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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/Strategispillet_Unknown_Horizons_n__tilgjengelig_p__bokm_l.html">Strategispillet Unknown Horizons nå tilgjengelig på bokmål</a>
  26       </div>
  27       <div class="date">
  28         23rd January 2019
  29       </div>
  30       <div class="body">
  31         <p>I høst ble jeg inspirert til å bidra til oversettelsen av
  32 <a href="http://unknown-horizons.org/">strategispillet Unknown
  33 Horizons</a>, og oversatte de nesten 200 strengene i prosjektet til
  34 bokmål.  Deretter har jeg gått å ventet på at det kom en ny utgave som
  35 inneholdt disse oversettelsene.  Nå er endelig ventetiden over.  Den
  36 nye versjonen kom på nyåret, og ble
  37 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/unknown-horizons">lastet opp i
  38 Debian</a> for noen få dager siden.  I går kveld fikk jeg testet det ut, og
  39 må innrømme at oversettelsene fungerer fint.  Fant noen få tekster som
  40 måtte justeres, men ikke noe alvorlig.  Har oppdatert
  41 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/uh/">oversettelsen på
  42 Weblate</a>, slik at neste utgave vil være enda bedre. :)</p>
  43
  44 <p>Spillet er et ressursstyringsspill ala Civilization, og er morsomt
  45 å spille for oss som liker slikt. :)</p>
  46
  47 <p>Som vanlig, hvis du bruker Bitcoin og ønsker å vise din støtte til
  48 det jeg driver med, setter jeg pris på om du sender Bitcoin-donasjoner
  49 til min adresse
  50 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.
  51 Merk, betaling med bitcoin er ikke anonymt. :)</p>
  52
  53       </div>
  54       <div class="tags">
  55
  56
  57         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>.
  58
  59
  60       </div>
  61     </div>
  62     <div class="padding"></div>
  63
  64     <div class="entry">
  65       <div class="title">
  66         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_got_everything_you_need_to_program_Micro_bit.html">Debian now got everything you need to program Micro:bit</a>
  67       </div>
  68       <div class="date">
  69         22nd January 2019
  70       </div>
  71       <div class="body">
  72         <p>I am amazed and very pleased to discover that since a few days ago,
  73 everything you need to program the <a href="https://microbit.org/">BBC
  74 micro:bit</a> is available from the Debian archive.  All this is
  75 thanks to the hard work of Nick Morrott and the Debian python
  76 packaging team.  The micro:bit project recommend the mu-editor to
  77 program the microcomputer, as this editor will take care of all the
  78 machinery required to injekt/flash micropython alongside the program
  79 into the micro:bit, as long as the pieces are available.</p>
  80
  81 <p>There are three main pieces involved.  The first to enter Debian
  82 was
  83 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/python-uflash">python-uflash</a>,
  84 which was accepted into the archive 2019-01-12.  The next one was
  85 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/mu-editor">mu-editor</a>, which
  86 showed up 2019-01-13.  The final and hardest part to to into the
  87 archive was
  88 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/firmware-microbit-micropython">firmware-microbit-micropython</a>,
  89 which needed to get its build system and dependencies into Debian
  90 before it was accepted 2019-01-20.  The last one is already in Debian
  91 Unstable and should enter Debian Testing / Buster in three days.  This
  92 all allow any user of the micro:bit to get going by simply running
  93 'apt install mu-editor' when using Testing or Unstable, and once
  94 Buster is released as stable, all the users of Debian stable will be
  95 catered for.</p>
  96
  97 <p>As a minor final touch, I added rules to
  98 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">the isenkram
  99 package</a> for recognizing micro:bit and recommend the mu-editor
 100 package.  This make sure any user of the isenkram desktop daemon will
 101 get a popup suggesting to install mu-editor then the USB cable from
 102 the micro:bit is inserted for the first time.</p>
 103
 104 <p>This should make it easier to have fun.</p>
 105
 106 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 107 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 108 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 109
 110       </div>
 111       <div class="tags">
 112
 113
 114         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
 115
 116
 117       </div>
 118     </div>
 119     <div class="padding"></div>
 120
 121     <div class="entry">
 122       <div class="title">
 123         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Learn_to_program_with_Minetest_on_Debian.html">Learn to program with Minetest on Debian</a>
 124       </div>
 125       <div class="date">
 126         15th December 2018
 127       </div>
 128       <div class="body">
 129         <p>A fun way to learn how to program
 130 <a href="https://www.python.org/">Python</a> is to follow the
 131 instructions in the book
 132 "<a href="https://nostarch.com/programwithminecraft">Learn to program
 133 with Minecraft</a>", which introduces programming in Python to people
 134 who like to play with Minecraft.  The book uses a Python library to
 135 talk to a TCP/IP socket with an API accepting build instructions and
 136 providing information about the current players in a Minecraft world.
