or USB stick.</li>
6265 <li><p>Press [tab] on the boot prompt and add this as a boot argument
6266 to the Debian installer:<p>
6267 <pre>url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat</a></pre></li>
6268
6269 <li>Answer the few language/region/password questions and pick disk to
6270 install on.</li>
6271
6272 <li>When the installation is finished and the machine have rebooted a
6273 few times, your Freedombox is ready for testing.</li>
6274
6275 </ol>
6276
6277 <p><strong>Raspberry Pi Raspbian</strong></p>
6278
6279 <ol>
6280
6281 <li>Fetch a Raspbian SD card image, create SD card.</li>
6282 <li>Boot from SD card, extend file system to fill the card completely.</li>
6283 <li><p>Log in and add this to /etc/sources.list:</p>
6284 <pre>
6285 deb <a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox</a> wheezy main
6286 </pre></li>
6287 <li><p>Run this as root:</p>
6288 <pre>
6289 wget -O - http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/BE1A583D.asc | \
6290    apt-key add -
6291 apt-get update
6292 apt-get install freedombox-setup
6293 /usr/lib/freedombox/setup
6294 </pre></li>
6295 <li>Reboot into your freshly created Freedombox.</li>
6296
6297 </ol>
6298
6299 <p>You can test it on other architectures too, but because the
6300 freedombox-privoxy package is binary, it will only work as intended on
6301 the architectures where I have had time to build the binary and put it
6302 in my APT repository.  But do not let this stop you.  It is only a
6303 short "<tt>apt-get source -b freedombox-privoxy</tt>" away. :)</p>
6304
6305 <p>Note that by default Freedombox is a DHCP server on the
6306 192.168.1.0/24 subnet, so if this is your subnet be careful and turn
6307 off the DHCP server by running "<tt>update-rc.d isc-dhcp-server
6308 disable</tt>" as root.</p>
6309
6310 <p>Please let me know if this works for you, or if you have any
6311 problems.  We gather on the IRC channel
6312 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">#freedombox</a> on
6313 irc.debian.org and the
6314 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">project
6315 mailing list</a>.</p>
6316
6317 <p>Once you get your freedombox operational, you can visit
6318 <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/</tt> to see the state of the plint
6319 welcome screen (dead end - do not be surprised if you are unable to
6320 get past it), and next visit <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/help/</tt>
6321 to look at the rest of plinth.  The default user is 'admin' and the
6322 default password is 'secret'.</p>
6323
6324       </div>
6325       <div class="tags">
6326
6327
6328         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>.
6329
6330
6331       </div>
6332     </div>
6333     <div class="padding"></div>
6334
6335     <div class="entry">
6336       <div class="title">
6337         <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>
6338       </div>
6339       <div class="date">
6340         18th August 2013
6341       </div>
6342       <div class="body">
6343         <p>Earlier, I reported about
6344 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">my
6345 problems using an Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB disk</a>.  Friday I was
6346 told by IBM that the original disk should be thrown away.  And as
6347 there no longer was a problem if I bricked the firmware, I decided
6348 today to try to install Intel firmware to replace the Lenovo firmware
6349 currently on the disk.</p>
6350
6351 <p>I searched the Intel site for firmware, and found
6352 <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>
6353 (aka Intel SATA Solid-State Drive Firmware Update Tool) which
6354 according to the site should contain the latest firmware for SSD
6355 disks.  I inserted the broken disk in one of my spare laptops and
6356 booted the ISO from a USB stick.  The disk was recognized, but the
6357 program claimed the newest firmware already were installed and refused
6358 to insert any Intel firmware.  So no change, and the disk is still
6359 unable to handle write load. :( I guess the only way to get them
6360 working would be if Lenovo releases new firmware.  No idea how likely
6361 that is.  Anyway, just blogging about this test for completeness.  I
6362 got a working Samsung disk, and see no point in spending more time on
6363 the broken disks.</p>
6364
6365       </div>
6366       <div class="tags">
6367
6368
6369         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>.
6370
6371
6372       </div>
6373     </div>
6374     <div class="padding"></div>
6375
6376     <div class="entry">
6377       <div class="title">
6378         <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>
6379       </div>
6380       <div class="date">
6381         17th July 2013
6382       </div>
6383       <div class="body">
6384         <p>Today I switched to
6385 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
6386 new laptop</a>.  I've previously written about the problems I had with
6387 my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
6388 <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
6389 GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
6390 sustained writes.  My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
6391 trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
6392 identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
6393 disk instead to fix it once and for all.  The Samsung disk survived
6394 the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
6395 random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
6396 decided to trust it with my data.  I have installed it as a Debian Edu
6397 Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
6398 server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
6399 station from now on.</p>
6400
6401 <p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
6402 Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
6403 performance and increase life time of the disk.  The Linux kernel and
6404 user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
6405 environment.  To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
6406 package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning.  The
6407 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
6408 for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
6409 is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
6410 package.  If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
6411 will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
6412 file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
6413
6414 <p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
6415 set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD.  It is adjusted to my use case,
6416 where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
6417 addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
6418 top of this again.  See the README file in the package source for the
6419 references I used to pick the settings.  At the moment these
6420 parameters are tuned:</p>
6421
6422 <ul>
6423
6424 <li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
6425     (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
6426
6427 <li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
6428     this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
6429     0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
6430
6431 <li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
6432     systems.</li>
6433
6434 <li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
6435     /etc/fstab.</li>
6436
6437 <li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
6438
6439 <li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
6440     cron.daily).</li>
6441
6442 <li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
6443     to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
6444
6445 </ul>
6446
6447 <p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
6448 the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
6449 little gain.  My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
6450 those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
6451 computer.  I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
6452 from getting the data on the disk (see
6453 <a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
6454 Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
6455 right thing to do.</p>
6456
6457 <p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
6458 it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
6459 indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
6460
6461 <p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
6462 and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
6463 file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
6464 instead of during my work.</p>
6465
6466 <p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
6467 this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
6468
6469 <p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning.  I expect
6470 iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
6471 have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
6472
6473 <p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
6474 there.</p>
6475
6476 <p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
6477 as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
6478 disk.  It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
6479 the Lenovo firmware.  But I have not tried and did not want to do so
6480 without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
6481 disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
6482 back.</p>
6483
6484       </div>
6485       <div class="tags">
6486
6487
6488         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>.
6489
6490
6491       </div>
6492     </div>
6493     <div class="padding"></div>
6494
6495     <div class="entry">
6496       <div class="title">
6497         <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>
6498       </div>
6499       <div class="date">
6500         10th July 2013
6501       </div>
6502       <div class="body">
6503         <p>A few days ago, I wrote about
6504 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
6505 problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
6506 was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
6507 sustained write.  My supplier is in contact with
6508 <a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
6509 replacement disk to try to fix the problem.  They decided to send an
6510 identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
6511
6512 <p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
6513 Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it.  The new disk have the
6514 same firmware version as the original.  This time my hope raised
6515 slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
6516 die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
6517 going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%.  But around 60%, the disk
6518 died again and I was back on square one.  I still do not have a new
6519 laptop with a disk I can trust.  I can not live with a disk that might
6520 lock up when I download a new
6521 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
6522 other large files.  I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
6523 the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
6524
6525 <p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
6526 11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
6527 LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
6528 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
6529 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
6530 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
6531
6532 <p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
6533 11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
6534 LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
6535 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
6536 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
6537 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
6538
6539 <p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
6540 SA, date and WNPP values.  Mentioning all the details here in case
6541 someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
6542 failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
6543 exist).</p>
6544
6545       </div>
6546       <div class="tags">
6547
6548
6549         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>.
6550
6551
6552       </div>
6553     </div>
6554     <div class="padding"></div>
6555
6556     <div class="entry">
6557       <div class="title">
6558         <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>
6559       </div>
6560       <div class="date">
6561          9th July 2013
6562       </div>
6563       <div class="body">
6564         <p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
6565 Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
6566 party in Oslo.  It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
6567 member assosiation NUUG</a> and
6568 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
6569 project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
6570 Bitraf</a>.</p>
6571
6572 <p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening.  Everyone is
6573 welcome, and there is no fee to participate.  There is on the other
6574 hand limited space, and only room for 30 people.  Please put your name
6575 on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
6576 wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
6577
6578       </div>
6579       <div class="tags">
6580
6581
6582         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>.
6583
6584
6585       </div>
6586     </div>
6587     <div class="padding"></div>
6588
6589     <div class="entry">
6590       <div class="title">
6591         <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>
6592       </div>
6593       <div class="date">
6594          5th July 2013
6595       </div>
6596       <div class="body">
6597         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
6598 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
6599 for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>.  Unfortunately I did not have much
6600 time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
6601 will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived.  I
6602 ended up picking a
6603 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
6604 with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
6605 a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly.  But my
6606 second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful.  More
6607 on that below.</p>
6608
6609 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
6610 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
6611 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
6612 feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
6613 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
6614 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
6615 to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
6616 disks from my search parameters.  I also asked around among friends to
6617 get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
6618
6619 <p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
6620 X41.  I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
6621 significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
6622 hand a lot more to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly
6623 good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
6624 I will get used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
6625 needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
6626
6627 <p>Turning off the touch pad was simple.  All it took was a quick
6628 visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
6629
6630 <p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop.  The 180 GB SSD disk
6631 lock up during load.  And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
6632 with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
6633 I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
6634 reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
6635 default in Ubuntu).  And the bug with is already known.  It was
6636 reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
6637 report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
6638 Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD).  It is also reported to the Linux
6639 kernel developers as
6640 <a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
6641 report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
6642 (SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
6643 Lenovo forums, both for
6644 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
6645 2012-11-10</a> and for
6646 <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
6647 03-20-2013</a>.  The problem do not only affect installation.  The
6648 reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
6649 on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
6650 problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
6651 There is even a
6652 <a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
6653 available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
6654 minutes by writing to a file.</p>
6655
6656 <p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
6657 contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
6658 requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
6659 firmware.  Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
6660 Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i).  I
6661 hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
6662 fixed. :)</p>
6663
6664       </div>
6665       <div class="tags">
6666
6667
6668         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>.
6669
6670
6671       </div>
6672     </div>
6673     <div class="padding"></div>
6674
6675     <div class="entry">
6676       <div class="title">
6677         <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>
6678       </div>
6679       <div class="date">
6680          4th July 2013
6681       </div>
6682       <div class="body">
6683         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
6684 trusty old Thinkpad X41.  Unfortunately I did not have much time to
6685 spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived.  I ended up
6686 picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
6687 X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu
6688 Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly.  As I write
6689 this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
6690 with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
6691 with an expencive door stop.</p>
6692
6693 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
6694 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
6695 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
6696 feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
6697 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
6698 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
6699 to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
6700
6701 <p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
6702 wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
6703 to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly good and the
6704 individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
6705 used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
6706 new laptop now. :)</p>
6707
6708 <p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
6709
6710       </div>
6711       <div class="tags">
6712
6713
6714         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>.
6715
6716
6717       </div>
6718     </div>
6719     <div class="padding"></div>
6720
6721     <div class="entry">
6722       <div class="title">
6723         <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>
6724       </div>
6725       <div class="date">
6726         25th June 2013
6727       </div>
6728       <div class="body">
6729         <p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
6730 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
6731 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
6732 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
6733 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
6734 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
6735 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
6736 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
6737 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
6738 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
6739 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
6740
6741 <p><pre>
6742 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
6743 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
6744 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
6745 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
6746 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
6747 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
6748 firmware-ipw2x00
6749 firmware-ipw2x00
6750 Preconfiguring packages ...
6751 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
6752 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
6753 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
6754 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
6755 #
6756 </pre></p>
6757
6758 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
6759 printed instead:</p>
6760
6761 <p><pre>
6762 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
6763 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
6764 #
6765 </pre></p>
6766
6767 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
6768 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
6769
6770 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
6771 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
6772 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
6773 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
6774 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
6775 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
6776 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
6777 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
6778 machine.</p>
6779
6780 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
6781 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
6782 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
6783 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
6784 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
6785 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
6786
6787       </div>
6788       <div class="tags">
6789
6790
6791         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>.
6792
6793
6794       </div>
6795     </div>
6796     <div class="padding"></div>
6797
6798     <div class="entry">
6799       <div class="title">
6800         <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>
6801       </div>
6802       <div class="date">
6803         11th June 2013
6804       </div>
6805       <div class="body">
6806         <p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
6807 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
6808 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
6809 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
6810 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
6811 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
6812 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
6813 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
6814 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
6815 i915 driver used by the
6816 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
6817 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
6818
6819 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
6820 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
6821 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
6822 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
6823 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
6824
6825 <pre>
6826 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
6827 update-initramfs -u -k all
6828 </pre>
6829
6830 <p>Since March 2012 there is
6831 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
6832 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
6833 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
6834 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
6835 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
6836 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
6837 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
6838 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
6839 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
6840 number.</p>
6841
6842 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
6843 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
6844
6845 <p><pre>
6846 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
6847     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
6848     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
6849  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
6850  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
6851     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
6852  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
6853     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
6854  Latency: 0
6855  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
6856  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
6857  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
6858  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
6859  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
6860  Capabilities: <access denied>
6861  Kernel driver in use: i915
6862 </pre></p>
6863
6864 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
6865
6866 <p><pre>
6867 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
6868        ...
6869         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
6870         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
6871        ...
6872 }
6873 </pre></p>
6874
6875 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
6876 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
6877 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
6878 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
6879 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
6880 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
6881 yet shown up in
6882 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
6883 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
6884 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
6885 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
6886 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
6887 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
6888
6889 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
6890 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
6891 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
6892 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
6893 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
6894 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
6895 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
6896 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
6897 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
6898 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
6899 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
6900 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
6901
6902 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
6903 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
6904 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
6905 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
6906 backlight.</p>
6907
6908       </div>
6909       <div class="tags">
6910
6911
6912         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>.
6913
6914
6915       </div>
6916     </div>
6917     <div class="padding"></div>
6918
6919     <div class="entry">
6920       <div class="title">
6921         <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>
6922       </div>
6923       <div class="date">
6924         27th May 2013
6925       </div>
6926       <div class="body">
6927         <p>Two days ago, I asked
6928 <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
6929 I could install Linux on a Packard Bell EasyNote LV computer
6930 preinstalled with Windows 8</a>.  I found a solution, but am horrified
6931 with the obstacles put in the way of Linux users on a laptop with UEFI
6932 and Windows 8.</p>
6933
6934 <p>I never found out if the cause of my problems were the use of UEFI
6935 secure booting or fast boot.  I suspect fast boot was the problem,
6936 causing the firmware to boot directly from HD without considering any
6937 key presses and alternative devices, but do not know UEFI settings
6938 enough to tell.</p>
6939
6940 <p>There is no way to install Linux on the machine in question without
6941 opening the box and disconnecting the hard drive!  This is as far as I
6942 can tell, the only way to get access to the firmware setup menu
6943 without accepting the Windows 8 license agreement.  I am told (and
6944 found description on how to) that it is possible to configure the
6945 firmware setup once booted into Windows 8.  But as I believe the terms
6946 of that agreement are completely unacceptable, accepting the license
6947 was never an alternative.  I do not enter agreements I do not intend
6948 to follow.</p>
6949
6950 <p>I feared I had to return the laptops and ask for a refund, and
6951 waste many hours on this, but luckily there was a way to get it to
6952 work.  But I would not recommend it to anyone planning to run Linux on
6953 it, and I have become sceptical to Windows 8 certified laptops.  Is
6954 this the way Linux will be forced out of the market place, by making
6955 it close to impossible for "normal" users to install Linux without
6956 accepting the Microsoft Windows license terms?  Or at least not
6957 without risking to loose the warranty?</p>
6958
6959 <p>I've updated the
6960 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Linux Laptop
6961 wiki page for Packard Bell EasyNote LV</a>, to ensure the next person
6962 do not have to struggle as much as I did to get Linux into the
6963 machine.</p>
6964
6965 <p>Thanks to Bob Rosbag, Florian Weimer, Philipp Kern, Ben Hutching,
6966 Michael Tokarev and others for feedback and ideas.</p>
6967
6968       </div>
6969       <div class="tags">
6970
6971
6972         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>.
6973
6974
6975       </div>
6976     </div>
6977     <div class="padding"></div>
6978
6979     <div class="entry">
6980       <div class="title">
6981         <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>
6982       </div>
6983       <div class="date">
6984         25th May 2013
6985       </div>
6986       <div class="body">
6987         <p>I've run into quite a problem the last few days.  I bought three
6988 new laptops for my parents and a few others.  I bought Packard Bell
6989 Easynote LV to run Kubuntu on and use as their home computer.  But I
6990 am completely unable to figure out how to install Linux on it.  The
6991 computer is preinstalled with Windows 8, and I suspect it uses UEFI
6992 instead of a BIOS to boot.</p>
6993
6994 <p>The problem is that I am unable to get it to PXE boot, and unable
6995 to get it to boot the Linux installer from my USB stick.  I have yet
6996 to try the DVD install, and still hope it will work.  when I turn on
6997 the computer, there is no information on what buttons to press to get
6998 the normal boot menu.  I expect to get some boot menu to select PXE or
6999 USB stick booting.  When booting, it first ask for the language to
7000 use, then for some regional settings, and finally if I will accept the
7001 Windows 8 terms of use.  As these terms are completely unacceptable to
7002 me, I have no other choice but to turn off the computer and try again
7003 to get it to boot the Linux installer.</p>
7004
7005 <p>I have gathered my findings so far on a Linlap page about the
7006 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
7007 EasyNote LV</a> model.  If you have any idea how to get Linux
7008 installed on this machine, please get in touch or update that wiki
7009 page.  If I can't find a way to install Linux, I will have to return
7010 the laptop to the seller and find another machine for my parents.</p>
7011
7012 <p>I wonder, is this the way Linux will be forced out of the market
7013 using UEFI and "secure boot" by making it impossible to install Linux
7014 on new Laptops?</p>
7015
7016       </div>
7017       <div class="tags">
7018
7019
7020         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>.
7021
7022
7023       </div>
7024     </div>
7025     <div class="padding"></div>
7026
7027     <div class="entry">
7028       <div class="title">
7029         <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>
7030       </div>
7031       <div class="date">
7032         17th May 2013
7033       </div>
7034       <div class="body">
7035         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is
7036 an operating system based on Debian intended for use in schools.  It
7037 contain a turn-key solution for the computer network provided to
7038 pupils in the primary schools.  It provide both the central server,
7039 network boot servers and desktop environments with heaps of
7040 educational software.  The project was founded almost 12 years ago,
7041 2001-07-02.  If you want to support the project, which is in need for
7042 cash to fund developer gatherings and other project related activity,
7043 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">please
7044 donate some money</a>.
7045
7046 <p>A topic that come up again and again on the Debian Edu mailing
7047 lists and elsewhere, is the question on how to transform a Debian or
7048 Ubuntu installation into a Debian Edu installation.  It isn't very
7049 hard, and last week I wrote a script to replicate the steps done by
7050 the Debian Edu installer.</p>
7051
7052 <p>The script,
7053 <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/>
7054 in the debian-edu-config package, will go through these six steps and
7055 transform an existing Debian Wheezy or Ubuntu (untested) installation
7056 into a Debian Edu Workstation:</p>
7057
7058 <ol>
7059
7060 <li>Add skolelinux related APT sources.</li>
7061 <li>Create /etc/debian-edu/config with the wanted configuration.</li>
7062 <li>Install debian-edu-install to load preseeding values and pull in
7063     our configuration.</li>
7064 <li>Preseed debconf database with profile setup in
7065     /etc/debian-edu/config, and run tasksel to install packages
7066     according to the profile specified in the config above,
7067     overriding some of the Debian automation machinery.</li>
7068 <li>Run debian-edu-cfengine-D installation to configure everything
7069     that could not be done using preseeding.</li>
7070 <li>Ask for a reboot to enable all the configuration changes.</li>
7071
7072 </ol>
7073
7074 <p>There are some steps in the Debian Edu installation that can not be
7075 replicated like this.  Disk partitioning and LVM setup, for example.
7076 So this script just assume there is enough disk space to install all
7077 the needed packages.</p>
7078
7079 <p>The script was created to help a Debian Edu student working on
7080 setting up <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org">Raspberry Pi</a> as a
7081 Debian Edu client, and using it he can take the existing
7082 <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/FrontPage‎">Raspbian</a> installation and
7083 transform it into a fully functioning Debian Edu Workstation (or
7084 Roaming Workstation, or whatever :).</p>
7085
7086 <p>The default setting in the script is to create a KDE Workstation.
7087 If a LXDE based Roaming workstation is wanted instead, modify the
7088 PROFILE and DESKTOP values at the top to look like this instead:</p>
7089
7090 <p><pre>
7091 PROFILE="Roaming-Workstation"
7092 DESKTOP="lxde"
7093 </pre></p>
7094
7095 <p>The script could even become useful to set up Debian Edu servers in
7096 the cloud, by starting with a virtual Debian installation at some
7097 virtual hosting service and setting up all the services on first
7098 boot.</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/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</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__the_Linux_distribution_of_choice_for_LEGO_designers_.html">Debian, the Linux distribution of choice for LEGO designers?</a>
7114       </div>
7115       <div class="date">
7116         11th May 2013
7117       </div>
7118       <div class="body">
7119         <P>In January,
7120 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
7121 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
7122 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
7123 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
7124 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
7125 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
7126 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
7127 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
7128 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
7129 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
7130 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
7131 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
7132
7133 <p><table>
7134 <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>
7135 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
7136 <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>
7137 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
7138 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
7139 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
7140 <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>
7141 <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>
7142 <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>
7143 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
7144 </table></p>
7145
7146 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
7147 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
7148 available in experimental.</p>
7149
7150 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
7151 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
7152 for LEGO designers.</p>
7153
7154       </div>
7155       <div class="tags">
7156
7157
7158         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/lego">lego</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
7159
7160
7161       </div>
7162     </div>
7163     <div class="padding"></div>
7164
7165     <div class="entry">
7166       <div class="title">
7167         <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>
7168       </div>
7169       <div class="date">
7170          5th May 2013
7171       </div>
7172       <div class="body">
7173         <p>When I woke up this morning, I was very happy to see that the
7174 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130504">release announcement
7175 for Debian Wheezy</a> was waiting in my mail box.  This is a great
7176 Debian release, and I expect to move my machines at home over to it fairly
7177 soon.</p>
7178
7179 <p>The new debian release contain heaps of new stuff, and one program
7180 in particular make me very happy to see included.  The
7181 <a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">Scratch</a> program, made famous by
7182 the <a href="http://www.code.org/">Teach kids code</a> movement, is
7183 included for the first time.  Alongside similar programs like
7184 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/kturtle/">kturtle</a> and
7185 <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/Turtle_Art">turtleart</a>,
7186 it allow for visual programming where syntax errors can not happen,
7187 and a friendly programming environment for learning to control the
7188 computer.  Scratch will also be included in the next release of Debian
7189 Edu.</a>
7190
7191 <p>And now that Wheezy is wrapped up, we can wrap up the next Debian
7192 Edu/Skolelinux release too.  The
7193 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/04/msg00132.html">first
7194 alpha release</a> went out last week, and the next should soon
7195 follow.<p>
7196
7197       </div>
7198       <div class="tags">
7199
7200
7201         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>.
7202
7203
7204       </div>
7205     </div>
7206     <div class="padding"></div>
7207
7208     <div class="entry">
7209       <div class="title">
7210         <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>
7211       </div>
7212       <div class="date">
7213          3rd April 2013
7214       </div>
7215       <div class="body">
7216         <p>Today the <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram
7217 package</a> finally made it into the archive, after lingering in NEW
7218 for many months.  I uploaded it to the Debian experimental suite
7219 2013-01-27, and today it was accepted into the archive.</p>
7220
7221 <p>Isenkram is a system for suggesting to users what packages to
7222 install to work with a pluggable hardware device.  The suggestion pop
7223 up when the device is plugged in.  For example if a Lego Mindstorm NXT
7224 is inserted, it will suggest to install the program needed to program
7225 the NXT controller.  Give it a go, and report bugs and suggestions to
7226 BTS. :)</p>
7227
7228       </div>
7229       <div class="tags">
7230
7231
7232         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>.
7233
7234
7235       </div>
7236     </div>
7237     <div class="padding"></div>
7238
7239     <div class="entry">
7240       <div class="title">
7241         <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>
7242       </div>
7243       <div class="date">
7244          2nd February 2013
7245       </div>
7246       <div class="body">
7247         <p>My
7248 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
7249 bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
7250 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
7251 Debian was waiting in NEW.  It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
7252 2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then.  It was
7253 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
7254 version too.</p>
7255
7256 <p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
7257 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
7258 architectures.  For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
7259 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
7260 architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
7261 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
7262 no-one have been able to propose a fix.  If you got an idea what is
7263 failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
7264
7265 <p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
7266 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
7267 if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
7268 #696715</a>).  So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
7269 it. :)</p>
7270
7271 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
7272 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
7273 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
7274
7275       </div>
7276       <div class="tags">
7277
7278
7279         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>.
7280
7281
7282       </div>
7283     </div>
7284     <div class="padding"></div>
7285
7286     <div class="entry">
7287       <div class="title">
7288         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a>
7289       </div>
7290       <div class="date">
7291         22nd January 2013
7292       </div>
7293       <div class="body">
7294         <p>Yesterday, I
7295 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
7296 for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
7297 pluggable hardware devices, which I
7298 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
7299 out to create</a> earlier this month.  Several valuable testers showed
7300 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
7301 people.  But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
7302 for this project.  Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
7303 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name.  In the
7304 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
7305 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
7306 repository in Debian.  The new name?  It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
7307 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
7308
7309 <pre>
7310 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
7311 cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
7312 </pre>
7313
7314 <p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet.  If you
7315 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
7316 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
7317 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
7318
7319 <p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
7320 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc.  Typical hardware
7321 stuff, in other words.  I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
7322 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
7323 word.</p>
7324
7325 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
7326 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
7327 process.</p>
7328
7329 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
7330 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
7331
7332       </div>
7333       <div class="tags">
7334
7335
7336         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>.
7337
7338
7339       </div>
7340     </div>
7341     <div class="padding"></div>
7342
7343     <div class="entry">
7344       <div class="title">
7345         <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>
7346       </div>
7347       <div class="date">
7348         21st January 2013
7349       </div>
7350       <div class="body">
7351         <p>Early this month I set out to try to
7352 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
7353 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>.  Now my
7354 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience.  To test
7355 it, fetch the
7356 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
7357 from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
7358 package.  You might have to log out and in again activate the
7359 autostart script.</p>
7360
7361 <p>The design is simple:</p>
7362
7363 <ul>
7364
7365 <li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
7366 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
7367
7368 <li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
7369 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
7370 initially did.</li>
7371
7372 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
7373 the APT database, a database
7374 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
7375 via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
7376
7377 <li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
7378 isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
7379 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
7380 package or packages.</li>
7381
7382 <li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
7383 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
7384
7385 <li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
7386 package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
7387
7388 </ul>
7389
7390 <p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system.  Here
7391 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action.  First the
7392 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
7393 approve all the dependencies.  Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
7394
7395 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
7396 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
7397 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
7398 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
7399 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
7400
7401 <p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
7402 is already useful.  The database of hardware to package mappings also
7403 need more work.  It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
7404 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
7405 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
7406 method.  I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
7407 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
7408 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
7409
7410 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
7411 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
7412 '<tt>svn checkout
7413 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
7414 hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'.  If you lack debuild, install the
7415 devscripts package.</p>
7416
7417 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
7418 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
7419 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository.  See
7420 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
7421 instructions</a> for details.</p>
7422
7423       </div>
7424       <div class="tags">
7425
7426
7427         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>.
7428
7429
7430       </div>
7431     </div>
7432     <div class="padding"></div>
7433
7434     <div class="entry">
7435       <div class="title">
7436         <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>
7437       </div>
7438       <div class="date">
7439         19th January 2013
7440       </div>
7441       <div class="body">
7442         <p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died.  It died quietly and
7443 suddenly in bed.  With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
7444 black.  The power button was no longer able to turn it on.  It was a
7445 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had.  Better than both
7446 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S.  Far better than the
7447 Compaq I had before that.  Now I need to find a replacement.  To keep
7448 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
7449 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
7450 not a durable solution.
7451
7452 <p>My laptop needs are fairly modest.  This is my wishlist from when I
7453 got a new one more than 10 years ago.  It still holds true.:)</p>
7454
7455 <ul>
7456
7457 <li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
7458   than A4).</li>
7459 <li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
7460 <li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
7461 <li>Long battery life time.  Preferable a week.</li>
7462 <li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
7463 <li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
7464 <li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
7465 <li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
7466 <li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
7467 size).</li>
7468 <li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
7469   X.org packages.</li>
7470 <li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
7471   the time).
7472
7473 </ul>
7474
7475 <p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
7476 list.  The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
7477 last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
7478 at other features to choose my laptop.  But are there still made as
7479 robust laptops as my X41?  The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
7480 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
7481 Lenovo took over.  But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
7482 still be useful.</p>
7483
7484 <p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
7485 external keyboard?  I'll have to check the
7486 <a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
7487 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
7488 of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
7489 Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
7490
7491       </div>
7492       <div class="tags">
7493
7494
7495         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>.
7496
7497
7498       </div>
7499     </div>
7500     <div class="padding"></div>
7501
7502     <div class="entry">
7503       <div class="title">
7504         <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>
7505       </div>
7506       <div class="date">
7507         18th January 2013
7508       </div>
7509       <div class="body">
7510         <p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
7511 install to get support for a given MIME type.  Thanks to
7512 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
7513 done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
7514 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
7515 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
7516 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
7517
7518 <pre>
7519 #!/usr/bin/python
7520 import sys
7521 import apt
7522 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
7523     cache = apt.Cache()
7524     cache.open(None)
7525     thepkgs = []
7526     for pkg in cache:
7527         version = pkg.candidate
7528         if version is None:
7529             version = pkg.installed
7530         if version is None:
7531             continue
7532         record = version.record
7533         if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
7534             continue
7535         mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
7536         for t in mime_types:
7537             t = t.rstrip().strip()
7538             if t == mimetype:
7539                 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
7540     return thepkgs
7541 mimetype = "audio/ogg"
7542 if 1 < len(sys.argv):
7543     mimetype = sys.argv[1]
7544 print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
7545 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
7546     print "  %s" %pkg
7547 </pre>
7548
7549 <p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
7550
7551 <pre>
7552 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
7553 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
7554   gecko-mediaplayer
7555 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
7556 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
7557   browser-plugin-gnash
7558 %
7559 </pre>
7560
7561 <p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
7562 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
7563 packages.  It would be great if Debian supported such feature too.  Is
7564 anyone working on adding it?</p>
7565
7566 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
7567 request for icweasel support for this feature is
7568 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
7569 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today).  Lack
7570 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
7571 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
7572
7573       </div>
7574       <div class="tags">
7575
7576
7577         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>.
7578
7579
7580       </div>
7581     </div>
7582     <div class="padding"></div>
7583
7584     <div class="entry">
7585       <div class="title">
7586         <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>
7587       </div>
7588       <div class="date">
7589         16th January 2013
7590       </div>
7591       <div class="body">
7592         <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
7593 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
7594 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
7595 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
7596 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing.  With such
7597 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
7598 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
7599 downloaded by the browser.</p>
7600
7601 <p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
7602 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
7603 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there.  The result
7604 can be found on the
7605 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
7606 site</a>.  Using the collected information, it become possible to
7607 answer the question in the title.  Here are the 20 most supported MIME
7608 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
7609 The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
7610
7611 <p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
7612
7613 <pre>
7614   count MIME type
7615   ----- -----------------------
7616      32 text/plain
7617      30 audio/mpeg
7618      29 image/png
7619      28 image/jpeg
7620      27 application/ogg
7621      26 audio/x-mp3
7622      25 image/tiff
7623      25 image/gif
7624      22 image/bmp
7625      22 audio/x-wav
7626      20 audio/x-flac
7627      19 audio/x-mpegurl
7628      18 video/x-ms-asf
7629      18 audio/x-musepack
7630      18 audio/x-mpeg
7631      18 application/x-ogg
7632      17 video/mpeg
7633      17 audio/x-scpls
7634      17 audio/ogg
7635      16 video/x-ms-wmv
7636 </pre>
7637
7638 <p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
7639
7640 <pre>
7641   count MIME type
7642   ----- -----------------------
7643      33 text/plain
7644      32 image/png
7645      32 image/jpeg
7646      29 audio/mpeg
7647      27 image/gif
7648      26 image/tiff
7649      26 application/ogg
7650      25 audio/x-mp3
7651      22 image/bmp
7652      21 audio/x-wav
7653      19 audio/x-mpegurl
7654      19 audio/x-mpeg
7655      18 video/mpeg
7656      18 audio/x-scpls
7657      18 audio/x-flac
7658      18 application/x-ogg
7659      17 video/x-ms-asf
7660      17 text/html
7661      17 audio/x-musepack
7662      16 image/x-xbitmap
7663 </pre>
7664
7665 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
7666
7667 <pre>
7668   count MIME type
7669   ----- -----------------------
7670      31 text/plain
7671      31 image/png
7672      31 image/jpeg
7673      29 audio/mpeg
7674      28 application/ogg
7675      27 image/gif
7676      26 image/tiff
7677      26 audio/x-mp3
7678      23 audio/x-wav
7679      22 image/bmp
7680      21 audio/x-flac
7681      20 audio/x-mpegurl
7682      19 audio/x-mpeg
7683      18 video/x-ms-asf
7684      18 video/mpeg
7685      18 audio/x-scpls
7686      18 application/x-ogg
7687      17 audio/x-musepack
7688      16 video/x-ms-wmv
7689      16 video/x-msvideo
7690 </pre>
7691
7692 <p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
7693 information mentioned in DEP-11.  I have not yet had time to look at
7694 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
7695 issues.</p>
7696
7697 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
7698 discovering a typo in my script.</p>
7699
7700       </div>
7701       <div class="tags">
7702
7703
7704         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>.
7705
7706
7707       </div>
7708     </div>
7709     <div class="padding"></div>
7710
7711     <div class="entry">
7712       <div class="title">
7713         <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>
7714       </div>
7715       <div class="date">
7716         15th January 2013
7717       </div>
7718       <div class="body">
7719         <p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
7720 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
7721 values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
7722 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
7723 dongle support in Debian</a>.  Using this knowledge, I have tested how
7724 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
7725 to hardware.  This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
7726 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
7727 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
7728 packages.</p>
7729
7730 <p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
7731 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
7732 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
7733 modalias.</p>
7734
7735 <p><blockquote>
7736 Package: package-name
7737 <br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
7738 </blockquote></p>
7739
7740 <p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
7741 for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
7742
7743 <p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
7744 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
7745
7746 <p><blockquote>
7747 Package: cheese
7748 <br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
7749 </blockquote></p>
7750
7751 <p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
7752 CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
7753
7754 <p><blockquote>
7755 Package: pcmciautils
7756 <br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
7757 </blockquote></p>
7758
7759 <p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
7760 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
7761
7762 <p><blockquote>
7763 Package: colorhug-client
7764 <br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
7765 </blockquote></p>
7766
7767 <p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
7768 file in the Debian archive.  Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
7769 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
7770
7771 <p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
7772 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
7773 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
7774 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
7775 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information.  I've
7776 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
7777 is working as it should with my prototype.  It even made it to Ubuntu
7778 Raring.</p>
7779
7780 <p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
7781 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
7782 implementation of the lookup code.  The idea is to create files for
7783 each modalias and let the shell do the matching.  Please check out and
7784 try the
7785 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
7786 shell script.  It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
7787 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
7788 repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
7789
7790 <p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
7791 install yubikey-personalization:</p>
7792
7793 <p><blockquote>
7794 % ./hw-support-lookup
7795 <br>yubikey-personalization
7796 <br>%
7797 </blockquote></p>
7798
7799 <p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
7800 propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
7801
7802 <p><blockquote>
7803 % ./hw-support-lookup
7804 <br>pcmciautils
7805 <br>%
7806 </blockquote></p>
7807
7808 <p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
7809 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
7810 database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
7811
7812 <p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
7813 packages and hardware.  One source would be to look at packages with
7814 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
7815 extract their modalias information.  Another would be to look at
7816 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
7817 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
7818 generate a modalias matching rule.  I have not tested any of these to
7819 see if it work.</p>
7820
7821 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
7822 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
7823 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
7824 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
7825
7826       </div>
7827       <div class="tags">
7828
7829
7830         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>.
7831
7832
7833       </div>
7834     </div>
7835     <div class="padding"></div>
7836
7837     <div class="entry">
7838       <div class="title">
7839         <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>
7840       </div>
7841       <div class="date">
7842         14th January 2013
7843       </div>
7844       <div class="body">
7845         <p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
7846 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
7847 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
7848 to document the details.  Here are my findings so far, also available
7849 in
7850 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
7851 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
7852
7853 <p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
7854
7855 <p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
7856 values stands for.  It is in part based on information from
7857 &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> &gt;,
7858 &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;,
7859 &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
7860 &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;.