 137 The TCP/IP API was first created for the Minecraft implementation for
 138 Raspberry Pi, and has since been ported to some server versions of
 139 Minecraft.  The book contain recipes for those using Windows, MacOSX
 140 and Raspian.  But a little known fact is that you can follow the same
 141 recipes using the free software construction game
 142 <a href="https://minetest.net/">Minetest</a>.</p>
 143
 144 <p>There is <a href="https://github.com/sprintingkiwi/pycraft_mod">a
 145 Minetest module implementing the same API</a>, making it possible to
 146 use the Python programs coded to talk to Minecraft with Minetest too.
 147 I
 148 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org/new/minetest-mod-pycraft_0.20%2Bgit20180331.0376a0a%2Bdfsg-1.html">uploaded
 149 this module</a> to Debian two weeks ago, and as soon as it clears the
 150 FTP masters NEW queue, learning to program Python with Minetest on
 151 Debian will be a simple 'apt install' away.  The Debian package is
 152 maintained as part of the Debian Games team, and
 153 <a href="https://salsa.debian.org/games-team/unfinished/minetest-mod-pycraft">the
 154 packaging rules</a> are currently located under 'unfinished' on
 155 Salsa.</p>
 156
 157 <p>You will most likely need to install several of the Minetest
 158 modules in Debian for the examples included with the library to work
 159 well, as there are several blocks used by the example scripts that are
 160 provided via modules in Minetest.  Without the required blocks, a
 161 simple stone block is used instead.  My initial testing with a analog
 162 clock did not get gold arms as instructed in the python library, but
 163 instead used stone arms.</p>
 164
 165 <p>I tried to find a way to add the API to the desktop version of
 166 Minecraft, but were unable to find any working recipes.  The
 167 <a href="https://www.epiphanydigest.com/tag/minecraft-python-api/">recipes</a>
 168 I <a href="https://github.com/kbsriram/mcpiapi">found</a> are only
 169 working with a standalone Minecraft server setup.  Are there any
 170 options to use with the normal desktop version?</p>
 171
 172 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 173 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 174 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 175
 176       </div>
 177       <div class="tags">
 178
 179
 180         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>.
 181
 182
 183       </div>
 184     </div>
 185     <div class="padding"></div>
 186
 187     <div class="entry">
 188       <div class="title">
 189         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_an_official_MIME_type_for_patches_.html">Time for an official MIME type for patches?</a>
 190       </div>
 191       <div class="date">
 192          1st November 2018
 193       </div>
 194       <div class="body">
 195         <p>As part of my involvement in
 196 <a href="https://gitlab.com/OsloMet-ABI/nikita-noark5-core">the Nikita
 197 archive API project</a>, I've been importing a fairly large lump of
 198 emails into a test instance of the archive to see how well this would
 199 go.  I picked a subset of <a href="https://notmuchmail.org/">my
 200 notmuch email database</a>, all public emails sent to me via
 201 @lists.debian.org, giving me a set of around 216 000 emails to import.
 202 In the process, I had a look at the various attachments included in
 203 these emails, to figure out what to do with attachments, and noticed
 204 that one of the most common attachment formats do not have
 205 <a href="https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">an
 206 official MIME type</a> registered with IANA/IETF.  The output from
 207 diff, ie the input for patch, is on the top 10 list of formats
 208 included in these emails.  At the moment people seem to use either
 209 text/x-patch or text/x-diff, but neither is officially registered.  It
 210 would be better if one official MIME type were registered and used
 211 everywhere.</p>
 212
 213 <p>To try to get one official MIME type for these files, I've brought
 214 up the topic on
 215 <a href="https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/media-types">the
 216 media-types mailing list</a>.  If you are interested in discussion
 217 which MIME type to use as the official for patch files, or involved in
 218 making software using a MIME type for patches, perhaps you would like
 219 to join the discussion?</p>
 220
 221 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 222 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 223 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 224
 225       </div>
 226       <div class="tags">
 227
 228
 229         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/noark5">noark5</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
 230
 231
 232       </div>
 233     </div>
 234     <div class="padding"></div>
 235
 236     <div class="entry">
 237       <div class="title">
 238         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_Google_Drive_sync_using_grive_in_Debian.html">Automatic Google Drive sync using grive in Debian</a>
 239       </div>
 240       <div class="date">
 241          4th October 2018
 242       </div>
 243       <div class="body">
 244         <p>A few days, I rescued a Windows victim over to Debian.  To try to
 245 rescue the remains, I helped set up automatic sync with Google Drive.