7861
7862 <p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
7863 this shell script:</p>
7864
7865 <pre>
7866 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
7867 </pre>
7868
7869 <p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
7870 using modinfo:</p>
7871
7872 <pre>
7873 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
7874 alias:          serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
7875 alias:          serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
7876 %
7877 </pre>
7878
7879 <p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
7880
7881 <p>A typical PCI entry can look like this.  This is an Intel Host
7882 Bridge memory controller:</p>
7883
7884 <p><blockquote>
7885 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
7886 </blockquote></p>
7887
7888 <p>This represent these values:</p>
7889
7890 <pre>
7891  v   00008086  (vendor)
7892  d   00002770  (device)
7893  sv  00001028  (subvendor)
7894  sd  000001AD  (subdevice)
7895  bc  06        (bus class)
7896  sc  00        (bus subclass)
7897  i   00        (interface)
7898 </pre>
7899
7900 <p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
7901 -n' as 8086:2770.  The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
7902 0600.  The 0600 class is a host bridge.  Other useful bus values are
7903 0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
7904
7905 <p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
7906 means.</p>
7907
7908 <p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
7909
7910 <p>Some typical USB entries can look like this.  This is an internal
7911 USB hub in a laptop:</p>
7912
7913 <p><blockquote>
7914 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
7915 </blockquote></p>
7916
7917 <p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
7918
7919 <pre>
7920  v    1D6B  (device vendor)
7921  p    0001  (device product)
7922  d    0206  (bcddevice)
7923  dc     09  (device class)
7924  dsc    00  (device subclass)
7925  dp     00  (device protocol)
7926  ic     09  (interface class)
7927  isc    00  (interface subclass)
7928  ip     00  (interface protocol)
7929 </pre>
7930
7931 <p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub.  Some times the relevant
7932 class is in the interface class section.  For a simple USB web camera,
7933 these alias entries show up:</p>
7934
7935 <p><blockquote>
7936 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
7937 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
7938 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
7939 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
7940 </blockquote></p>
7941
7942 <p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
7943 camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
7944 microphone).  Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
7945
7946 <p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
7947
7948 <p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff.  This is an IR
7949 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
7950
7951 <p><blockquote>
7952 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
7953 </blockquote></p>
7954
7955 <p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
7956
7957 <p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
7958
7959 <p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
7960 and model.  This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
7961 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
7962
7963 <p><blockquote>
7964 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
7965 </blockquote></p>
7966
7967 <p>The values present are</p>
7968
7969 <pre>
7970  bvn  IBM            (BIOS vendor)
7971  bvr  1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
7972  bd   06/15/2005     (BIOS date)
7973  svn  IBM            (system vendor)
7974  pn   2371H4G        (product name)
7975  pvr  ThinkPadX40    (product version)
7976  rvn  IBM            (board vendor)
7977  rn   2371H4G        (board name)
7978  rvr  NotAvailable   (board version)
7979  cvn  IBM            (chassis vendor)
7980  ct   10             (chassis type)
7981  cvr  NotAvailable   (chassis version)
7982 </pre>
7983
7984 <p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook.  Other interesting values can be
7985 found in the dmidecode source:</p>
7986
7987 <pre>
7988   3 Desktop
7989   4 Low Profile Desktop
7990   5 Pizza Box
7991   6 Mini Tower
7992   7 Tower
7993   8 Portable
7994   9 Laptop
7995  10 Notebook
7996  11 Hand Held
7997  12 Docking Station
7998  13 All In One
7999  14 Sub Notebook
8000  15 Space-saving
8001  16 Lunch Box
8002  17 Main Server Chassis
8003  18 Expansion Chassis
8004  19 Sub Chassis
8005  20 Bus Expansion Chassis
8006  21 Peripheral Chassis
8007  22 RAID Chassis
8008  23 Rack Mount Chassis
8009  24 Sealed-case PC
8010  25 Multi-system
8011  26 CompactPCI
8012  27 AdvancedTCA
8013  28 Blade
8014  29 Blade Enclosing
8015 </pre>
8016
8017 <p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
8018 table.  For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
8019 claim it is a desktop.</p>
8020
8021 <p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
8022
8023 <p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs.  One example is from my
8024 test machine:</p>
8025
8026 <p><blockquote>
8027 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
8028 </blockquote></p>
8029
8030 <p>The values present are</p>
8031
8032 <pre>
8033   ty  01  (type)
8034   pr  00  (prototype)
8035   id  00  (id)
8036   ex  00  (extra)
8037 </pre>
8038
8039 <p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver.  I am not sure what
8040 the valid values are.</p>
8041
8042 <p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
8043
8044 <p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
8045 file2alias.c.  There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
8046 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
8047 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
8048 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro.  I did not spend time documenting all of
8049 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
8050 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
8051
8052 <p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
8053
8054 <p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
8055 one can use the following shell script:</p>
8056
8057 <pre>
8058   for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
8059     echo "$id" ; \
8060     /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/  /' ; \
8061   done
8062 </pre>
8063
8064 <p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
8065 list is very long on my test machine):</p>
8066
8067 <pre>
8068   acpi:ACPI0003:
8069     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
8070   acpi:device:
8071   FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
8072   acpi:IBM0068:
8073     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
8074     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
8075     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
8076     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
8077   acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
8078     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
8079     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
8080     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
8081   [...]
8082 </pre>
8083
8084 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
8085 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
8086 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
8087 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
8088
8089 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
8090 "find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
8091 in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
8092
8093       </div>
8094       <div class="tags">
8095
8096
8097         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>.
8098
8099
8100       </div>
8101     </div>
8102     <div class="padding"></div>
8103
8104     <div class="entry">
8105       <div class="title">
8106         <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>
8107       </div>
8108       <div class="date">
8109         10th January 2013
8110       </div>
8111       <div class="body">
8112         <p>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
8113 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
8114 Launcher and updated the Debian package
8115 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">pymissile</a> to make
8116 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in.  I
8117 also added a "Modaliases" header to test it in the Debian archive and
8118 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
8119 plug in his rocket launcher.  In the process I moved the source to a
8120 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
8121 contribute.  <a href="http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/">Upstream</a>
8122 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
8123 years of relative silence.  The new git repository is not listed in
8124 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
8125 bit more before I upload the new version.  If you want to check out
8126 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
8127 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git">gitweb
8128 view</a> or use "<tt>git clone
8129 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git</tt>".</p>
8130
8131       </div>
8132       <div class="tags">
8133
8134
8135         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>.
8136
8137
8138       </div>
8139     </div>
8140     <div class="padding"></div>
8141
8142     <div class="entry">
8143       <div class="title">
8144         <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>
8145       </div>
8146       <div class="date">
8147          9th January 2013
8148       </div>
8149       <div class="body">
8150         <p>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
8151 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
8152 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
8153 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
8154 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
8155 machine.  Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
8156 Linux distribution.  When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
8157 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
8158 I need to talk to it.  When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
8159 yubikey-personalization package.  The information required to do this
8160 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.</p>
8161
8162 <p>Some years ago, I proposed to
8163 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg01206.html">use
8164 the discover subsystem to implement this</a>.  The idea is fairly
8165 simple:
8166
8167 <ul>
8168
8169 <li>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
8170   starting when a user log in.</li>
8171
8172 <li>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
8173   hardware is inserted into the computer.</li>
8174
8175 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
8176   database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
8177   packages.</li>
8178
8179 <li>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
8180   package, and make it easy to install it.</li>
8181
8182 </ul>
8183
8184 <p>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
8185 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
8186 discover database to find packages and
8187 <a href="http://www.packagekit.org/">PackageKit</a> to install
8188 packages.</p>
8189
8190 <p>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
8191 draft package is now checked into
8192 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
8193 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>.  In the process, I updated the
8194 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html">discover-data</a>
8195 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
8196 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
8197 2.2013.01.09 to unstable.  I also discovered that the current
8198 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html">discover</a>
8199 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
8200 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present.  I ported it to use
8201 libusb as a fall back option to get it working.  The fixed package
8202 version 2.1.2-6 is now in experimental (didn't upload it to unstable
8203 because of the freeze).</p>
8204
8205 <p>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
8206 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
8207 inserted):</p>
8208
8209 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-09-hw-autoinstall.png"></p>
8210
8211 <p>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
8212 install the proposed packages by pressing the "Please install
8213 program(s)" button should to be implemented.</p>
8214
8215 <p>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
8216 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
8217 from hardware to Debian packages.  Check if 'discover-pkginstall -l'
8218 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
8219 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
8220 reportbug if it isn't.  Or, if you know of a better way to provide
8221 such mapping, please let me know.</p>
8222
8223 <p>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
8224 should be considered before it is ready for production use.  Is dbus
8225 the correct way to detect new hardware?  At the moment I look for HAL
8226 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
8227 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop.  Are there better events to use?
8228 How should the user be notified?  Is the desktop notification
8229 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
8230 popup instead?  How should packages be installed?  When should they
8231 not be installed?</p>
8232
8233 <p>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
8234 please send me an email. :)</p>
8235
8236       </div>
8237       <div class="tags">
8238
8239
8240         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>.
8241
8242
8243       </div>
8244     </div>
8245     <div class="padding"></div>
8246
8247     <div class="entry">
8248       <div class="title">
8249         <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>
8250       </div>
8251       <div class="date">
8252          2nd January 2013
8253       </div>
8254       <div class="body">
8255         <p>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
8256 <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx">LEGO Mindstorm
8257 NXT</a>.  My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
8258 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
8259 already in Debian Squeeze.  If Debian support for LEGO is something
8260 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
8261 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> (server
8262 irc.debian.org).  There is a lot that could be done to improve the
8263 Debian support for LEGO designers.  For example both CAD software
8264 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)</p>
8265
8266 <p>Update 2012-01-03: A
8267 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">project page</a>
8268 including links to Lego related packages is now available.</p>
8269
8270       </div>
8271       <div class="tags">
8272
8273
8274         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/lego">lego</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
8275
8276
8277       </div>
8278     </div>
8279     <div class="padding"></div>
8280
8281     <div class="entry">
8282       <div class="title">
8283         <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>
8284       </div>
8285       <div class="date">
8286         25th December 2012
8287       </div>
8288       <div class="body">
8289         <p>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
8290 year!  I hope next year will prove to be a good year.</p>
8291
8292 <p><a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">Bitcoin</a>, the digital
8293 decentralised "currency" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
8294 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
8295 experiment.  And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
8296 <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> is about to improve a bit.
8297 The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">new debian source
8298 package</a> (version 0.7.2-2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
8299 in <a href="http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW queue</A>
8300 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
8301 name.</p>
8302
8303 <p>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
8304 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
8305 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:</p>
8306
8307 <blockquote><pre>
8308 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
8309 cd bitcoin
8310 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
8311 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
8312 </pre></blockquote>
8313
8314 <p>You might have to install some build dependencies as well.  The
8315 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
8316 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment.  Note that the
8317 client will download the complete set of bitcoin "blocks", which need
8318 around 5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment.  Make sure your
8319 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
8320 all the blocks.  The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
8321 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
8322 not be able to get all the features out of the client.</p>
8323
8324 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
8325 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
8326 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8327
8328       </div>
8329       <div class="tags">
8330
8331
8332         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>.
8333
8334
8335       </div>
8336     </div>
8337     <div class="padding"></div>
8338
8339     <div class="entry">
8340       <div class="title">
8341         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html">A word on bitcoin support in Debian</a>
8342       </div>
8343       <div class="date">
8344         21st December 2012
8345       </div>
8346       <div class="body">
8347         <p>It has been a while since I wrote about
8348 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>, the decentralised
8349 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
8350 have been busy elsewhere.  But two days ago, I started looking at the
8351 state of <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin in
8352 Debian</a> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet.  The package
8353 is now maintained by a
8354 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/">team of
8355 people</a>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team.  We
8356 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
8357 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
8358 Wheezy.  It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
8359 backports).  The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
8360 it from entering testing.  To try to help the team and improve the
8361 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
8362 reports.  I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
8363 Corallo in a
8364 <a href="https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin">PPA for
8365 Ubuntu</a>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
8366 Debian package.</p>
8367
8368 <p>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
8369 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
8370 improve the package.  It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
8371 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
8372 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
8373 setup.  As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
8374 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-20121217/000041.html">a
8375 patch to backport</a> the latest version.  Jonas is going to look at
8376 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
8377 new version to unstable.
8378
8379 <p>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
8380 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system.  I
8381 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
8382 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
8383 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
8384 transactions to Wikileaks.  But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
8385 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
8386 they sell products and services.  Improving the bitcoin support in
8387 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
8388 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
8389 pay with bitcoin is still not very good.  The bitcoin: URI is a step
8390 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
8391 use.  Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
8392 quick transaction.  I believe there are other clients available, but
8393 have not tested them.</p>
8394
8395 <p>My
8396 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">experiment
8397 with bitcoins</a> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
8398 I received 20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
8399 years ago, as can be
8400 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">seen
8401 on the blockexplorer service</a>.  Thank you everyone for your
8402 donation.  The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
8403 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
8404 number of users have gone up since then.  If you use bitcoin and want
8405 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
8406 the same address as last time,
8407 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8408
8409       </div>
8410       <div class="tags">
8411
8412
8413         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>.
8414
8415
8416       </div>
8417     </div>
8418     <div class="padding"></div>
8419
8420     <div class="entry">
8421       <div class="title">
8422         <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>
8423       </div>
8424       <div class="date">
8425          7th September 2012
8426       </div>
8427       <div class="body">
8428         <p>As I
8429 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">mentioned
8430 this summer</a>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
8431 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
8432 <a href="https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook">Gitorious
8433 repository for the project</a>.</p>
8434
8435 <p>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
8436 to the HTML version.  To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
8437 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
8438 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.</p>
8439
8440 <p>Want to sing?  You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
8441 PostScript formats at
8442 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's Computer
8443 Science Songbook</a>.</p>
8444
8445       </div>
8446       <div class="tags">
8447
8448
8449         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>.
8450
8451
8452       </div>
8453     </div>
8454     <div class="padding"></div>
8455
8456     <div class="entry">
8457       <div class="title">
8458         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gratulerer_med_19__rsdagen__Debian_.html">Gratulerer med 19-årsdagen, Debian!</a>
8459       </div>
8460       <div class="date">
8461         16th August 2012
8462       </div>
8463       <div class="body">
8464         <p>I dag fyller
8465 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120813">Debian-prosjektet 19
8466 år</a>.  Jeg har fulgt det de siste 12 årene, og er veldig glad for å kunne
8467 si gratulerer med dagen, Debian!</p>
8468
8469       </div>
8470       <div class="tags">
8471
8472
8473         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>.
8474
8475
8476       </div>
8477     </div>
8478     <div class="padding"></div>
8479
8480     <div class="entry">
8481       <div class="title">
8482         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Song book for Computer Scientists</a>
8483       </div>
8484       <div class="date">
8485         24th June 2012
8486       </div>
8487       <div class="body">
8488         <p>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
8489 <a href="http://www.uit.no/">University of Tromsø</a>, I started
8490 collecting computer related songs for use at parties.  The original
8491 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
8492 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
8493 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format.  I have
8494 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
8495 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
8496 help me extend and update the book.  If anyone is volunteering to help
8497 me with this, send me an email.  Also let me know if there are songs
8498 missing in my book.</p>
8499
8500 <p>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
8501 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
8502 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
8503 Especially now that <a href="http://debconf12.debconf.org/">Debconf
8504 12</a> is about to start (and I am not going).  Want to sing?  Check
8505 out <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's
8506 Computer Science Songbook</a>.
8507
8508       </div>
8509       <div class="tags">
8510
8511
8512         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>.
8513
8514
8515       </div>
8516     </div>
8517     <div class="padding"></div>
8518
8519     <div class="entry">
8520       <div class="title">
8521         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html">Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge</a>
8522       </div>
8523       <div class="date">
8524         21st November 2011
8525       </div>
8526       <div class="body">
8527         <p>At work we have heaps of servers.  I believe the total count is
8528 around 1000 at the moment.  To be able to get help from the vendors
8529 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
8530 up to date.  If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the
8531 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
8532 firmware is upgraded.  So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
8533 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
8534 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
8535 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
8536 the tools to do so.</p>
8537
8538 <p>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
8539 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got.  Most of
8540 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
8541 so far.  This blog post is about the Dell part.</P>
8542
8543 <p>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
8544 <a href="ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz">an XML file</a>
8545 with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing
8546 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
8547 site I can find it.  Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
8548 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
8549 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
8550 be activated on the first reboot.</p>
8551
8552 <p>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
8553 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
8554 servers at a site?  Please get in touch and lets share resources.</p>
8555
8556 <p><pre>
8557 #!/usr/bin/perl
8558 use strict;
8559 use warnings;
8560 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
8561 BEGIN {
8562     # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
8563     my %rhelmodules = (
8564         'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
8565         );
8566     for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
8567         eval "use $module;";
8568         if ($@) {
8569             my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
8570             system("yum install -y $pkg");
8571             eval "use $module;";
8572         }
8573     }
8574 }
8575 my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
8576
8577 upgrade_dell();
8578
8579 exit 0;
8580
8581 sub run_firmware_script {
8582     my ($opts, $script) = @_;
8583     unless ($script) {
8584         print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
8585         exit 1
8586     }
8587     print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
8588
8589     if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
8590         print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
8591     } else {
8592         print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
8593     }
8594 }
8595
8596 sub run_firmware_scripts {
8597     my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
8598     # Run firmware packages
8599     for my $dir (@dirs) {
8600         print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
8601         opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
8602         while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
8603             next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
8604             run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
8605         }
8606         closedir $dh;
8607     }
8608 }
8609
8610 sub download {
8611     my $url = shift;
8612     print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
8613     system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
8614 }
8615
8616 sub upgrade_dell {
8617     my @dirs;
8618     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
8619     chomp $product;
8620
8621     if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
8622
8623         # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
8624         system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
8625
8626         my $tmpdir = tempdir(
8627             CLEANUP => 1
8628             );
8629         chdir($tmpdir);
8630         fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
8631         system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
8632         my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
8633         # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
8634         my $fwopts = "-q";
8635         if (@paths) {
8636             for my $url (@paths) {
8637                 fetch_dell_fw($url);
8638             }
8639             run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
8640         } else {
8641             print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
8642             print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
8643         }
8644         chdir('/');
8645     } else {
8646         print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
8647         print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
8648     }
8649 }
8650
8651 sub fetch_dell_fw {
8652     my $path = shift;
8653     my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
8654     download($url);
8655 }
8656
8657 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
8658 # firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
8659 # machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
8660 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
8661     my $filename = shift;
8662
8663     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
8664     chomp $product;
8665     my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
8666
8667     print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
8668
8669     my $xml = XMLin($filename);
8670     my @paths;
8671     for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
8672         my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
8673         my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
8674         my $oscode;
8675         if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
8676             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
8677         } else {
8678             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
8679         }
8680         if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
8681         {
8682             @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
8683         }
8684     }
8685     for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
8686         my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
8687
8688         # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
8689         next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
8690
8691         my $cpath = $component->{path};
8692         for my $path (@paths) {
8693             if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
8694                 push(@paths, $cpath);
8695             }
8696         }
8697     }
8698     return @paths;
8699 }
8700 </pre>
8701
8702 <p>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
8703 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking.  Anyone know a
8704 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers?  At the
8705 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
8706 outdated.</p>
8707
8708       </div>
8709       <div class="tags">
8710
8711
8712         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>.
8713
8714
8715       </div>
8716     </div>
8717     <div class="padding"></div>
8718
8719     <div class="entry">
8720       <div class="title">
8721         <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>
8722       </div>
8723       <div class="date">
8724          4th August 2011
8725       </div>
8726       <div class="body">
8727         <p>Wouter Verhelst have some
8728 <a href="http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot">interesting
8729 comments and opinions</a> on my blog post on
8730 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">the
8731 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian</a> and my blog post about
8732 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">the
8733 default KDE desktop in Debian</a>.  I only have time to address one
8734 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
8735 misunderstanding he bring forward:</p>
8736
8737 <p><blockquote>
8738 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
8739 single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line;
8740 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
8741 </blockquote></p>
8742
8743 <p>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
8744 and booting into runlevel 1 is the same.  I am not surprised he
8745 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
8746 thing to believe.  But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
8747 runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user
8748 mode.  I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
8749 hard to explain.</p>
8750
8751 <p>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
8752 "<tt>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin</tt>".  This means the only thing that is
8753 executed in single user mode is sulogin.  Single user mode is a boot
8754 state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
8755 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
8756 enters the single user state.  When switching to runlevel 1, the state
8757 is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1
8758 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
8759 runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
8760 1.  It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the
8761 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
8762 mode).</p>
8763
8764 <p>This summary might make it clearer.  When booting for the first
8765 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
8766 "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  When booting into
8767 runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc
8768 S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  A problem show up when
8769 trying to continue after visiting single user mode.  Not all services
8770 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
8771 unpredicatble state.  This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
8772 after visiting single user mode.</p>
8773
8774 <p>A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of
8775 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/.  When switching from say runlevel 2
8776 to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
8777 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
8778 started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels
8779 2-5.  I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
8780 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not <strong>required</strong> to get a
8781 functioning single user mode during boot.</p>
8782
8783 <p>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
8784 and discovered this problem a few years ago.  I suspect it originates
8785 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.</p>
8786
8787       </div>
8788       <div class="tags">
8789
8790
8791         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>.
8792
8793
8794       </div>
8795     </div>
8796     <div class="padding"></div>
8797
8798     <div class="entry">
8799       <div class="title">
8800         <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>
8801       </div>
8802       <div class="date">
8803         30th July 2011
8804       </div>
8805       <div class="body">
8806         <p>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
8807 are started from /etc/rcS.d/.  In fact, there is a bite more of them
8808 than make sense, and this causes a few problems.  What kind of
8809 problems, you might ask.  There are at least two problems.  The first
8810 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
8811 runlevel 1.  One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
8812 the expected state.  The other is that single user boot will sometimes
8813 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
8814 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
8815 machine from a problem in that subsystem.  A minor additional point is
8816 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
8817 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
8818 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.</p>
8819
8820 <p>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/.  In short, only the
8821 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
8822 presented during a single user boot should go there.  Everything else
8823 should go into the numeric runlevels.  This means things like
8824 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
8825 the numeric runlevels.  Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d
8826 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
8827 out.  Do your package have one of them?  Please help us make single
8828 user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.</p>
8829
8830 <p>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
8831 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
8832 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
8833 is presented.</p>
8834
8835 <p>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound.  To keep
8836 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
8837 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
8838 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
8839 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
8840 moved first.  This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
8841 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
8842 the system state correct.  This will require some coordination when it
8843 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
8844 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
8845 on them.  Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
8846 package, while others are still left to do.  I wish I had time to work
8847 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
8848 find time to push this forward.</p>
8849
8850       </div>
8851       <div class="tags">
8852
8853
8854         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>.
8855
8856
8857       </div>
8858     </div>
8859     <div class="padding"></div>
8860
8861     <div class="entry">
8862       <div class="title">
8863         <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>
8864       </div>
8865       <div class="date">
8866         29th July 2011
8867       </div>
8868       <div class="body">
8869         <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
8870 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
8871 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
8872 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
8873 issues.</p>
8874
8875 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
8876 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
8877 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
8878
8879 <ol>
8880
8881 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
8882 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
8883 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
8884 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
8885 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
8886 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
8887 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
8888 Debian.</li>
8889
8890 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
8891 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
8892 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
8893 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
8894 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
8895 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
8896 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
8897 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
8898 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
8899 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
8900 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
8901 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
8902 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
8903
8904 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
8905 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
8906 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
8907 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
8908 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
8909 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
8910 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
8911 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
8912 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
8913 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
8914
8915 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
8916 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
8917 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
8918 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
8919 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
8920 latter behaviour.</li>
8921
8922 </ol>
8923
8924 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
8925 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
8926 it do not matter much.</p>
8927
8928 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
8929 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
8930 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>
8931
8932       </div>
8933       <div class="tags">
8934
8935
8936         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>.
8937
8938
8939       </div>
8940     </div>
8941     <div class="padding"></div>
8942
8943     <div class="entry">
8944       <div class="title">
8945         <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>
8946       </div>
8947       <div class="date">
8948         26th July 2011
8949       </div>
8950       <div class="body">
8951         <p>The Norwegian <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</A>
8952 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
8953 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10
8954 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
8955 security support for a few years.</p>
8956
8957 <p>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
8958 that are missing in Debian at the moment.  It would be great if these
8959 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
8960 their own <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com">FixMyStreet</a> clone
8961 in their own country using only Debian packages.  The list of modules
8962 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group
8963 will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
8964 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
8965 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
8966 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
8967 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
8968 easier in the future.</p>
8969
8970 <p>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
8971 installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name'
8972 and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package.  But this leave me
8973 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
8974 do not have time for.</p>
8975
8976       </div>
8977       <div class="tags">
8978
8979
8980         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>.
8981
8982
8983       </div>
8984     </div>
8985     <div class="padding"></div>
8986
8987     <div class="entry">
8988       <div class="title">
8989         <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>
8990       </div>
8991       <div class="date">
8992          3rd April 2011
8993       </div>
8994       <div class="body">
8995         <p>Here is a small update for my English readers.  Most of my blog
8996 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
8997 update in English.</p>
8998
8999 <p>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
9000 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
9001 of the British service
9002 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> up and running,
9003 and it has been running for a month now.  The entire project has been
9004 organised by me and two others.  Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
9005 to fund the development work.  In January I drafted a contract with
9006 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> on what to develop,
9007 and in February the development took place.  Most of it involved
9008 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
9009 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
9010 running in any country by now.  The Norwegian
9011 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is using
9012 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> as the map
9013 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
9014 support for this had to be added/fixed.</p>
9015
9016 <p>The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend
9017 polishing the system before we announced it March 7th.  The system is
9018 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000
9019 problem reports in a few weeks.  Soon we hope to announce the Android
9020 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
9021 public infrastructure.</p>
9022
9023 <p>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
9024 such service?</p>
9025
9026       </div>
9027       <div class="tags">
9028
9029
9030         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>.
9031
9032
9033       </div>
9034     </div>
9035     <div class="padding"></div>
9036
9037     <div class="entry">
9038       <div class="title">
9039         <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>
9040       </div>
9041       <div class="date">
9042         28th January 2011
9043       </div>
9044       <div class="body">
9045         <p>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
9046 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo.  My idea is that
9047 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
9048 available on the Internet, and check our locally
9049 maintained/distributed software against this information.  It should
9050 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten.  The
9051 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
9052 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
9053 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
9054 out which security holes were present in our free software
9055 collection.</p>
9056
9057 <p>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
9058 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
9059 consistent way across data sources.  I considered several ways to do
9060 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
9061 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
9062 existing naming scheme.  And it seem like I am not the first one to
9063 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
9064 solution.  Enter the <a href="http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html">Common
9065 Platform Enumeration</a> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
9066 software, hardware and other platform components.  The CPE ids are
9067 mapped to CVEs in the <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/">National
9068 Vulnerability Database</a>, allowing me to look up know security
9069 issues for any CPE name.  With this in place, all I need to do is to
9070 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
9071 This is fairly trivial (I google for 'cve cpe $package' and check the
9072 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).</p>
9073
9074 <p>To give you an example.  The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
9075 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip.  If the old version 1.3.3 was the package to
9076 check out, one could look up
9077 <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
9078 in NVD</a> and get a list of 6 security holes with public CVE entries.
9079 The most recent one is
9080 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-0001">CVE-2010-0001</a>,
9081 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
9082 list of affected versions is provided.</p>
9083
9084 <p>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
9085 for offline processing of issues.  Using this dump, I've written a
9086 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
9087 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs.  One give it CPEs
9088 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
9089 security issues out.</p>
9090
9091 <p>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
9092 information need to be high.  For that to happen, I believe as many as
9093 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database.  I notice
9094 RHEL is providing
9095 <a href="https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt">a
9096 map from CVE to CPE</a>, indicating that they are using the CPE
9097 information.  I'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.</p>
9098
9099 <p>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
9100 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
9101 the CVE database in NVD.  The result look fairly good, but there are
9102 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
9103 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
9104 Debian believe are affected by a CVE).  Hope to find time to improve
9105 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
9106 someone maintaining it.  So far my three emails with questions and
9107 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
9108 established soon.</p>
9109
9110 <p>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
9111 mapping.  It would be useful to know which packages in for example
9112 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
9113 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
9114 for their packages.</p>
9115
9116       </div>
9117       <div class="tags">
9118
9119
9120         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>.
9121
9122
9123       </div>
9124     </div>
9125     <div class="padding"></div>
9126
9127     <div class="entry">
9128       <div class="title">
9129         <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>
9130       </div>
9131       <div class="date">
9132         23rd January 2011
9133       </div>
9134       <div class="body">
9135         <p>In the
9136 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data">discover-data</a>
9137 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
9138 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
9139 information.  One part of this script that I find very useful when
9140 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
9141 to the PCI device it claims.  It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
9142 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with.  To see
9143 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
9144 <tt>/usr/share/bug/discover-data 3>&1</tt>.  The relevant output on
9145 one of my machines like this:</p>
9146
9147 <pre>
9148 loaded modules:
9149 10de:03eb i2c_nforce2
9150 10de:03f1 ohci_hcd
9151 10de:03f2 ehci_hcd
9152 10de:03f0 snd_hda_intel
9153 10de:03ec pata_amd
9154 10de:03f6 sata_nv
9155 1022:1103 k8temp
9156 109e:036e bttv
9157 109e:0878 snd_bt87x
9158 11ab:4364 sky2
9159 </pre>
9160
9161 <p>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
9162 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor 3:</p>
9163
9164 <pre>
9165 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
9166     echo loaded pci modules:
9167     (
9168         cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
9169         for address in * ; do
9170             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
9171                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
9172                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
9173                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
9174                     id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $3}'`
9175                     echo "$id $module"
9176                 fi
9177             fi
9178         done
9179     )
9180     echo
9181 fi
9182 </pre>
9183
9184 <p>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
9185 mappings:</p>
9186
9187 <pre>
9188 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
9189     echo loaded usb modules:
9190     (
9191         cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
9192         for address in * ; do
9193             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
9194                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
9195                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
9196                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
9197                     id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $6}')
9198                     if [ "$id" ] ; then
9199                         echo "$id $module"
9200                     fi
9201                 fi
9202             fi
9203         done
9204     )
9205     echo
9206 fi
9207 </pre>
9208
9209 <p>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
9210 well.</p>
9211
9212       </div>
9213       <div class="tags">
9214
9215
9216         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>.
9217
9218
9219       </div>
9220     </div>
9221     <div class="padding"></div>
9222
9223     <div class="entry">
9224       <div class="title">
9225         <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>
9226       </div>
9227       <div class="date">
9228         22nd December 2010
9229       </div>
9230       <div class="body">
9231         <p>The last few days I have spent at work here at the <a
9232 href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> testing if the new
9233 batch of computers will work with Linux.  Every year for the last few
9234 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
9235 computers, and this year HP won the bid.  Two different desktops and
9236 five different laptops are on the list this year.  We in the UNIX
9237 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
9238 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
9239 university.</p>
9240
9241 <p>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
9242 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well.  To test, I PXE
9243 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
9244 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware.  When
9245 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
9246 on.  If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
9247 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
9248 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.</p>
9249
9250 <p>Anyway, to get to the point of this post.  Here is the simple tests
9251 I perform on a new model.</p>
9252
9253 <ul>
9254
9255 <li>Is PXE installation working?  I'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
9256 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment.  If I feel like it, I also test with
9257 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.</li>
9258
9259 <li>Is X.org working?  If the graphical login screen show up after
9260 installation, X.org is working.</li>
9261
9262 <li>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working?  Running glxgears (in
9263 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
9264 reported by the program.</li>
9265
9266 <li>Is sound working?  With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
9267 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful.  If there
9268 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
9269 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound.  I
9270 normally test this by playing
9271 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20101012-chef/ ">a HTML5
9272 video</a> in Firefox/Iceweasel.</li>
9273
9274 <li>Is the USB subsystem working?  I test this by plugging in a USB
9275 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
9276
9277 <li>Is the CD/DVD player working?  I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
9278 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
9279
9280 <li>Is any built in camera working?  Test using cheese, and see if a
9281 picture from the v4l device show up.</li>
9282
9283 <li>Is bluetooth working?  Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
9284 any bluetooth devices are discovered.  In my office, I normally see a
9285 few.</li>
9286
9287 <li>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working.  I have
9288 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
9289 notice this.</li>
9290
9291 <li>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working?  I'm testing if the
9292 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
9293 resume.</li>
9294
9295 <li>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
9296 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
9297 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc?  The set of buttons differ from
9298 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
9299 not.</li>
9300
9301 <li>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
9302 acceleration sensors etc.  I rarely test these, as I do not know how
9303 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
9304 existence.</li>
9305
9306 </ul>
9307
9308 <p>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
9309 for the HP machines I am testing.  I'm not done yet, so I will report
9310 the test results later.  For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work
9311 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
9312 and audio fail on RHEL6.  Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p.  As you
9313 can see, I have most machines left to test.  One interesting
9314 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
9315 RHEL6 with glxgears.  No idea why.</p>
9316
9317       </div>
9318       <div class="tags">
9319
9320
9321         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>.
9322
9323
9324       </div>
9325     </div>
9326     <div class="padding"></div>
9327
9328     <div class="entry">
9329       <div class="title">
9330         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html">Some thoughts on BitCoins</a>
9331       </div>
9332       <div class="date">
9333         11th December 2010
9334       </div>
9335       <div class="body">
9336         <p>As I continue to explore
9337 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>, I've starting to wonder
9338 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
9339 and regulations here in Norway.  Here are some random notes.</p>
9340
9341 <p>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
9342 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
9343 is known to everyone.  This means that if a BitCoin address has been
9344 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
9345 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
9346 that address.  There is even a web service to look at the details for
9347 all transactions.  There I can see that my address
9348 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a>
9349 have received 16.06 Bitcoin, the
9350 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3</a>
9351 address of Simon Phipps have received 181.97 BitCoin and the address
9352 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt</A>
9353 of EFF have received 2447.38 BitCoins so far.  Thank you to each and
9354 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
9355 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
9356 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
9357 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction.  I'm told
9358 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
9359 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
9360 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.</p>
9361
9362 <p>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
9363 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
9364 without declaring it.  There are money laundering, tax and accounting
9365 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
9366 If the Skolelinux foundation
9367 (<a href="http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">SLX
9368 Debian Labs</a>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
9369 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
9370 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
9371 not, should everything or nothing be declared?  What exchange rate
9372 should be used when calculating taxes?  Would receivers have to pay
9373 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
9374 BitCoin?  I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.</p>
9375
9376 <p>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
9377 accepted by a lot of users.  It must be possible to get easy access to
9378 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
9379 easy to spend it.  At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
9380 access to, but there are very few places to spend it.  I am not really
9381 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
9382 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins.  I
9383 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
9384 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
9385 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
9386 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular.  I'm sure they
9387 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
9388 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
9389 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
9390 currencies.</p>
9391
9392 <p>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
9393 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
9394 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
9395 to see which one get the next lump of cash).  The "winner" get 50
9396 BitCoin when this happen.  Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
9397 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
9398 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
9399 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the 50
9400 BitCoins.  Check out
9401 <a href="http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/">BitCoin Pool</a>
9402 if this sounds interesting.  I have not had time to try to set up a
9403 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
9404 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
9405 yet.</p>
9406
9407 <p>Update 2010-12-15: Found an <a
9408 href="http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi">interesting
9409 criticism</a> of bitcoin.  Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
9410 it was interesting to read.  The arguments presented seem to be
9411 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.</p>
9412
9413       </div>
9414       <div class="tags">
9415
9416
9417         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>.
9418
9419
9420       </div>
9421     </div>
9422     <div class="padding"></div>
9423
9424     <div class="entry">
9425       <div class="title">
9426         <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>
9427       </div>
9428       <div class="date">
9429         10th December 2010
9430       </div>
9431       <div class="body">
9432         <p>With this weeks lawless
9433 <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/06/wikileaks/index.html">governmental
9434 attacks</a> on Wikileak and
9435 <a href="http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/2010/12/06/war_on_speech">free
9436 speech</a>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
9437 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
9438 A blog post from
9439 <a href="http://webmink.com/2010/12/06/now-accepting-bitcoin/">Simon
9440 Phipps on bitcoin</a> reminded me about a project that a friend of
9441 mine mentioned earlier.  I decided to follow Simon's example, and get
9442 involved with <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>.  I got
9443 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
9444 some bitcoins to get started.  I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
9445 for helping me remember BitCoin.</p>
9446
9447 <p>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder?  It is a digital
9448 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
9449 networks.  It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
9450 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
9451 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions.  The
9452 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets 2.9
9453 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
9454 line client builds just fine.  Hopefully Jonas
9455 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/578157">will get the package into
9456 Debian</a> soon.</p>
9457
9458 <p>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
9459 There are <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/trade">companies accepting
9460 bitcoins</a> when selling services and goods, and there are even
9461 currency "stock" markets where the exchange rate is decided.  There
9462 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising.  If you
9463 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
9464 you can even get
9465 <a href="https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/">some for free</a> (0.05
9466 bitcoin at the time of writing).  Use
9467 <a href="http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/">BitcoinWatch</a> to keep an eye
9468 on the current exchange rates.</p>
9469
9470 <p>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
9471 machines.  If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
9472 donations to the address
9473 <b>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</b>.  Thank you!</p>
9474
9475       </div>
9476       <div class="tags">
9477
9478
9479         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>.
9480
9481
9482       </div>
9483     </div>
9484     <div class="padding"></div>
9485
9486     <div class="entry">
9487       <div class="title">
9488         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html">Why isn't Debian Edu using VLC?</a>
9489       </div>
9490       <div class="date">
9491         27th November 2010
9492       </div>
9493       <div class="body">
9494         <p>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
9495 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
9496 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
9497 to play a video file or stream.  Only if VLC fail will I drag out
9498 gmplayer to see if it can do better.  The reason is mostly the failure
9499 model and trust.  When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
9500 reporting the problem.  When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
9501 just hangs.  The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.<p>
9502
9503 <p>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
9504 mplayer in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
9505 Edu/Skolelinux</a>.  The reason is simple.  We need a good browser
9506 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
9507 not very good.  For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
9508 is no way for the user to pause the video.  Also, when I
9509 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">last
9510 tested the browser plugins</a> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
9511 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked.  If
9512 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
9513 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.</P>
9514
9515 <p>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
9516 annoying.  The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
9517 keyboard shortcuts.  When the player is in full screen mode, its
9518 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
9519 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode.  I
9520 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
9521 window mode.  Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
9522 the current video.  It is very nice when playing short videos from the
9523 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
9524 what is going on.</p>
9525
9526       </div>
9527       <div class="tags">
9528
9529
9530         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>.
9531
9532
9533       </div>
9534     </div>
9535     <div class="padding"></div>
9536
9537     <div class="entry">
9538       <div class="title">
9539         <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>
9540       </div>
9541       <div class="date">
9542         22nd November 2010
9543       </div>
9544       <div class="body">
9545         <p>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
9546 upgrade testing of the
9547 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
9548 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a> to do <tt>apt-get autoremove</tt> when using apt-get.