 246 I did not find any sensible Debian package handling this
 247 automatically, so I rebuild the grive2 source from
 248 <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/">the Ubuntu UPD8 PPA</a> to do the
 249 task and added a autostart desktop entry and a small shell script to
 250 run in the background while the user is logged in to do the sync.
 251 Here is a sketch of the setup for future reference.</p>
 252
 253 <p>I first created <tt>~/googledrive</tt>, entered the directory and
 254 ran '<tt>grive -a</tt>' to authenticate the machine/user.  Next, I
 255 created a autostart hook in <tt>~/.config/autostart/grive.desktop</tt>
 256 to start the sync when the user log in:</p>
 257
 258 <p><blockquote><pre>
 259 [Desktop Entry]
 260 Name=Google drive autosync
 261 Type=Application
 262 Exec=/home/user/bin/grive-sync
 263 </pre></blockquote></p>
 264
 265 <p>Finally, I wrote the <tt>~/bin/grive-sync</tt> script to sync
 266 ~/googledrive/ with the files in Google Drive.</p>
 267
 268 <p><blockquote><pre>
 269 #!/bin/sh
 270 set -e
 271 cd ~/
 272 cleanup() {
 273     if [ "$syncpid" ] ; then
 274         kill $syncpid
 275     fi
 276 }
 277 trap cleanup EXIT INT QUIT
 278 /usr/lib/grive/grive-sync.sh listen googledrive 2>&1 | sed "s%^%$0:%" &
 279 syncpdi=$!
 280 while true; do
 281     if ! xhost >/dev/null 2>&1 ; then
 282         echo "no DISPLAY, exiting as the user probably logged out"
 283         exit 1
 284     fi
 285     if [ ! -e /run/user/1000/grive-sync.sh_googledrive ] ; then
 286         /usr/lib/grive/grive-sync.sh sync googledrive
 287     fi
 288     sleep 300
 289 done 2>&1 | sed "s%^%$0:%"
 290 </pre></blockquote></p>
 291
 292 <p>Feel free to use the setup if you want.  It can be assumed to be
 293 GNU GPL v2 licensed (or any later version, at your leisure), but I
 294 doubt this code is possible to claim copyright on.</p>
 295
 296 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 297 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 298 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 299
 300       </div>
 301       <div class="tags">
 302
 303
 304         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>.
 305
 306
 307       </div>
 308     </div>
 309     <div class="padding"></div>
 310
 311     <div class="entry">
 312       <div class="title">
 313         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_the_Kodi_API_to_play_Youtube_videos.html">Using the Kodi API to play Youtube videos</a>
 314       </div>
 315       <div class="date">
 316          2nd September 2018
 317       </div>
 318       <div class="body">
 319         <p>I continue to explore my Kodi installation, and today I wanted to
 320 tell it to play a youtube URL I received in a chat, without having to
 321 insert search terms using the on-screen keyboard.  After searching the
 322 web for API access to the Youtube plugin and testing a bit, I managed
 323 to find a recipe that worked.  If you got a kodi instance with its API
 324 available from http://kodihost/jsonrpc, you can try the following to
 325 have check out a nice cover band.</p>
 326
 327 <p><blockquote><pre>curl --silent --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
 328   --data-binary '{ "id": 1, "jsonrpc": "2.0", "method": "Player.Open",
 329   "params": {"item": { "file":
 330   "plugin://plugin.video.youtube/play/?video_id=LuRGVM9O0qg" } } }' \
 331   http://projector.local/jsonrpc</pre></blockquote></p>
 332
 333 <p>I've extended kodi-stream program to take a video source as its
 334 first argument.  It can now handle direct video links, youtube links
 335 and 'desktop' to stream my desktop to Kodi.  It is almost like a
 336 Chromecast. :)</p>
 337
 338 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 339 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 340 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 341
 342       </div>
 343       <div class="tags">
 344
 345
 346         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/kodi">kodi</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
 347
 348
 349       </div>
 350     </div>
 351     <div class="padding"></div>
 352
 353     <div class="entry">
 354       <div class="title">
 355         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sharing_images_with_friends_and_family_using_RSS_and_EXIF_XMP_metadata.html">Sharing images with friends and family using RSS and EXIF/XMP metadata</a>
 356       </div>
 357       <div class="date">
 358         31st July 2018