9549 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
9550 can now present the updated result from today:</p>
9551
9552 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
9553
9554 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
9555
9556 <blockquote><p>
9557   apache2.2-bin
9558   aptdaemon
9559   baobab
9560   binfmt-support
9561   browser-plugin-gnash
9562   cheese-common
9563   cli-common
9564   cups-pk-helper
9565   dmz-cursor-theme
9566   empathy
9567   empathy-common
9568   freedesktop-sound-theme
9569   freeglut3
9570   gconf-defaults-service
9571   gdm-themes
9572   gedit-plugins
9573   geoclue
9574   geoclue-hostip
9575   geoclue-localnet
9576   geoclue-manual
9577   geoclue-yahoo
9578   gnash
9579   gnash-common
9580   gnome
9581   gnome-backgrounds
9582   gnome-cards-data
9583   gnome-codec-install
9584   gnome-core
9585   gnome-desktop-environment
9586   gnome-disk-utility
9587   gnome-screenshot
9588   gnome-search-tool
9589   gnome-session-canberra
9590   gnome-system-log
9591   gnome-themes-extras
9592   gnome-themes-more
9593   gnome-user-share
9594   gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
9595   gstreamer0.10-tools
9596   gtk2-engines
9597   gtk2-engines-pixbuf
9598   gtk2-engines-smooth
9599   hamster-applet
9600   libapache2-mod-dnssd
9601   libapr1
9602   libaprutil1
9603   libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
9604   libaprutil1-ldap
9605   libart2.0-cil
9606   libboost-date-time1.42.0
9607   libboost-python1.42.0
9608   libboost-thread1.42.0
9609   libchamplain-0.4-0
9610   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0
9611   libcheese-gtk18
9612   libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
9613   libcryptui0
9614   libdiscid0
9615   libelf1
9616   libepc-1.0-2
9617   libepc-common
9618   libepc-ui-1.0-2
9619   libfreerdp-plugins-standard
9620   libfreerdp0
9621   libgconf2.0-cil
9622   libgdata-common
9623   libgdata7
9624   libgdu-gtk0
9625   libgee2
9626   libgeoclue0
9627   libgexiv2-0
9628   libgif4
9629   libglade2.0-cil
9630   libglib2.0-cil
9631   libgmime2.4-cil
9632   libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
9633   libgnome2.24-cil
9634   libgnomepanel2.24-cil
9635   libgpod-common
9636   libgpod4
9637   libgtk2.0-cil
9638   libgtkglext1
9639   libgtksourceview2.0-common
9640   libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
9641   libmono-addins0.2-cil
9642   libmono-cairo2.0-cil
9643   libmono-corlib2.0-cil
9644   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
9645   libmono-posix2.0-cil
9646   libmono-security2.0-cil
9647   libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
9648   libmono-system2.0-cil
9649   libmtp8
9650   libmusicbrainz3-6
9651   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
9652   libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
9653   libopal3.6.8
9654   libpolkit-gtk-1-0
9655   libpt2.6.7
9656   libpython2.6
9657   librpm1
9658   librpmio1
9659   libsdl1.2debian
9660   libsrtp0
9661   libssh-4
9662   libtelepathy-farsight0
9663   libtelepathy-glib0
9664   libtidy-0.99-0
9665   media-player-info
9666   mesa-utils
9667   mono-2.0-gac
9668   mono-gac
9669   mono-runtime
9670   nautilus-sendto
9671   nautilus-sendto-empathy
9672   p7zip-full
9673   pkg-config
9674   python-aptdaemon
9675   python-aptdaemon-gtk
9676   python-axiom
9677   python-beautifulsoup
9678   python-bugbuddy
9679   python-clientform
9680   python-coherence
9681   python-configobj
9682   python-crypto
9683   python-cupshelpers
9684   python-elementtree
9685   python-epsilon
9686   python-evolution
9687   python-feedparser
9688   python-gdata
9689   python-gdbm
9690   python-gst0.10
9691   python-gtkglext1
9692   python-gtksourceview2
9693   python-httplib2
9694   python-louie
9695   python-mako
9696   python-markupsafe
9697   python-mechanize
9698   python-nevow
9699   python-notify
9700   python-opengl
9701   python-openssl
9702   python-pam
9703   python-pkg-resources
9704   python-pyasn1
9705   python-pysqlite2
9706   python-rdflib
9707   python-serial
9708   python-tagpy
9709   python-twisted-bin
9710   python-twisted-conch
9711   python-twisted-core
9712   python-twisted-web
9713   python-utidylib
9714   python-webkit
9715   python-xdg
9716   python-zope.interface
9717   remmina
9718   remmina-plugin-data
9719   remmina-plugin-rdp
9720   remmina-plugin-vnc
9721   rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
9722   rhythmbox-plugins
9723   rpm-common
9724   rpm2cpio
9725   seahorse-plugins
9726   shotwell
9727   software-center
9728   system-config-printer-udev
9729   telepathy-gabble
9730   telepathy-mission-control-5
9731   telepathy-salut
9732   tomboy
9733   totem
9734   totem-coherence
9735   totem-mozilla
9736   totem-plugins
9737   transmission-common
9738   xdg-user-dirs
9739   xdg-user-dirs-gtk
9740   xserver-xephyr
9741 </p></blockquote>
9742
9743 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
9744
9745 <blockquote><p>
9746   cheese
9747   ekiga
9748   eog
9749   epiphany-extensions
9750   evolution-exchange
9751   fast-user-switch-applet
9752   file-roller
9753   gcalctool
9754   gconf-editor
9755   gdm
9756   gedit
9757   gedit-common
9758   gnome-games
9759   gnome-games-data
9760   gnome-nettool
9761   gnome-system-tools
9762   gnome-themes
9763   gnuchess
9764   gucharmap
9765   guile-1.8-libs
9766   libavahi-ui0
9767   libdmx1
9768   libgalago3
9769   libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
9770   libgtksourceview2.0-0
9771   liblircclient0
9772   libsdl1.2debian-alsa
9773   libspeexdsp1
9774   libsvga1
9775   rhythmbox
9776   seahorse
9777   sound-juicer
9778   system-config-printer
9779   totem-common
9780   transmission-gtk
9781   vinagre
9782   vino
9783 </p></blockquote>
9784
9785 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9786
9787 <blockquote><p>
9788   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
9789 </p></blockquote>
9790
9791 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9792
9793 <blockquote><p>
9794 [nothing]
9795 </p></blockquote>
9796
9797 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
9798
9799 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
9800
9801 <blockquote><p>
9802   ksmserver
9803 </p></blockquote>
9804
9805 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
9806
9807 <blockquote><p>
9808   kwin
9809   network-manager-kde
9810 </p></blockquote>
9811
9812 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9813
9814 <blockquote><p>
9815   arts
9816   dolphin
9817   freespacenotifier
9818   google-gadgets-gst
9819   google-gadgets-xul
9820   kappfinder
9821   kcalc
9822   kcharselect
9823   kde-core
9824   kde-plasma-desktop
9825   kde-standard
9826   kde-window-manager
9827   kdeartwork
9828   kdeartwork-emoticons
9829   kdeartwork-style
9830   kdeartwork-theme-icon
9831   kdebase
9832   kdebase-apps
9833   kdebase-workspace
9834   kdebase-workspace-bin
9835   kdebase-workspace-data
9836   kdeeject
9837   kdelibs
9838   kdeplasma-addons
9839   kdeutils
9840   kdewallpapers
9841   kdf
9842   kfloppy
9843   kgpg
9844   khelpcenter4
9845   kinfocenter
9846   konq-plugins-l10n
9847   konqueror-nsplugins
9848   kscreensaver
9849   kscreensaver-xsavers
9850   ktimer
9851   kwrite
9852   libgle3
9853   libkde4-ruby1.8
9854   libkonq5
9855   libkonq5-templates
9856   libnetpbm10
9857   libplasma-ruby
9858   libplasma-ruby1.8
9859   libqt4-ruby1.8
9860   marble-data
9861   marble-plugins
9862   netpbm
9863   nuvola-icon-theme
9864   plasma-dataengines-workspace
9865   plasma-desktop
9866   plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
9867   plasma-runners-addons
9868   plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
9869   plasma-scriptengine-python
9870   plasma-scriptengine-qedje
9871   plasma-scriptengine-ruby
9872   plasma-scriptengine-webkit
9873   plasma-scriptengines
9874   plasma-wallpapers-addons
9875   plasma-widget-folderview
9876   plasma-widget-networkmanagement
9877   ruby
9878   sweeper
9879   update-notifier-kde
9880   xscreensaver-data-extra
9881   xscreensaver-gl
9882   xscreensaver-gl-extra
9883   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
9884 </p></blockquote>
9885
9886 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9887
9888 <blockquote><p>
9889   ark
9890   google-gadgets-common
9891   google-gadgets-qt
9892   htdig
9893   kate
9894   kdebase-bin
9895   kdebase-data
9896   kdepasswd
9897   kfind
9898   klipper
9899   konq-plugins
9900   konqueror
9901   ksysguard
9902   ksysguardd
9903   libarchive1
9904   libcln6
9905   libeet1
9906   libeina-svn-06
9907   libggadget-1.0-0b
9908   libggadget-qt-1.0-0b
9909   libgps19
9910   libkdecorations4
9911   libkephal4
9912   libkonq4
9913   libkonqsidebarplugin4a
9914   libkscreensaver5
9915   libksgrd4
9916   libksignalplotter4
9917   libkunitconversion4
9918   libkwineffects1a
9919   libmarblewidget4
9920   libntrack-qt4-1
9921   libntrack0
9922   libplasma-geolocation-interface4
9923   libplasmaclock4a
9924   libplasmagenericshell4
9925   libprocesscore4a
9926   libprocessui4a
9927   libqalculate5
9928   libqedje0a
9929   libqtruby4shared2
9930   libqzion0a
9931   libruby1.8
9932   libscim8c2a
9933   libsmokekdecore4-3
9934   libsmokekdeui4-3
9935   libsmokekfile3
9936   libsmokekhtml3
9937   libsmokekio3
9938   libsmokeknewstuff2-3
9939   libsmokeknewstuff3-3
9940   libsmokekparts3
9941   libsmokektexteditor3
9942   libsmokekutils3
9943   libsmokenepomuk3
9944   libsmokephonon3
9945   libsmokeplasma3
9946   libsmokeqtcore4-3
9947   libsmokeqtdbus4-3
9948   libsmokeqtgui4-3
9949   libsmokeqtnetwork4-3
9950   libsmokeqtopengl4-3
9951   libsmokeqtscript4-3
9952   libsmokeqtsql4-3
9953   libsmokeqtsvg4-3
9954   libsmokeqttest4-3
9955   libsmokeqtuitools4-3
9956   libsmokeqtwebkit4-3
9957   libsmokeqtxml4-3
9958   libsmokesolid3
9959   libsmokesoprano3
9960   libtaskmanager4a
9961   libtidy-0.99-0
9962   libweather-ion4a
9963   libxklavier16
9964   libxxf86misc1
9965   okteta
9966   oxygencursors
9967   plasma-dataengines-addons
9968   plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
9969   plasma-widget-lancelot
9970   plasma-widgets-addons
9971   plasma-widgets-workspace
9972   polkit-kde-1
9973   ruby1.8
9974   systemsettings
9975   update-notifier-common
9976 </p></blockquote>
9977
9978 <p>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
9979 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
9980 differences.  I have no idea what packages should be installed after
9981 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.</p>
9982
9983       </div>
9984       <div class="tags">
9985
9986
9987         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>.
9988
9989
9990       </div>
9991     </div>
9992     <div class="padding"></div>
9993
9994     <div class="entry">
9995       <div class="title">
9996         <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>
9997       </div>
9998       <div class="date">
9999         22nd November 2010
10000       </div>
10001       <div class="body">
10002         <p>Most of the computers in use by the
10003 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project</a>
10004 are virtual machines.  And they have been Xen machines running on a
10005 fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
10006 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge 2950 host machine.  This was a
10007 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
10008 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
10009 know is not supported by KVM.  So to migrate, we had to convert
10010 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.</p>
10011
10012 <p>I found
10013 <a href="http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM">a
10014 nice recipe</a> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
10015 migration.  It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
10016 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
10017 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data.  I NFS mounted the
10018 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.</p>
10019
10020 <pre>
10021 #!/bin/sh
10022
10023 # Based on
10024 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
10025
10026 set -e
10027 set -x
10028
10029 if [ -z "$1" ] ; then
10030     echo "Usage: $0 &lt;hostname&gt;"
10031     exit 1
10032 else
10033     host="$1"
10034 fi
10035
10036 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
10037     echo "error: unable to find LVM volume for $host"
10038     exit 1
10039 fi
10040
10041 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs.  not sure why.
10042 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
10043 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
10044 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
10045
10046 img=$host.img
10047 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
10048 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
10049
10050 parted $img mklabel msdos
10051 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap 0 $disksize
10052 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
10053 parted $img set 1 boot on
10054
10055 modprobe dm-mod
10056 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
10057 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
10058
10059 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=1M
10060 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
10061 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
10062
10063 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
10064 losetup -d /dev/loop0
10065 </pre>
10066
10067 <p>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
10068 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.</p>
10069
10070 <p>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
10071 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and
10072 set up grub to boot from the disk image.  After this, the KVM machines
10073 seem to work just fine.</p>
10074
10075       </div>
10076       <div class="tags">
10077
10078
10079         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>.
10080
10081
10082       </div>
10083     </div>
10084     <div class="padding"></div>
10085
10086     <div class="entry">
10087       <div class="title">
10088         <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>
10089       </div>
10090       <div class="date">
10091         20th November 2010
10092       </div>
10093       <div class="body">
10094         <p>I'm still running upgrade testing of the
10095 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
10096 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
10097 status.  Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.</p>
10098
10099 <p>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
10100 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
10101 can see if anything should be changed.</p>
10102
10103 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
10104
10105 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10106
10107 <blockquote><p>
10108   apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
10109   browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-4.3 cups-pk-helper
10110   dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
10111   freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
10112   gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
10113   geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
10114   gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
10115   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
10116   gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
10117   gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
10118   gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
10119   gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
10120   gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
10121   libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
10122   libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-0 libboost-date-time1.42.0
10123   libboost-python1.42.0 libboost-thread1.42.0 libchamplain-0.4-0
10124   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
10125   libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-1.0-2
10126   libepc-common libepc-ui-1.0-2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
10127   libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
10128   libgdl-1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-0 libgif4
10129   libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
10130   libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
10131   libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
10132   libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
10133   libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
10134   libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
10135   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
10136   libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
10137   libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-6
10138   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6.8
10139   libpolkit-gtk-1-0 libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
10140   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
10141   libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-4
10142   libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-0.99-0
10143   libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
10144   mono-2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
10145   nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
10146   openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-4suite-xml
10147   python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
10148   python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
10149   python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
10150   python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
10151   python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
10152   python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
10153   python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
10154   python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
10155   python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
10156   python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
10157   python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
10158   python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
10159   python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
10160   remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
10161   rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
10162   software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
10163   telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-5 telepathy-salut tomboy
10164   totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
10165   transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
10166   zip
10167 </p></blockquote>
10168
10169 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
10170
10171 <blockquote><p>
10172   arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
10173   epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
10174   fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
10175   gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
10176   gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
10177   gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
10178   guile-1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
10179   libavahi-ui0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7
10180   libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
10181   libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1
10182   libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3 libfaad0 libgadu3
10183   libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
10184   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
10185   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
10186   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
10187   libgtkhtml2-0 libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgtksourceview2.0-0
10188   libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
10189   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
10190   libmagick++10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
10191   libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
10192   libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpisock9
10193   libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8
10194   libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
10195   libspeexdsp1 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libsvga1
10196   libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
10197   libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
10198   libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
10199   sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
10200   totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
10201 </p></blockquote>
10202
10203 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10204
10205 <blockquote><p>
10206   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
10207 </p></blockquote>
10208
10209 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10210
10211 <blockquote><p>
10212 [nothing]
10213 </p></blockquote>
10214
10215 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
10216
10217 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10218
10219 <blockquote><p>
10220   autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-4.3 dcoprss
10221   edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
10222   ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
10223   gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
10224   kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
10225   kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
10226   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
10227   kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
10228   kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
10229   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
10230   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
10231   kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
10232   killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
10233   kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
10234   ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42.0
10235   libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
10236   libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
10237   libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
10238   libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
10239   libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
10240   libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
10241   libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
10242   libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
10243   libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
10244   lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
10245   openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
10246   parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
10247   pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
10248   speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
10249   ttf-sazanami-gothic
10250 </p></blockquote>
10251
10252 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10253
10254 <blockquote><p>
10255   amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
10256   dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
10257   kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
10258   kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
10259   keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
10260   kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
10261   kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
10262   klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
10263   kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
10264   kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
10265   kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
10266   ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
10267   ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
10268   kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
10269   kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
10270   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
10271   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2
10272   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
10273   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
10274   libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0 libicu38
10275   libiec61883-0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
10276   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
10277   libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
10278   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
10279   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
10280   libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
10281   libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
10282   libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 librss1 libsensors3
10283   libsmbios2 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90
10284   libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
10285   mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
10286   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
10287   ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
10288 </p></blockquote>
10289
10290 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10291
10292 <blockquote><p>
10293   dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
10294   kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
10295   kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
10296   kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
10297   netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
10298   xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra
10299   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
10300 </p></blockquote>
10301
10302 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10303
10304 <blockquote><p>
10305   kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
10306 </p></blockquote>
10307
10308       </div>
10309       <div class="tags">
10310
10311
10312         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>.
10313
10314
10315       </div>
10316     </div>
10317     <div class="padding"></div>
10318
10319     <div class="entry">
10320       <div class="title">
10321         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html">Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd</a>
10322       </div>
10323       <div class="date">
10324         20th November 2010
10325       </div>
10326       <div class="body">
10327         <p>Answering
10328 <a href="http://www.listware.net/201011/gnash-dev/67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html">the
10329 call from the Gnash project</a> for
10330 <a href="http://www.gnashdev.org:8010">buildbot</a> slaves to test the
10331 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
10332 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
10333 Debian/Squeeze.  I hope this can help the developers in getting new
10334 releases out more often.</p>
10335
10336 <p>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
10337 I have considered setting up a <a
10338 href="http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/">Debian/kfreebsd</a>
10339 machine as well.  I have also considered using the kfreebsd
10340 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the 5
10341 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video.  Because of this, I
10342 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
10343 kfreebsd.  Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
10344 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
10345 screen at random locations).  Have not gotten very far with the
10346 testing.  Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
10347 fatal problem.  Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
10348 useful as a file server for NUUG.  Will try to find time to set up a
10349 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.</p>
10350
10351       </div>
10352       <div class="tags">
10353
10354
10355         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>.
10356
10357
10358       </div>
10359     </div>
10360     <div class="padding"></div>
10361
10362     <div class="entry">
10363       <div class="title">
10364         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html">Debian in 3D</a>
10365       </div>
10366       <div class="date">
10367          9th November 2010
10368       </div>
10369       <div class="body">
10370         <p><img src="http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/23/e0/c4/f9/2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg"></p>
10371
10372 <p>3D printing is just great.  I just came across this Debian logo in
10373 3D linked in from
10374 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2010/11/09/participatory-branding/">the
10375 thingiverse blog</a>.</p>
10376
10377       </div>
10378       <div class="tags">
10379
10380
10381         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>.
10382
10383
10384       </div>
10385     </div>
10386     <div class="padding"></div>
10387
10388     <div class="entry">
10389       <div class="title">
10390         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html">Software updates 2010-10-24</a>
10391       </div>
10392       <div class="date">
10393         24th October 2010
10394       </div>
10395       <div class="body">
10396         <p>Some updates.</p>
10397
10398 <p>My <a href="http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">gnash pledge</a> to
10399 raise money for the project is going well.  The lower limit of 10
10400 signers was reached in 24 hours, and so far 13 people have signed it.
10401 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
10402 how far we can get before the time limit of December 24 is reached.
10403 :)</p>
10404
10405 <p>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
10406 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
10407 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
10408 It is called
10409 <a href="http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html">kcov</a>,
10410 and can be used using <tt>kcov &lt;directory&gt; &lt;binary&gt;</tt>.
10411 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
10412 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
10413 libglib2.0-dev.  Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
10414 solvable.  I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.</p>
10415
10416 <p>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for <a
10417 href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2010/10/msg00002.html">a
10418 new alpha release of Debian Edu</a>, and just published the second
10419 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
10420 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>
10421 release.  Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
10422 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
10423 client servers and diskless workstations.  A nice touch added
10424 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
10425 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.</p>
10426
10427       </div>
10428       <div class="tags">
10429
10430
10431         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>.
10432
10433
10434       </div>
10435     </div>
10436     <div class="padding"></div>
10437
10438     <div class="entry">
10439       <div class="title">
10440         <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>
10441       </div>
10442       <div class="date">
10443          4th September 2010
10444       </div>
10445       <div class="body">
10446         <p>In the <a href="http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote">Debian
10447 popularity-contest numbers</a>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
10448 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian.  The sixth
10449 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla.  This is a clear indication that
10450 working flash is important for Debian users.  Around 10 percent of the
10451 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
10452 installed.</p>
10453
10454 <p>In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008
10455 («<a href="http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile&do=view&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf">Skolelinux
10456 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
10457 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs</a>»), one of the most important problems
10458 schools experienced with <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
10459 Edu/Skolelinux</a> was the lack of working Flash.  A lot of educational
10460 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
10461 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
10462 good reason to stay with Windows.</p>
10463
10464 <p>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
10465 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
10466 everything you told him but could work fairly well.  This was a
10467 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
10468 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
10469 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
10470 example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
10471 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
10472 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
10473 pages they want to visit.</p>
10474
10475 <p>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
10476 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
10477 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
10478 Video to working out of the box.  For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
10479 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
10480 the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
10481 unstable.  The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7.
10482 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
10483 release team have not had time to reply to it yet.  I hope they agree
10484 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
10485 accept the new package into Squeeze.</p>
10486
10487       </div>
10488       <div class="tags">
10489
10490
10491         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>.
10492
10493
10494       </div>
10495     </div>
10496     <div class="padding"></div>
10497
10498     <div class="entry">
10499       <div class="title">
10500         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html">Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery</a>
10501       </div>
10502       <div class="date">
10503         27th July 2010
10504       </div>
10505       <div class="body">
10506         <p>I discovered this while doing
10507 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">automated
10508 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze</a>.  A few packages
10509 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
10510 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
10511 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.</p>
10512
10513 <p>An example is from todays
10514 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt">upgrade
10515 of KDE using aptitude</a>.  In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
10516 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade.  The cause is simple.  If a
10517 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
10518 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
10519 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
10520 because its dependencies are unavailable.</p>
10521
10522 <p>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:</p>
10523
10524 <blockquote><pre>
10525 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
10526  perl-modules depends on perl (>= 5.10.1-1); however:
10527   Version of perl on system is 5.10.0-19lenny2.
10528 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
10529  dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
10530 </pre></blockquote>
10531
10532 <p>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
10533 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/527917">reported as a bug</a>, and will
10534 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
10535 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
10536 failures.  Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
10537 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
10538 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
10539 of dependency loops.</p>
10540
10541 <p>Thanks to
10542 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/06/msg00116.html">the
10543 tireless effort by Bill Allombert</a>, the number of circular
10544 dependencies
10545 <a href="http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html">left in Debian
10546 is dropping</a>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)</p>
10547
10548 <p>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
10549 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590605">update-notifier</a> and
10550 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590604">different behaviour</a> between
10551 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
10552 dependency.  Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
10553 it.</p>
10554
10555       </div>
10556       <div class="tags">
10557
10558
10559         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>.
10560
10561
10562       </div>
10563     </div>
10564     <div class="padding"></div>
10565
10566     <div class="entry">
10567       <div class="title">
10568         <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>
10569       </div>
10570       <div class="date">
10571         17th July 2010
10572       </div>
10573       <div class="body">
10574         <p>This is a
10575 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">followup</a>
10576 on my
10577 <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
10578 work</a> on
10579 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">merging
10580 all</a> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.</p>
10581
10582 <p>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
10583 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
10584 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server.  The two
10585 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.</p>
10586
10587 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
10588 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
10589 on a Debian Edu main-server.  Here is a summary.
10590
10591 <p><strong>powerdns</strong></p>
10592
10593 <a href="http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend">Clues
10594 on how to</a> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
10595 the web.
10596
10597 <p>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
10598 One "strict" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
10599 using the same LDAP objects, and a "tree" mode where the forward and
10600 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
10601 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
10602 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.</p>
10603
10604 <p>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
10605 base, and uses a "base" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
10606 "dc=tjener,dc=intern," to the base with a filter for
10607 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" for the forward entry and
10608 "dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa," with a filter for
10609 "(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)" for the reverse entry.  For
10610 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
10611 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
10612 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
10613 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
10614 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
10615 spfrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entries it is looking for
10616 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
10617 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
10618 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  The equivalent
10619 ldapsearch commands could look like this:</p>
10620
10621 <blockquote><pre>
10622 ldapsearch -h ldap \
10623   -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
10624   -s base -x '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
10625   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
10626   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
10627   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
10628   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
10629
10630 ldapsearch -h ldap \
10631   -b dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
10632   -s base -x '(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)'
10633   dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
10634   hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
10635   srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
10636 </pre></blockquote>
10637
10638 <p>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
10639 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
10640 example LDAP objects used there.  In addition to these objects, the
10641 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10642 also exist.</p>
10643
10644 <blockquote><pre>
10645 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10646 objectclass: top
10647 objectclass: dnsdomain
10648 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10649 dc: tjener
10650 arecord: 10.0.2.2
10651 associateddomain: tjener.intern
10652
10653 dn: dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10654 objectclass: top
10655 objectclass: dnsdomain2
10656 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10657 dc: 2
10658 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
10659 associateddomain: 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
10660 </pre></blockquote>
10661
10662 <p>In strict mode, the server behaves differently.  When looking for
10663 forward DNS entries, it is doing a "subtree" scoped search with the
10664 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
10665 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
10666 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
10667 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
10668 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entires it also do a
10669 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is "(arecord=10.0.2.2)"
10670 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
10671 modifytimestamp.  In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
10672 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
10673 instead.</p>
10674
10675 <p>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
10676 like this:</p>
10677
10678 <blockquote><pre>
10679 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
10680   '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
10681   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
10682   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
10683   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
10684   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
10685
10686 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
10687   '(arecord=10.0.2.2)' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
10688 </pre></blockquote>
10689
10690 <p>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
10691 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
10692 reverse lookups.</p>
10693
10694 <p>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
10695 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
10696 need to generate a DNS reply.  This make it able to work with any
10697 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.</p>
10698
10699 <p>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC 1274) and
10700 dnsdomain2 schemas.  The latter is used for reverse entries like
10701 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.</p>
10702
10703 <p>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
10704 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
10705 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain).  The use
10706 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
10707 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.</p>
10708
10709 <p>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
10710 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
10711 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
10712 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
10713 (zonename and relativedomainname).</p>
10714
10715 <p>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
10716 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
10717 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
10718 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
10719 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
10720 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):</p>
10721
10722 <blockquote><pre>
10723 objectclass ( some-oid NAME 'dnsDomainAux'
10724     SUP top
10725     AUXILIARY
10726     MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
10727           DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
10728           TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
10729           NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
10730           A6Record $ DNAMERecord
10731     ))
10732 </pre></blockquote>
10733
10734 <p>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
10735 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
10736 all the attributes PowerDNS wants.  I've sent an email to the PowerDNS
10737 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
10738 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
10739 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.</p>
10740
10741 <p><strong>ISC dhcp</strong></p>
10742
10743 <p>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
10744 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want.  This
10745 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
10746 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
10747 what is needed without having to read the source code.</p>
10748
10749 <p>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
10750 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
10751 stored.  These are the relevant entries from
10752 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:</p>
10753
10754 <blockquote><pre>
10755 ldap-base-dn "dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no";
10756 ldap-dhcp-server-cn "dhcp";
10757 </pre></blockquote>
10758
10759 <p>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
10760 configuration it need.  The cn "dhcp" is located using the given LDAP
10761 base and the filter "(&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))".  The
10762 search result is this entry:</p>
10763
10764 <blockquote><pre>
10765 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10766 cn: dhcp
10767 objectClass: top
10768 objectClass: dhcpServer
10769 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10770 </pre></blockquote>
10771
10772 <p>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
10773 subtree with DHCP configuration.  The DHCP configuration subtree base
10774 is located using a base scope search with base "cn=DHCP
10775 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" and filter
10776 "(&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))".
10777 The search result is this entry:</p>
10778
10779 <blockquote><pre>
10780 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10781 cn: DHCP Config
10782 objectClass: top
10783 objectClass: dhcpService
10784 objectClass: dhcpOptions
10785 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10786 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
10787 dhcpStatements: authoritative
10788 dhcpOption: smtp-server code 69 = array of ip-address
10789 dhcpOption: www-server code 72 = array of ip-address
10790 dhcpOption: wpad-url code 252 = text
10791 </pre></blockquote>
10792
10793 <p>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time.  When
10794 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
10795 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
10796 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
10797 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost.  These provide options
10798 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc.  Leaving out the
10799 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
10800 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
10801 related computer objects.</p>
10802
10803 <p>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
10804 of the client (00:00:00:00:00:00 in this example), using a subtree
10805 scoped search with "cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" as
10806 the base and "(&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
10807 00:00:00:00:00:00))" as the filter.  This is what a host object look
10808 like:</p>
10809
10810 <blockquote><pre>
10811 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10812 cn: hostname
10813 objectClass: top
10814 objectClass: dhcpHost
10815 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10816 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
10817 </pre></blockquote>
10818
10819 <p>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
10820 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
10821 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure.  On the
10822 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
10823 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries.  The latter should make
10824 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
10825 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
10826 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
10827 structural object class.
10828
10829 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
10830
10831 <p>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
10832 to which LDAP schemas to use.  While its "tree" mode is rigid when it
10833 come to the the LDAP structure, the "strict" mode is very flexible,
10834 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
10835 in the configuration.</p>
10836
10837 <p>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
10838 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
10839 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
10840 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
10841 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
10842 structure.</p>
10843
10844 <p>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
10845 this might work for Debian Edu:</p>
10846
10847 <blockquote><pre>
10848 ou=services
10849   cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
10850     cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
10851     cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
10852       cn=10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
10853         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
10854     cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
10855       cn=192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
10856         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
10857     ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
10858       cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
10859 </pre></blockquote>
10860
10861 <P>This is not tested yet.  If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
10862 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
10863 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
10864 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.</p>
10865
10866 <p>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
10867 like this:</p>
10868
10869 <blockquote><pre>
10870 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10871 dc: hostname
10872 objectClass: top
10873 objectClass: dhcpHost
10874 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10875 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
10876 associateddomain: hostname.intern
10877 arecord: 10.11.12.13
10878 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10879 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
10880 </pre></blockquote>
10881
10882 </p>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
10883 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
10884 auxiliary object class.</p>
10885
10886       </div>
10887       <div class="tags">
10888
10889
10890         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>.
10891
10892
10893       </div>
10894     </div>
10895     <div class="padding"></div>
10896
10897     <div class="entry">
10898       <div class="title">
10899         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects</a>
10900       </div>
10901       <div class="date">
10902         14th July 2010
10903       </div>
10904       <div class="body">
10905         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
10906 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
10907 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
10908 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
10909 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.</p>
10910
10911 <p>I've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
10912 information finally found a solution that seem to work.</p>
10913
10914 <p>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
10915 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry.  If
10916 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
10917 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
10918 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
10919 to a slave DNS server.</p>
10920
10921 <p>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
10922 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
10923 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
10924 I've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
10925 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup.  It
10926 seem to work.</p>
10927
10928 <p>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
10929 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
10930 an earlier email.  The combined LDAP object will look something like
10931 this:</p>
10932
10933 <blockquote><pre>
10934   dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10935   cn: hostname
10936   objectClass: dhcphost
10937   objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10938   objectclass: dnsdomainaux
10939   associateddomain: hostname.intern
10940   arecord: 10.11.12.13
10941   dhcphwaddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10942   dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
10943   ldapconfigsound: Y
10944 </pre></blockquote>
10945
10946 <p>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
10947 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
10948 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress.  LTSP will use
10949 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.</p>
10950
10951 <p>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
10952 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
10953 outside the "DHCP Config" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
10954 that.  If I can't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
10955 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
10956 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
10957 content.  I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
10958 might be a good place to put it.</p>
10959
10960 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10961 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
10962
10963       </div>
10964       <div class="tags">
10965
10966
10967         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>.
10968
10969
10970       </div>
10971     </div>
10972     <div class="padding"></div>
10973
10974     <div class="entry">
10975       <div class="title">
10976         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html">Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP</a>
10977       </div>
10978       <div class="date">
10979         11th July 2010
10980       </div>
10981       <div class="body">
10982         <p>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
10983 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
10984 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
10985 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.</p>
10986
10987 <p>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
10988 to get configuration from LDAP.  The idea is to look up the MAC
10989 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
10990 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
10991 LTSP clients.</p>
10992
10993 <p>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
10994 in a "computer" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
10995 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.</p>
10996
10997 <p>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
10998 this approach.  A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
10999 need to be written.  Comments, suggestions, etc?</p>
11000
11001 <blockquote><pre>
11002 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
11003 #
11004 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
11005 #
11006 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
11007 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
11008 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
11009 #
11010 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
11011 # existence of attribute names.
11012 #
11013 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
11014 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
11015 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
11016 #
11017 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
11018 # configuration settings.  Something like this should work:
11019 #
11020 # objectclass ( 1.1.2.2 NAME 'ltspClientAux'
11021 #     SUP top
11022 #     AUXILIARY
11023 #     MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
11024
11025 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
11026 if [ "$LDAPSERVER" ] ; then
11027     LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
11028     for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk '{print $5}'|sort -u) ; do
11029         filter="(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))"
11030         ldapsearch -h "$LDAPSERVER" -b "$LDAPBASE" -v -x "$filter" | \
11031             grep '^ltspConfig' | while read attr value ; do
11032             # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
11033             attr=$(echo $attr | sed 's/^ltspConfig//i' | tr a-z A-Z)
11034             # bass value on to clients
11035             eval "$attr=$value; export $attr"
11036         done
11037     done
11038 fi
11039 </pre></blockquote>
11040
11041 <p>I'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
11042 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
11043 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
11044 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
11045 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)</p>
11046
11047 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11048 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11049
11050 <p>Update 2010-07-17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
11051 configuration in LDAP that was created around year 2000 by
11052 <a href="http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html">PC
11053 Xperience, Inc., 2000</a>.  I found its
11054 <a href="http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/">files</a> on a
11055 personal home page over at redhat.com.</p>
11056
11057       </div>
11058       <div class="tags">
11059
11060
11061         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>.
11062
11063
11064       </div>
11065     </div>
11066     <div class="padding"></div>
11067
11068     <div class="entry">
11069       <div class="title">
11070         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
11071       </div>
11072       <div class="date">
11073          9th July 2010
11074       </div>
11075       <div class="body">
11076         <p>Since
11077 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">my
11078 last post</a> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
11079 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma.  The java application
11080 <a href="http://jxplorer.org/">jXplorer</a> is claimed to be capable of
11081 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
11082 authenticate using Kerberos.  I have only tested the Kerberos
11083 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
11084 LDAP with my test user yet.  It is
11085 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html">available in
11086 Debian</a> testing and unstable at the moment.  The only problem I
11087 have with it is how it handle errors.  If something go wrong, its
11088 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
11089 and remove the failing query.  Nothing big, but very annoying.</p>
11090
11091       </div>
11092       <div class="tags">
11093
11094
11095         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>.
11096
11097
11098       </div>
11099     </div>
11100     <div class="padding"></div>
11101
11102     <div class="entry">
11103       <div class="title">
11104         <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>
11105       </div>
11106       <div class="date">
11107          3rd July 2010
11108       </div>
11109       <div class="body">
11110         <p>Here is a short update on my <a
11111 href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">my
11112 Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing</a>.  Here is a summary of the
11113 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude.  I'm
11114 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
11115 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
11116 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> and
11117 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585716">#585716</a>).</p>
11118
11119 <p>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
11120 complete list of the installed packages.  Based on this I see these
11121 differences when I did a test run today.  As usual, I do not really
11122 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
11123 publish the difference.</p>
11124
11125 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
11126
11127 <blockquote><p>
11128   at-spi cpp-4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
11129   libatspi1.0-0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-1-common
11130   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
11131   libgtksourceview-common libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
11132   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
11133   libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
11134   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
11135   python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
11136 </p></blockquote>
11137
11138 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
11139
11140 <blockquote><p>
11141   bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
11142   gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
11143   libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-50
11144   libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
11145   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9
11146   libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3
11147   libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
11148   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
11149   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11150   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
11151   libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
11152   libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++10
11153   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
11154   libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5
11155   libparted1.8-10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
11156   libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
11157   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1
11158   libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
11159   libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
11160   mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
11161 </p></blockquote>
11162
11163 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
11164
11165 <blockquote><p>
11166   gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
11167   python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
11168   xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11169   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11170   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
11171   xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
11172   xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
11173   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11174   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11175   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11176   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11177   xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
11178   xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
11179   xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
11180   xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
11181   xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
11182   xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
11183   xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
11184   xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
11185   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
11186   xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
11187 </p></blockquote>
11188
11189 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
11190
11191 <blockquote><p>
11192   deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
11193   xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
11194   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
11195 </p></blockquote>
11196
11197 <p>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
11198 <a href="http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120">changed
11199 in git</a> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
11200 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
11201 the difference somewhat.
11202
11203       </div>
11204       <div class="tags">
11205
11206
11207         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>.
11208
11209
11210       </div>
11211     </div>
11212     <div class="padding"></div>
11213
11214     <div class="entry">
11215       <div class="title">
11216         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
11217       </div>
11218       <div class="date">
11219         28th June 2010
11220       </div>
11221       <div class="body">
11222         <p>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
11223 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
11224 tool to browse the LDAP tree.  The only one I was able to find in
11225 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
11226 <a href="http://luma.sourceforge.net/">LUMA</a>, which has proved to
11227 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
11228 populated by default in Skolelinux.  Thanks to it, I have been able to
11229 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
11230 objects.  It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze.  If you
11231 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)</p>
11232
11233 <p>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
11234 the BTS yet.  There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
11235 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
11236 Debian submenu in KDE.  I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
11237 released.</p>
11238
11239 <p>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet.  I would
11240 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
11241 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet.  So in the mean time, I use
11242 <a href="http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/">ldapvi</a> for that.</p>
11243
11244 <p>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
11245 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11246
11247 <p>Update 2010-06-29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
11248 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html">gq</a> package as a
11249 useful GUI alternative.  It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
11250 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze.  Unless that
11251 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.</p>
11252
11253       </div>
11254       <div class="tags">
11255
11256
11257         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>.
11258
11259
11260       </div>
11261     </div>
11262     <div class="padding"></div>
11263
11264     <div class="entry">
11265       <div class="title">
11266         <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>
11267       </div>
11268       <div class="date">
11269         24th June 2010
11270       </div>
11271       <div class="body">
11272         <p>A while back, I
11273 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
11274 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
11275 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
11276 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
11277
11278 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
11279 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
11280 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
11281 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
11282
11283 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
11284 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
11285 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
11286 Debian Edu.</p>
11287
11288 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
11289 the
11290 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
11291 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
11292 available today from IETF.</p>
11293
11294 <pre>
11295 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
11296 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
11297 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
11298  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
11299         NAME 'dhcpHost'
11300         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
11301 -       SUP top
11302 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
11303         MUST cn
11304         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
11305         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
11306 </pre>
11307
11308 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
11309 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
11310 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
11311
11312 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11313 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11314
11315       </div>
11316       <div class="tags">
11317
11318
11319         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>.
11320
11321
11322       </div>
11323     </div>
11324     <div class="padding"></div>
11325
11326     <div class="entry">
11327       <div class="title">
11328         <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>
11329       </div>
11330       <div class="date">
11331         16th June 2010
11332       </div>
11333       <div class="body">
11334         <p>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
11335 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run.  Until now,
11336 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
11337 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
11338 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
11339 this:
11340
11341 <blockquote><pre>
11342 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11343 tasksel --new-install
11344 </pre></blockquote>
11345
11346 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
11347 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
11348 any output what so ever.
11349
11350 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
11351 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
11352 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
11353 happen.  Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
11354 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
11355 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run.  I ended up using
11356 code like this:
11357
11358 <blockquote><pre>
11359 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11360 cmd="$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed 's/debconf-apt-progress -- //')"
11361 $cmd
11362 </pre></blockquote>
11363
11364 <p>The content of $cmd is typically something like "<tt>aptitude -q
11365 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
11366 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
11367 ~pimportant</tt>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
11368 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
11369 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
11370 installation.</p>
11371
11372 <p>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
11373 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
11374 like this.</p>
11375
11376       </div>
11377       <div class="tags">
11378
11379
11380         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>.
11381
11382
11383       </div>
11384     </div>
11385     <div class="padding"></div>
11386
11387     <div class="entry">
11388       <div class="title">
11389         <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>
11390       </div>
11391       <div class="date">
11392         13th June 2010
11393       </div>
11394       <div class="body">
11395         <p>My
11396 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">testing
11397 of Debian upgrades</a> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've
11398 finally made the upgrade logs available from
11399 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/</a>.