 359       </div>
 360       <div class="body">
 361         <p>For a while now, I have looked for a sensible way to share images
 362 with my family using a self hosted solution, as it is unacceptable to
 363 place images from my personal life under the control of strangers
 364 working for data hoarders like Google or Dropbox.  The last few days I
 365 have drafted an approach that might work out, and I would like to
 366 share it with you.  I would like to publish images on a server under
 367 my control, and point some Internet connected display units using some
 368 free and open standard to the images I published.  As my primary
 369 language is not limited to ASCII, I need to store metadata using
 370 UTF-8.  Many years ago, I hoped to find a digital photo frame capable
 371 of reading a RSS feed with image references (aka using the
 372 &lt;enclosure&gt; RSS tag), but was unable to find a current supplier
 373 of such frames.  In the end I gave up that approach.</p>
 374
 375 <p>Some months ago, I discovered that
 376 <a href="https://www.jwz.org/xscreensaver/">XScreensaver</a> is able to
 377 read images from a RSS feed, and used it to set up a screen saver on
 378 my home info screen, showing images from the Daily images feed from
 379 NASA.  This proved to work well.  More recently I discovered that
 380 <a href="https://kodi.tv">Kodi</a> (both using
 381 <a href="https://www.openelec.tv/">OpenELEC</a> and
 382 <a href="https://libreelec.tv">LibreELEC</a>) provide the
 383 <a href="https://github.com/grinsted/script.screensaver.feedreader">Feedreader</a>
 384 screen saver capable of reading a RSS feed with images and news.  For
 385 fun, I used it this summer to test Kodi on my parents TV by hooking up
 386 a Raspberry PI unit with LibreELEC, and wanted to provide them with a
 387 screen saver showing selected pictures from my selection.</p>
 388
 389 <p>Armed with motivation and a test photo frame, I set out to generate
 390 a RSS feed for the Kodi instance.  I adjusted my <a
 391 href="https://freedombox.org/">Freedombox</a> instance, created
 392 /var/www/html/privatepictures/, wrote a small Perl script to extract
 393 title and description metadata from the photo files and generate the
 394 RSS file.  I ended up using Perl instead of python, as the
 395 libimage-exiftool-perl Debian package seemed to handle the EXIF/XMP
 396 tags I ended up using, while python3-exif did not.  The relevant EXIF
 397 tags only support ASCII, so I had to find better alternatives.  XMP
 398 seem to have the support I need.</p>
 399
 400 <p>I am a bit unsure which EXIF/XMP tags to use, as I would like to
 401 use tags that can be easily added/updated using normal free software
 402 photo managing software.  I ended up using the tags set using this
 403 exiftool command, as these tags can also be set using digiKam:</p>
 404
 405 <blockquote><pre>
 406 exiftool -headline='The RSS image title' \
 407   -description='The RSS image description.' \
 408   -subject+=for-family photo.jpeg
 409 </pre></blockquote>
 410
 411 <p>I initially tried the "-title" and "keyword" tags, but they were
 412 invisible in digiKam, so I changed to "-headline" and "-subject".  I
 413 use the keyword/subject 'for-family' to flag that the photo should be
 414 shared with my family.  Images with this keyword set are located and
 415 copied into my Freedombox for the RSS generating script to find.</p>
 416
 417 <p>Are there better ways to do this?  Get in touch if you have better
 418 suggestions.</p>
 419
 420 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 421 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 422 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 423
 424       </div>
 425       <div class="tags">
 426
 427
 428         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>.
 429
 430
 431       </div>
 432     </div>
 433     <div class="padding"></div>
 434
 435     <div class="entry">
 436       <div class="title">
 437         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simple_streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_GStreamer_and_RTP.html">Simple streaming the Linux desktop to Kodi using GStreamer and RTP</a>
 438       </div>
 439       <div class="date">
 440         12th July 2018
 441       </div>
 442       <div class="body">
 443         <p>Last night, I wrote
 444 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html">a
 445 recipe to stream a Linux desktop using VLC to a instance of Kodi</a>.