11400 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
11401 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting.  This time
11402 I will only focus on their removal plans.</p>
11403
11404 <p>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
11405 to remove 72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze.  The
11406 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
11407 xserver-xorg-video* drivers.  Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
11408 sure why.  When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove 129
11409 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
11410 longer needed.  Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
11411 I do not know.  Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?</p>
11412
11413 <p>For KDE, apt-get want to remove 82 packages, among them kdebase
11414 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
11415 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove 192 packages, none which are
11416 too surprising.</p>
11417
11418 <p>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
11419 and avoided, and perhaps others as well.  Here are the complete list
11420 of planned removals.  The complete logs is available from the URL
11421 above.  Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
11422 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
11423 conffile questions.  No idea why.  I worked around it by using
11424 '<tt>echo >> /proc/<em>pidofdpkg</em>/fd/0</tt>' to tell dpkg to
11425 continue.</p>
11426
11427 <p><b>apt-get gnome 72</b>
11428 <br>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
11429   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
11430   iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-1-0
11431   libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
11432   nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
11433   serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
11434   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11435   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11436   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
11437   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
11438   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
11439   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
11440   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11441   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11442   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11443   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11444   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11445   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
11446   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
11447   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
11448   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
11449   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
11450   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
11451   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
11452   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
11453   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
11454   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
11455   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9
11456   xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support</p>
11457
11458 <p><b>aptitude gnome 129</b>
11459
11460 <br>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
11461   djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
11462   gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
11463   gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
11464   libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
11465   libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
11466   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20
11467   libeel2-data libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libfaad0 libgail-common
11468   libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libgdl-1-0 libgdl-1-common
11469   libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0
11470   libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11471   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
11472   libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
11473   libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6
11474   libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++10
11475   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
11476   libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2
11477   libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10
11478   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-8
11479   libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8 libssh2-1
11480   libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
11481   libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
11482   libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
11483   libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
11484   openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
11485   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
11486   python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
11487   python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
11488   swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
11489   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11490   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
11491   zip</p>
11492
11493 <p><b>apt-get kde 82</b>
11494
11495 <br>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
11496   kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
11497   kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
11498   kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
11499   kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
11500   libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
11501   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11502   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11503   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
11504   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
11505   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
11506   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
11507   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11508   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11509   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11510   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11511   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11512   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
11513   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
11514   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
11515   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
11516   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
11517   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
11518   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
11519   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
11520   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
11521   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
11522   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9</p>
11523
11524 <p><b>aptitude kde 192</b>
11525 <br>bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
11526   djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
11527   ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
11528   kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
11529   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
11530   kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
11531   kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
11532   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
11533   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
11534   kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
11535   kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
11536   klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
11537   kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
11538   krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
11539   ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
11540   kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
11541   kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
11542   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
11543   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
11544   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
11545   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
11546   libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0
11547   libicu38 libiec61883-0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
11548   libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
11549   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
11550   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
11551   libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
11552   libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 libsmbios2
11553   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
11554   libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
11555   libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
11556   openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
11557   superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
11558   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
11559   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11560   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
11561   xulrunner-1.9</p>
11562
11563
11564       </div>
11565       <div class="tags">
11566
11567
11568         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>.
11569
11570
11571       </div>
11572     </div>
11573     <div class="padding"></div>
11574
11575     <div class="entry">
11576       <div class="title">
11577         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze</a>
11578       </div>
11579       <div class="date">
11580         11th June 2010
11581       </div>
11582       <div class="body">
11583         <p>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
11584 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly.  A few bugs
11585 have been discovered and reported in the process
11586 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585410">#585410</a> in nagios3-cgi,
11587 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584879">#584879</a> already fixed in
11588 enscript and <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> in
11589 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
11590 am working on a script to automate the test.</p>
11591
11592 <p>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
11593 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
11594 it.  To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
11595 script is inserted.  To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
11596 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
11597 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).</p>
11598
11599 <p>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
11600 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
11601 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
11602 is created.  The bug report
11603 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566000">#566000</a> make me suspect
11604 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
11605 to make sure the upgrade go well.  Testing on virtual and real
11606 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
11607 do the trick in such settings anyway.  This is a
11608 <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-804130/">known
11609 issue</a> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
11610 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
11611 working with old kernels or something like that.  I really wish the
11612 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
11613 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
11614 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
11615 Debian Squeeze.</p>
11616
11617 <p>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades.  This test
11618 script, which I call <tt>upgrade-test</tt> for now, is doing the
11619 trick:</p>
11620
11621 <blockquote><pre>
11622 #!/bin/sh
11623 set -ex
11624
11625 if [ "$1" ] ; then
11626     desktop=$1
11627 else
11628     desktop=gnome
11629 fi
11630
11631 from=lenny
11632 to=squeeze
11633
11634 exec &lt; /dev/null
11635 unset LANG
11636 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
11637 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
11638 fuser -mv .
11639 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
11640 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
11641 cat > $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d &lt;&lt;EOF
11642 #!/bin/sh
11643 exit 101
11644 EOF
11645 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
11646 exit_cleanup() {
11647     umount $tmpdir/proc
11648 }
11649 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
11650 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
11651 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
11652
11653 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
11654
11655 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger.  It need the test scripts
11656 # to return the correct answers.
11657 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
11658     chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
11659
11660 # Include the desktop and laptop task
11661 for test in desktop laptop ; do
11662     echo > $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test &lt;&lt;EOF
11663 #!/bin/sh
11664 exit 2
11665 EOF
11666     chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
11667 done
11668
11669 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11670 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
11671 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
11672 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
11673
11674 echo deb $mirror $to main > $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
11675 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
11676 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
11677 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
11678 fuser -mv
11679 </pre></blockquote>
11680
11681 <p>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
11682 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
11683 differently so far.  I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
11684 regularly and post the result on the web.  The Gnome upgrade currently
11685 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
11686 kdebase-workspace-data</p>
11687
11688 <p>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
11689 (KDE 167 KiB, Gnome 516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
11690 post, so I will refrain from trying.  I can report that for Gnome,
11691 aptitude report 760 packages upgraded, 448 newly installed, 129 to
11692 remove and 1 not upgraded and 1024MB need to be downloaded while for
11693 KDE the same numbers are 702 packages upgraded, 507 newly installed,
11694 193 to remove and 0 not upgraded and 1117MB need to be downloaded</p>
11695
11696 <p>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
11697 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
11698 booting without a hitch.  Was unsure if there were still bugs with
11699 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
11700 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
11701 packages.</p>
11702
11703       </div>
11704       <div class="tags">
11705
11706
11707         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>.
11708
11709
11710       </div>
11711     </div>
11712     <div class="padding"></div>
11713
11714     <div class="entry">
11715       <div class="title">
11716         <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>
11717       </div>
11718       <div class="date">
11719          6th June 2010
11720       </div>
11721       <div class="body">
11722         <p>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
11723 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
11724 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd.  The packages with such
11725 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
11726 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart.  Because of
11727 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
11728 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.</p>
11729
11730 <p>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
11731 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
11732 COLUMNS):</p>
11733
11734 <blockquote><pre>
11735 DEFAULT_RUNLEVEL=2
11736 previous=N
11737 PREVLEVEL=
11738 RUNLEVEL=
11739 runlevel=S
11740 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
11741 UPSTART_INSTANCE=
11742 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
11743 </pre></blockquote>
11744
11745 <p>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
11746 script.</p>
11747
11748 <blockquote><pre>
11749 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-2.88
11750 previous=N
11751 PREVLEVEL=N
11752 RUNLEVEL=S
11753 runlevel=S
11754 </pre></blockquote>
11755
11756 <p>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
11757 sysvinit are not set by upstart.  Not sure if it is intentional or not
11758 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.</p>
11759
11760 <p>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
11761 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
11762 choice.</p>
11763
11764       </div>
11765       <div class="tags">
11766
11767
11768         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>.
11769
11770
11771       </div>
11772     </div>
11773     <div class="padding"></div>
11774
11775     <div class="entry">
11776       <div class="title">
11777         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html">A manual for standards wars...</a>
11778       </div>
11779       <div class="date">
11780          6th June 2010
11781       </div>
11782       <div class="body">
11783         <p>Via the
11784 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html">blog
11785 of Rob Weir</a> I came across the very interesting essay named
11786 <a href="http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf">The Art of
11787 Standards Wars</a> (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
11788 following the standards wars of today.</p>
11789
11790       </div>
11791       <div class="tags">
11792
11793
11794         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>.
11795
11796
11797       </div>
11798     </div>
11799     <div class="padding"></div>
11800
11801     <div class="entry">
11802       <div class="title">
11803         <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>
11804       </div>
11805       <div class="date">
11806          3rd June 2010
11807       </div>
11808       <div class="body">
11809         <p>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
11810 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
11811 information extracted from each machine.  The script to do so is
11812 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
11813 the Skolelinux build servers:</p>
11814
11815 <blockquote><pre>
11816 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
11817   vendor                    count
11818   Dell Computer Corporation     1
11819     PowerEdge 1750              1
11820   IBM                           1
11821     eserver xSeries 345 -[8670M1X]-     1
11822   Intel                         2
11823   [no-dmi-info]                 3
11824 maintainer:~#
11825 </pre></blockquote>
11826
11827 <p>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
11828 provided in each machine.  Here there are Intel machines without model
11829 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
11830 machines listed as [no-dmi-info].  One can add -l as a command line
11831 option to list the individual machines.</p>
11832
11833 <p>A larger list is
11834 <a href="http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/">available from the the
11835 city of Narvik</a>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
11836 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly.  In their report there
11837 are ~1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
11838 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
11839 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
11840 collector.</p>
11841
11842       </div>
11843       <div class="tags">
11844
11845
11846         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>.
11847
11848
11849       </div>
11850     </div>
11851     <div class="padding"></div>
11852
11853     <div class="entry">
11854       <div class="title">
11855         <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>
11856       </div>
11857       <div class="date">
11858          1st June 2010
11859       </div>
11860       <div class="body">
11861         <p>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
11862 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled.  The
11863 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
11864 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
11865 wait.</p>
11866
11867 <p>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
11868 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">#583312</a> initially filed
11869 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
11870 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
11871 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/524751">#524751</a> initially filed against
11872 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.</p>
11873
11874 <p>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
11875 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
11876 distribution work out of the box for these users.  The nvidia driver
11877 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
11878 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
11879 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
11880 distribution that work for them.  I have no idea what the solution is,
11881 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.</p>
11882
11883 <p>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.</p>
11884
11885       </div>
11886       <div class="tags">
11887
11888
11889         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>.
11890
11891
11892       </div>
11893     </div>
11894     <div class="padding"></div>
11895
11896     <div class="entry">
11897       <div class="title">
11898         <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>
11899       </div>
11900       <div class="date">
11901         27th May 2010
11902       </div>
11903       <div class="body">
11904         <p>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
11905 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
11906 issues are known and should be solved:
11907
11908 <p><ul>
11909
11910 <li>The wicd package seen to
11911 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/508289">break NFS mounting</a> and
11912 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/581586">network setup</a> when
11913 parallel booting is enabled.  No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
11914 seem to be on the case.</li>
11915
11916 <li>The nvidia X driver seem to
11917 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">have a race condition</a>
11918 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect.  The
11919 maintainer is on the case.</li>
11920
11921 <li>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
11922 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
11923 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/575080">try to switch back</a> to
11924 sysv-rc.  One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
11925 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
11926 sysv-rc more robust.  Will investigate some more and probably upload a
11927 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
11928 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.</li>
11929
11930 </ul></p>
11931
11932 <p>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
11933 solvable before Squeeze is released.  In addition to these there are
11934 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
11935 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.</p>
11936
11937 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
11938 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
11939 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
11940 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
11941
11942 <p>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.</p>
11943
11944       </div>
11945       <div class="tags">
11946
11947
11948         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>.
11949
11950
11951       </div>
11952     </div>
11953     <div class="padding"></div>
11954
11955     <div class="entry">
11956       <div class="title">
11957         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html">More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer</a>
11958       </div>
11959       <div class="date">
11960         22nd May 2010
11961       </div>
11962       <div class="body">
11963         <p>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
11964 found time today to return to the project.  Having to spend less time
11965 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
11966 definitely helped freeing some time.</p>
11967
11968 <p>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu.  We
11969 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
11970 get disk and network controllers working.  Without having these
11971 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
11972 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
11973 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
11974 an external medium is a support pain.  Initially, I expected it to be
11975 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
11976 debian-installer to find and use them.  This proved to be wrong.
11977 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
11978 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
11979 /cdrom/firmware/).  This also proved to not work, and at this point I
11980 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
11981 going to work.</p>
11982
11983 <p>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
11984 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
11985 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
11986 packages.  It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
11987 "external" media devices.  Today I changed it to also look in the
11988 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
11989 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu.  I also changed it to
11990 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
11991 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
11992 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
11993 Edu.</p>
11994
11995 <p>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
11996 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
11997 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
11998 run these before activating the firmware during installation.  The
11999 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
12000 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.</p>
12001
12002 <p>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
12003 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.</p>
12004
12005       </div>
12006       <div class="tags">
12007
12008
12009         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>.
12010
12011
12012       </div>
12013     </div>
12014     <div class="padding"></div>
12015
12016     <div class="entry">
12017       <div class="title">
12018         <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>
12019       </div>
12020       <div class="date">
12021         14th May 2010
12022       </div>
12023       <div class="body">
12024         <p>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
12025 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
12026 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
12027 expected, if I am to believe the
12028 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
12029 on debian-devel@</a>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
12030 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
12031 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen.  If serious problems are
12032 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
12033 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
12034 version.</p>
12035
12036 More information about
12037 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12038 based boot sequencing</a> is available from the Debian wiki.  It is
12039 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
12040 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:</p>
12041
12042 <blockquote><pre>
12043 CONCURRENCY=none
12044 </pre></blockquote>
12045
12046 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12047 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12048 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12049 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12050
12051       </div>
12052       <div class="tags">
12053
12054
12055         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>.
12056
12057
12058       </div>
12059     </div>
12060     <div class="padding"></div>
12061
12062     <div class="entry">
12063       <div class="title">
12064         <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>
12065       </div>
12066       <div class="date">
12067         14th May 2010
12068       </div>
12069       <div class="body">
12070         <p>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
12071 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">sitesummary
12072 system</a> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
12073 network.  Each machine will automatically report its status to the
12074 central server after boot and once per night.  The network setup is
12075 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
12076 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines.  This is useful
12077 to update the DHCP configuration.</p>
12078
12079 <p>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
12080 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary.  Run
12081 this on the collector host:</p>
12082
12083 <blockquote><pre>
12084 perl -MSiteSummary -e 'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(" ", get_macaddresses(shift)), "\n"; });'
12085 </pre></blockquote>
12086
12087 <p>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
12088 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.</p>
12089
12090 <p>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
12091 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
12092 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
12093 tables in LDAP using this information.  Such tool is unfortunately not
12094 written yet.</p>
12095
12096       </div>
12097       <div class="tags">
12098
12099
12100         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>.
12101
12102
12103       </div>
12104     </div>
12105     <div class="padding"></div>
12106
12107     <div class="entry">
12108       <div class="title">
12109         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html">systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart</a>
12110       </div>
12111       <div class="date">
12112         13th May 2010
12113       </div>
12114       <div class="body">
12115         <p>The last few days a new boot system called
12116 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd">systemd</a>
12117 has been
12118 <a href="http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html">introduced</a>
12119
12120 to the free software world.  I have not yet had time to play around
12121 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
12122 <a href="http://upstart.ubuntu.com/">upstart</a>, and might prove to be
12123 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
12124 based boot system.  Tollef is
12125 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/580814">in the process</a> of getting
12126 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work.  I
12127 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
12128 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
12129 at the moment do not.</p>
12130
12131 <p>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
12132 platform support.  It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
12133 some new kernel features enabled to function properly.  This means
12134 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
12135 system.  Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
12136 way forward.</p>
12137
12138 <p>In the mean time, based on the
12139 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
12140 on debian-devel@</a> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
12141 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
12142 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
12143 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies.  A
12144 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
12145 already in experimental.  If all go well, Squeeze will be released
12146 with parallel booting enabled by default.</p>
12147
12148       </div>
12149       <div class="tags">
12150
12151
12152         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>.
12153
12154
12155       </div>
12156     </div>
12157     <div class="padding"></div>
12158
12159     <div class="entry">
12160       <div class="title">
12161         <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>
12162       </div>
12163       <div class="date">
12164          6th May 2010
12165       </div>
12166       <div class="body">
12167         <p>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
12168 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
12169 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies.  If you want
12170 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
12171 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12172 based boot sequencing</a> is enabled, and add this line to
12173 /etc/default/rcS:</p>
12174
12175 <blockquote><pre>
12176 CONCURRENCY=makefile
12177 </pre></blockquote>
12178
12179 <p>That is it.  It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
12180 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
12181 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
12182 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts.  Startpar is configured
12183 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
12184 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
12185 make this happen.</p>
12186
12187 <p>Give it a try, and see if you like the result.  If some services
12188 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
12189 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
12190 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies).  Report bugs and get
12191 the package maintainers to fix it. :)</p>
12192
12193 <p>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
12194 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct.  I
12195 expect we will get there in Squeeze+1, if we get manage to test and
12196 fix the remaining issues.</p>
12197
12198 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12199 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12200 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12201 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12202
12203       </div>
12204       <div class="tags">
12205
12206
12207         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>.
12208
12209
12210       </div>
12211     </div>
12212     <div class="padding"></div>
12213
12214     <div class="entry">
12215       <div class="title">
12216         <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>
12217       </div>
12218       <div class="date">
12219         27th July 2009
12220       </div>
12221       <div class="body">
12222         <p>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2,
12223 and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable
12224 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing.  This
12225 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
12226 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
12227 installation.  Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
12228 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.</p>
12229
12230 <p>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
12231 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
12232 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.</p>
12233
12234       </div>
12235       <div class="tags">
12236
12237
12238         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>.
12239
12240
12241       </div>
12242     </div>
12243     <div class="padding"></div>
12244
12245     <div class="entry">
12246       <div class="title">
12247         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html">Taking over sysvinit development</a>
12248       </div>
12249       <div class="date">
12250         22nd July 2009
12251       </div>
12252       <div class="body">
12253         <p>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
12254 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
12255 take over the package and become the new upstream.  The number of
12256 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
12257 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
12258 the package up to date.</p>
12259
12260 <p>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
12261 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman.  About 10 days ago, I made
12262 a new upstream tarball with version number 2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
12263 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
12264 distributions.  We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
12265 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge.  Since the
12266 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
12267 upstream project at <a href="http://savannah.nongnu.org/">Savannah</a>, and continue
12268 development there.  The project is registered and currently waiting
12269 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
12270 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
12271 working on the future release.</p>
12272
12273 <p>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
12274 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.</p>
12275
12276       </div>
12277       <div class="tags">
12278
12279
12280         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>.
12281
12282
12283       </div>
12284     </div>
12285     <div class="padding"></div>
12286
12287     <div class="entry">
12288       <div class="title">
12289         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html">Debian boots quicker and quicker</a>
12290       </div>
12291       <div class="date">
12292         24th June 2009
12293       </div>
12294       <div class="body">
12295         <p>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
12296 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
12297 could find more ways to speed up the boot system.  This was an Ubuntu
12298 funded
12299 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint">developer
12300 gathering</a>. It was quite productive.  We also discussed the future
12301 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
12302 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
12303 asynchronous and event base.  The Ubuntu approach using udev and
12304 upstart might be a good way forward.  Time will show.</p>
12305
12306 <p>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
12307 process in Debian.  All of these should be applied to get a quick
12308 boot:</p>
12309
12310 <ul>
12311
12312 <li>Use dash as /bin/sh.</li>
12313
12314 <li>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
12315    clock is in UTC.</li>
12316
12317 <li>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
12318    <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12319    based boot sequencing</a>, and enable concurrent booting.</li>
12320
12321 </ul>
12322
12323 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
12324 <a href="http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/">Carlos
12325 Villegas</a>.
12326
12327 <p>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
12328 unstable yesterday.  When we tested it, we were able to cut 6 seconds
12329 from the boot sequence.  It depend on very correct dependency
12330 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
12331 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
12332 using this.</p>
12333
12334 <p>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
12335 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
12336 startup speed as well.  Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
12337 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
12338 possible to run a of them in the same process.  A quick way to test
12339 this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
12340 insserv'.  Will need to test if that work. :)</p>
12341
12342       </div>
12343       <div class="tags">
12344
12345
12346         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>.