 446 During the day I received valuable feedback, and thanks to the
 447 suggestions I have been able to rewrite the recipe into a much simpler
 448 approach requiring no setup at all.  It is a single script that take
 449 care of it all.</p>
 450
 451 <p>This new script uses GStreamer instead of VLC to capture the
 452 desktop and stream it to Kodi.  This fixed the video quality issue I
 453 saw initially.  It further removes the need to add a m3u file on the
 454 Kodi machine, as it instead connects to
 455 <a href="https://kodi.wiki/view/JSON-RPC_API/v8">the JSON-RPC API in
 456 Kodi</a> and simply ask Kodi to play from the stream created using
 457 GStreamer.  Streaming the desktop to Kodi now become trivial.  Copy
 458 the script below, run it with the DNS name or IP address of the kodi
 459 server to stream to as the only argument, and watch your screen show
 460 up on the Kodi screen.  Note, it depend on multicast on the local
 461 network, so if you need to stream outside the local network, the
 462 script must be modified.  Also note, I have no idea if audio work, as
 463 I only care about the picture part.</p>
 464
 465 <blockquote><pre>
 466 #!/bin/sh
 467 #
 468 # Stream the Linux desktop view to Kodi.  See
 469 # http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html
 470 # for backgorund information.
 471
 472 # Make sure the stream is stopped in Kodi and the gstreamer process is
 473 # killed if something go wrong (for example if curl is unable to find the
 474 # kodi server).  Do the same when interrupting this script.
 475 kodicmd() {
 476     host="$1"
 477     cmd="$2"
 478     params="$3"
 479     curl --silent --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
 480          --data-binary "{ \"id\": 1, \"jsonrpc\": \"2.0\", \"method\": \"$cmd\", \"params\": $params }" \
 481          "http://$host/jsonrpc"
 482 }
 483 cleanup() {
 484     if [ -n "$kodihost" ] ; then
 485         # Stop the playing when we end
 486         playerid=$(kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.GetActivePlayers "{}" |
 487                             jq .result[].playerid)
 488         kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.Stop "{ \"playerid\" : $playerid }" > /dev/null
 489     fi
 490     if [ "$gstpid" ] && kill -0 "$gstpid" >/dev/null 2>&1; then
 491         kill "$gstpid"
 492     fi
 493 }
 494 trap cleanup EXIT INT
 495
 496 if [ -n "$1" ]; then
 497     kodihost=$1
 498     shift
 499 else
 500     kodihost=kodi.local
 501 fi
 502
 503 mcast=239.255.0.1
 504 mcastport=1234
 505 mcastttl=1
 506
 507 pasrc=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' | \
 508   cut -d" " -f2|head -1)
 509 gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
 510   videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
 511   x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
 512   key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
 513   mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
 514   udpsink host=$mcast port=$mcastport ttl-mc=$mcastttl auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
 515   pulsesrc device=$pasrc ! audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux. \
 516   > /dev/null 2>&1 &
 517 gstpid=$!
 518
 519 # Give stream a second to get going
 520 sleep 1
 521
 522 # Ask kodi to start streaming using its JSON-RPC API
 523 kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.Open \
 524         "{\"item\": { \"file\": \"udp://@$mcast:$mcastport\" } }" > /dev/null
 525
 526 # wait for gst to end
 527 wait "$gstpid"
 528 </pre></blockquote>
 529
 530 <p>I hope you find the approach useful.  I know I do.</p>
 531
 532 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 533 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 534 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 535
 536       </div>
 537       <div class="tags">
 538
 539
 540         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/kodi">kodi</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
 541
 542
 543       </div>
 544     </div>
 545     <div class="padding"></div>
 546
 547     <div class="entry">
 548       <div class="title">
 549         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html">Streaming the Linux desktop to Kodi using VLC and RTSP</a>
 550       </div>
 551       <div class="date">
 552         12th July 2018
 553       </div>
 554       <div class="body">
 555         <p>PS: See
 556 <ahref="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simple_streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_GStreamer_and_RTP.html">the
 557 followup post</a> for a even better approach.</p>
 558
 559 <p>A while back, I was asked by a friend how to stream the desktop to
 560 my projector connected to Kodi.  I sadly had to admit that I had no
 561 idea, as it was a task I never had tried.  Since then, I have been
 562 looking for a way to do so, preferable without much extra software to
 563 install on either side.  Today I found a way that seem to kind of
 564 work.  Not great, but it is a start.</p>
 565
 566 <p>I had a look at several approaches, for example