12347
12348
12349       </div>
12350     </div>
12351     <div class="padding"></div>
12352
12353     <div class="entry">
12354       <div class="title">
12355         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/BSAs_p_stander_om_piratkopiering_m_ter_motstand.html">BSAs påstander om piratkopiering møter motstand</a>
12356       </div>
12357       <div class="date">
12358         17th May 2009
12359       </div>
12360       <div class="body">
12361         <p>Hvert år de siste årene har BSA, lobbyfronten til de store
12362 programvareselskapene som Microsoft og Apple, publisert en rapport der
12363 de gjetter på hvor mye piratkopiering påfører i tapte inntekter i
12364 ulike land rundt om i verden.  Resultatene er tendensiøse.  For noen
12365 dager siden kom
12366 <a href="http://global.bsa.org/globalpiracy2008/studies/globalpiracy2008.pdf">siste
12367 rapport</a>, og det er flere kritiske kommentarer publisert de siste
12368 dagene.  Et spesielt interessant kommentar fra Sverige,
12369 <a href="http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.229795/bsa-hoftade-sverigesiffror">BSA
12370 höftade Sverigesiffror</a>, oppsummeres slik:</p>
12371
12372 <blockquote>
12373 I sin senaste rapport slår BSA fast att 25 procent av all mjukvara i
12374 Sverige är piratkopierad. Det utan att ha pratat med ett enda svenskt
12375 företag. "Man bör nog kanske inte se de här siffrorna som helt
12376 exakta", säger BSAs Sverigechef John Hugosson.
12377 </blockquote>
12378
12379 <p>Mon tro om de er like metodiske når de gjetter på andelen piratkopiering i Norge?  To andre kommentarer er <a
12380 href="http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/comment/2242134/bsa-piracy-figures-shot-reality">BSA
12381 piracy figures need a shot of reality</a> og <a
12382 href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3958/125/">Does The WIPO
12383 Copyright Treaty Work?</a></p>
12384
12385 <p>Fant lenkene via <a
12386 href="http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/17/1632242">oppslag
12387 på Slashdot</a>.</p>
12388
12389       </div>
12390       <div class="tags">
12391
12392
12393         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>.
12394
12395
12396       </div>
12397     </div>
12398     <div class="padding"></div>
12399
12400     <div class="entry">
12401       <div class="title">
12402         <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>
12403       </div>
12404       <div class="date">
12405          7th May 2009
12406       </div>
12407       <div class="body">
12408         <p>Kom over
12409 <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10216873-16.html">interessante
12410 tall</a> fra IDG om utviklingen av linuxservermarkedet.  Fikk meg til
12411 å tenke på antall tjenermaskiner ved Universitetet i Oslo der jeg
12412 jobber til daglig.  En rask opptelling forteller meg at vi har 490
12413 (61%) fysiske unix-tjener (mest linux men også noen solaris) og 196
12414 (25%) windowstjenere, samt 112 (14%) virtuelle unix-tjenere.  Med den
12415 bakgrunnskunnskapen kan jeg godt tro at IDG er inne på noe.</p>
12416
12417       </div>
12418       <div class="tags">
12419
12420
12421         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>.
12422
12423
12424       </div>
12425     </div>
12426     <div class="padding"></div>
12427
12428     <div class="entry">
12429       <div class="title">
12430         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kryptert_harddisk___naturligvis.html">Kryptert harddisk - naturligvis</a>
12431       </div>
12432       <div class="date">
12433          2nd May 2009
12434       </div>
12435       <div class="body">
12436         <p><a href="http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1658676.ece">Dagens
12437 IT melder</a> at Intel hevder at det er dyrt å miste en datamaskin,
12438 når en tar tap av arbeidstid, fortrolige dokumenter,
12439 personopplysninger og alt annet det innebærer.  Det er ingen tvil om
12440 at det er en kostbar affære å miste sin datamaskin, og det er årsaken
12441 til at jeg har kryptert harddisken på både kontormaskinen og min
12442 bærbare.  Begge inneholder personopplysninger jeg ikke ønsker skal
12443 komme på avveie, den første informasjon relatert til jobben min ved
12444 Universitetet i Oslo, og den andre relatert til blant annet
12445 foreningsarbeide.  Kryptering av diskene gjør at det er lite
12446 sannsynlig at dophoder som kan finne på å rappe maskinene får noe ut
12447 av dem.  Maskinene låses automatisk etter noen minutter uten bruk,
12448 og en reboot vil gjøre at de ber om passord før de vil starte opp.
12449 Jeg bruker Debian på begge maskinene, og installasjonssystemet der
12450 gjør det trivielt å sette opp krypterte disker.  Jeg har LVM på toppen
12451 av krypterte partisjoner, slik at alt av datapartisjoner er kryptert.
12452 Jeg anbefaler alle å kryptere diskene på sine bærbare.  Kostnaden når
12453 det er gjort slik jeg gjør det er minimale, og gevinstene er
12454 betydelige.  En bør dog passe på passordet.  Hvis det går tapt, må
12455 maskinen reinstalleres og alt er tapt.</p>
12456
12457 <p>Krypteringen vil ikke stoppe kompetente angripere som f.eks. kjøler
12458 ned minnebrikkene før maskinen rebootes med programvare for å hente ut
12459 krypteringsnøklene.  Kostnaden med å forsvare seg mot slike angripere
12460 er for min del høyere enn gevinsten.  Jeg tror oddsene for at
12461 f.eks. etteretningsorganisasjoner har glede av å titte på mine
12462 maskiner er minimale, og ulempene jeg ville oppnå ved å forsøke å
12463 gjøre det vanskeligere for angripere med kompetanse og ressurser er
12464 betydelige.</p>
12465
12466       </div>
12467       <div class="tags">
12468
12469
12470         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>.
12471
12472
12473       </div>
12474     </div>
12475     <div class="padding"></div>
12476
12477     <div class="entry">
12478       <div class="title">
12479         <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>
12480       </div>
12481       <div class="date">
12482          2nd May 2009
12483       </div>
12484       <div class="body">
12485         <p>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
12486 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
12487 do not yet know them.</p>
12488
12489 <p>The first one is <a href="http://valgrind.org/">valgrind</a>, a
12490 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
12491 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run 'valgrind program',
12492 and it will report any problems on stdout.  It is even better if the
12493 program include debug information.  With debug information, it is able
12494 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
12495 occurs.  It can report things like 'reading past memory block in file
12496 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M', and
12497 'using uninitialised value in control logic'.  This tool has made it
12498 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
12499 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
12500
12501 <p>The second one is
12502 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity">Coverity</a> which is
12503 a source code checker.  It is able to process the source of a program
12504 and find problems in the logic without running the program.  It
12505 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
12506 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel.  It is now a commercial tool
12507 and the company behind it is running
12508 <a href="http://www.scan.coverity.com/">a community service</a> for the
12509 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
12510 their source checked for free.  Several thousand defects have been
12511 found and fixed so far.  It can find errors like 'lock L taken in file
12512 X line N is never released if exiting in line M', or 'the code in file
12513 Y lines O to P can never be executed'.  The projects included in the
12514 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
12515 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.</p>
12516
12517 <p>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
12518 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
12519 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
12520 surrounded by today.</p>
12521
12522       </div>
12523       <div class="tags">
12524
12525
12526         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>.
12527
12528
12529       </div>
12530     </div>
12531     <div class="padding"></div>
12532
12533     <div class="entry">
12534       <div class="title">
12535         <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>
12536       </div>
12537       <div class="date">
12538         28th April 2009
12539       </div>
12540       <div class="body">
12541         <p>Julien Blache
12542 <a href="http://blog.technologeek.org/2009/04/12/214">claim that no
12543 patch is better than a useless patch</a>.  I completely disagree, as a
12544 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
12545 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
12546 time on fixing it.  No patch do not provide any of these positive
12547 properties.</p>
12548
12549       </div>
12550       <div class="tags">
12551
12552
12553         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>.
12554
12555
12556       </div>
12557     </div>
12558     <div class="padding"></div>
12559
12560     <div class="entry">
12561       <div class="title">
12562         <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>
12563       </div>
12564       <div class="date">
12565         30th March 2009
12566       </div>
12567       <div class="body">
12568         <p>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
12569 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
12570 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
12571 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
12572 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
12573 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
12574 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
12575 application.</p>
12576
12577 <p>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
12578 independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
12579 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
12580 protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
12581 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
12582 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
12583 blocked from doing so.</p>
12584
12585 <p>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
12586 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
12587 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
12588 requirements change.</p>
12589
12590 <p>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
12591 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
12592 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.</p>
12593
12594       </div>
12595       <div class="tags">
12596
12597
12598         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>.
12599
12600
12601       </div>
12602     </div>
12603     <div class="padding"></div>
12604
12605     <div class="entry">
12606       <div class="title">
12607         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html">Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering</a>
12608       </div>
12609       <div class="date">
12610         29th March 2009
12611       </div>
12612       <div class="body">
12613         <p>I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
12614 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering.  I got a bit done tuning the
12615 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
12616 implementation avahi.  It look like it could be useful for us.  Almost
12617 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
12618 get to know the Skolelinux system.  Walter Bender, involved in the
12619 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
12620 also helped me improve my OLPC installation.  He also showed me that
12621 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
12622 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian.  As a
12623 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu.  We also
12624 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
12625 proved to be too hard for us.  The application seem to need more work
12626 before it is ready for me.  I look forward to getting home and relax
12627 now. :)</p>
12628
12629       </div>
12630       <div class="tags">
12631
12632
12633         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>.
12634
12635
12636       </div>
12637     </div>
12638     <div class="padding"></div>
12639
12640     <div class="entry">
12641       <div class="title">
12642         <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>
12643       </div>
12644       <div class="date">
12645         29th March 2009
12646       </div>
12647       <div class="body">
12648         <p>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
12649 optimal.  There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
12650 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with
12651 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory.  The RFC
12652 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
12653 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.</p>
12654
12655 <p>In <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux</a>,
12656 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
12657 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
12658 and LTSP configuration in LDAP.  These objects have a lot in common,
12659 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
12660 object per entity.  For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
12661 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
12662 DNS information and another with DHCP information.  The schemas
12663 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
12664 object.  In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
12665 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
12666 It just do not scale.  I believe it is time for a few RFC
12667 specifications to cleam up this mess.</p>
12668
12669 <p>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
12670 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
12671 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
12672 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.</p>
12673
12674 <p>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
12675 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.</p>
12676
12677 <p>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
12678 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up.  Time to start a
12679 new IETF work group?</p>
12680
12681       </div>
12682       <div class="tags">
12683
12684
12685         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>.
12686
12687
12688       </div>
12689     </div>
12690     <div class="padding"></div>
12691
12692     <div class="entry">
12693       <div class="title">
12694         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Endelig_er_Debian_Lenny_gitt_ut.html">Endelig er Debian Lenny gitt ut</a>
12695       </div>
12696       <div class="date">
12697         15th February 2009
12698       </div>
12699       <div class="body">
12700         <p>Endelig er <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>
12701 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090214">Lenny</a> gitt ut.
12702 Et langt steg videre for Debian-prosjektet, og en rekke nye
12703 programpakker blir nå tilgjengelig for de av oss som bruker den
12704 stabile utgaven av Debian.  Neste steg er nå å få
12705 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> /
12706 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> ferdig
12707 oppdatert for den nye utgaven, slik at en oppdatert versjon kan
12708 slippes løs på skolene.  Takk til alle debian-utviklerne som har
12709 gjort dette mulig.  Endelig er f.eks. fungerende avhengighetsstyrt
12710 bootsekvens tilgjengelig i stabil utgave, vha pakken
12711 <tt>insserv</tt>.</p>
12712
12713       </div>
12714       <div class="tags">
12715
12716
12717         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>.
12718
12719
12720       </div>
12721     </div>
12722     <div class="padding"></div>
12723
12724     <div class="entry">
12725       <div class="title">
12726         <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>
12727       </div>
12728       <div class="date">
12729          7th December 2008
12730       </div>
12731       <div class="body">
12732         <p>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
12733 Oslo.  Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
12734 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
12735 LTSP installation.  LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network.
12736 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
12737 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box.  Was working on getting the
12738 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
12739 finish it before the weekend was up.</p>
12740
12741 <p>Did not find time to look at the 4 VGA cards in one box we got from
12742 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
12743 development gathering.  Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
12744 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
12745 of these cards.</p>
12746
12747       </div>
12748       <div class="tags">
12749
12750
12751         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>.
12752
12753
12754       </div>
12755     </div>
12756     <div class="padding"></div>
12757
12758     <div class="entry">
12759       <div class="title">
12760         <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>
12761       </div>
12762       <div class="date">
12763         25th November 2008
12764       </div>
12765       <div class="body">
12766         <p>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
12767 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
12768 default in Debian Edu.  We need an embedded video playing plugin with
12769 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
12770 all the multimedia content available on the web.  The test results and
12771 notes are available on
12772 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">the
12773 Debian wiki</a>.  I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
12774 fill this need.  My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
12775 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages.  A lot of the MIME
12776 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
12777 video/ogg), just do not work.  And simple formats like the
12778 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn't supported by the
12779 totem and vlc plugins.  I hope the situation will improve soon.  No
12780 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.</p>
12781
12782 <p>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin.  It seem to
12783 be the only one fitting our needs. :/</p>
12784
12785       </div>
12786       <div class="tags">
12787
12788
12789         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>.
12790
12791
12792       </div>
12793     </div>
12794     <div class="padding"></div>
12795
12796     <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>
12797     <div id="sidebar">
12798
12799
12800
12801 <h2>Archive</h2>
12802 <ul>
12803
12804 <li>2017
12805 <ul>
12806
12807 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/01/">January (4)</a></li>
12808
12809 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/02/">February (3)</a></li>
12810
12811 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/03/">March (5)</a></li>
12812
12813 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/04/">April (2)</a></li>
12814
12815 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/06/">June (5)</a></li>
12816
12817 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/07/">July (1)</a></li>
12818
12819 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/08/">August (1)</a></li>
12820
12821 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/09/">September (3)</a></li>
12822
12823 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/10/">October (5)</a></li>
12824
12825 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/11/">November (3)</a></li>
12826
12827 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/12/">December (4)</a></li>
12828
12829 </ul></li>
12830
12831 <li>2016
12832 <ul>
12833
12834 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
12835
12836 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
12837
12838 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
12839
12840 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
12841
12842 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
12843
12844 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12845
12846 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/07/">July (2)</a></li>
12847
12848 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/08/">August (5)</a></li>
12849
12850 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/09/">September (2)</a></li>
12851
12852 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/10/">October (3)</a></li>
12853
12854 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/11/">November (8)</a></li>
12855
12856 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/12/">December (5)</a></li>
12857
12858 </ul></li>
12859
12860 <li>2015
12861 <ul>
12862
12863 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
12864
12865 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
12866
12867 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
12868
12869 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
12870
12871 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
12872
12873 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
12874
12875 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
12876
12877 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
12878
12879 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
12880
12881 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
12882
12883 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
12884
12885 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
12886
12887 </ul></li>
12888
12889 <li>2014
12890 <ul>
12891
12892 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
12893
12894 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
12895
12896 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
12897
12898 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
12899
12900 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
12901
12902 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12903
12904 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
12905
12906 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
12907
12908 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
12909
12910 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
12911
12912 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
12913
12914 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
12915
12916 </ul></li>
12917
12918 <li>2013
12919 <ul>
12920
12921 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
12922
12923 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
12924
12925 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
12926
12927 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
12928
12929 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
12930
12931 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
12932
12933 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
12934
12935 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
12936
12937 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
12938
12939 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
12940
12941 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
12942
12943 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
12944
12945 </ul></li>
12946
12947 <li>2012
12948 <ul>
12949
12950 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
12951
12952 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
12953
12954 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
12955
12956 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
12957
12958 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
12959
12960 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
12961
12962 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
12963
12964 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
12965
12966 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
12967
12968 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
12969
12970 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
12971
12972 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
12973
12974 </ul></li>
12975
12976 <li>2011
12977 <ul>
12978
12979 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
12980
12981 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
12982
12983 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
12984
12985 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
12986
12987 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
12988
12989 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12990
12991 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
12992
12993 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
12994
12995 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
12996
12997 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
12998
12999 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13000
13001 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
13002
13003 </ul></li>
13004
13005 <li>2010
13006 <ul>
13007
13008 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
13009
13010 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
13011
13012 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13013
13014 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
13015
13016 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
13017
13018 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
13019
13020 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
13021
13022 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
13023
13024 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
13025
13026 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
13027
13028 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
13029
13030 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
13031
13032 </ul></li>
13033
13034 <li>2009
13035 <ul>
13036
13037 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
13038
13039 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
13040
13041 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
13042
13043 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
13044
13045 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
13046
13047 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
13048
13049 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
13050
13051 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
13052
13053 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
13054
13055 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
13056
13057 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13058
13059 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
13060
13061 </ul></li>
13062
13063 <li>2008
13064 <ul>
13065
13066 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
13067
13068 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
13069
13070 </ul></li>
13071
13072 </ul>
13073
13074
13075
13076 <h2>Tags</h2>
13077 <ul>
13078
13079  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (15)</a></li>
13080
13081  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
13082
13083  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
13084
13085  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
13086
13087  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (9)</a></li>
13088
13089  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (16)</a></li>
13090
13091  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
13092
13093  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
13094
13095  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (155)</a></li>
13096
13097  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (158)</a></li>
13098
13099  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook (4)</a></li>
13100
13101  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
13102
13103  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (17)</a></li>
13104
13105  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (24)</a></li>
13106
13107  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
13108
13109  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (363)</a></li>
13110
13111  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
13112
13113  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (13)</a></li>
13114
13115  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (32)</a></li>
13116
13117  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
13118
13119  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (18)</a></li>
13120
13121  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
13122
13123  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
13124
13125  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (15)</a></li>
13126
13127  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (20)</a></li>
13128
13129  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
13130
13131  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lego">lego (4)</a></li>
13132
13133  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
13134
13135  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
13136
13137  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
13138
13139  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
13140
13141  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (39)</a></li>
13142
13143  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (9)</a></li>
13144
13145  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (294)</a></li>
13146
13147  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (190)</a></li>
13148
13149  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (33)</a></li>
13150
13151  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
13152
13153  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (70)</a></li>
13154
13155  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (104)</a></li>
13156
13157  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (2)</a></li>
13158
13159  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
13160
13161  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
13162
13163  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
13164
13165  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (10)</a></li>
13166
13167  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
13168
13169  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (5)</a></li>
13170
13171  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
13172
13173  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (53)</a></li>
13174
13175  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
13176
13177  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (5)</a></li>
13178
13179  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (55)</a></li>
13180
13181  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (6)</a></li>
13182
13183  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (12)</a></li>
13184
13185  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (52)</a></li>
13186
13187  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (4)</a></li>
13188
13189  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
13190
13191  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (9)</a></li>
13192
13193  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/verkidetfri">verkidetfri (9)</a></li>
13194
13195  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (61)</a></li>
13196
13197  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
13198
13199  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (40)</a></li>
13200
13201 </ul>
13202
13203
13204     </div>
13205     <p style="text-align: right">
13206  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
13207 </p>
13208
13209   </body>
13210 </html>