 567 <a href="https://github.com/mfoetsch/dlna_live_streaming">using uPnP
 568 DLNA as described in 2011</a>, but it required a uPnP server, fuse and
 569 local storage enough to store the stream locally.  This is not going
 570 to work well for me, lacking enough free space, and it would
 571 impossible for my friend to get working.</p>
 572
 573 <p>Next, it occurred to me that perhaps I could use VLC to create a
 574 video stream that Kodi could play.  Preferably using
 575 broadcast/multicast, to avoid having to change any setup on the Kodi
 576 side when starting such stream.  Unfortunately, the only recipe I
 577 could find using multicast used the rtp protocol, and this protocol
 578 seem to not be supported by Kodi.</p>
 579
 580 <p>On the other hand, the rtsp protocol is working!  Unfortunately I
 581 have to specify the IP address of the streaming machine in both the
 582 sending command and the file on the Kodi server.  But it is showing my
 583 desktop, and thus allow us to have a shared look on the big screen at
 584 the programs I work on.</p>
 585
 586 <p>I did not spend much time investigating codeces.  I combined the
 587 rtp and rtsp recipes from
 588 <a href="https://wiki.videolan.org/Documentation:Streaming_HowTo/Command_Line_Examples/">the
 589 VLC Streaming HowTo/Command Line Examples</a>, and was able to get
 590 this working on the desktop/streaming end.</p>
 591
 592 <blockquote><pre>
 593 vlc screen:// --sout \
 594   '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{dst=projector.local,port=1234,sdp=rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp}'
 595 </pre></blockquote>
 596
 597 <p>I ssh-ed into my Kodi box and created a file like this with the
 598 same IP address:</p>
 599
 600 <blockquote><pre>
 601 echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp \
 602   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 603 </pre></blockquote>
 604
 605 <p>Note the 192.168.11.4 IP address is my desktops IP address.  As far
 606 as I can tell the IP must be hardcoded for this to work.  In other
 607 words, if someone elses machine is going to do the steaming, you have
 608 to update screenstream.m3u on the Kodi machine and adjust the vlc
 609 recipe.  To get started, locate the file in Kodi and select the m3u
 610 file while the VLC stream is running.  The desktop then show up in my
 611 big screen. :)</p>
 612
 613 <p>When using the same technique to stream a video file with audio,
 614 the audio quality is really bad.  No idea if the problem is package
 615 loss or bad parameters for the transcode.  I do not know VLC nor Kodi
 616 enough to tell.</p>
 617
 618 <p><strong>Update 2018-07-12</strong>: Johannes Schauer send me a few
 619 succestions and reminded me about an important step.  The "screen:"
 620 input source is only available once the vlc-plugin-access-extra
 621 package is installed on Debian.  Without it, you will see this error
 622 message: "VLC is unable to open the MRL 'screen://'.  Check the log
 623 for details."  He further found that it is possible to drop some parts
 624 of the VLC command line to reduce the amount of hardcoded information.
 625 It is also useful to consider using cvlc to avoid having the VLC
 626 window in the desktop view.  In sum, this give us this command line on
 627 the source end
 628
 629 <blockquote><pre>
 630 cvlc screen:// --sout \
 631   '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{sdp=rtsp://:8080/}'
 632 </pre></blockquote>
 633
 634 <p>and this on the Kodi end<p>
 635
 636 <blockquote><pre>
 637 echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/ \
 638   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 639 </pre></blockquote>
 640
 641 <p>Still bad image quality, though.  But I did discover that streaming
 642 a DVD using dvdsimple:///dev/dvd as the source had excellent video and
 643 audio quality, so I guess the issue is in the input or transcoding
 644 parts, not the rtsp part.  I've tried to change the vb and ab
 645 parameters to use more bandwidth, but it did not make a
 646 difference.</p>
 647
 648 <p>I further received a suggestion from Einar Haraldseid to try using
 649 gstreamer instead of VLC, and this proved to work great!  He also
 650 provided me with the trick to get Kodi to use a multicast stream as
 651 its source.  By using this monstrous oneliner, I can stream my desktop
 652 with good video quality in reasonable framerate to the 239.255.0.1
 653 multicast address on port 1234:
 654
 655 <blockquote><pre>
 656 gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
 657   videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
 658   x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
 659   key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
 660   mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
 661   udpsink host=239.255.0.1 port=1234 ttl-mc=1 auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
 662   pulsesrc device=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | \
 663     grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' |  cut -d" " -f2|head -1) ! \
 664   audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux.
 665 </pre></blockquote>
 666
 667 <p>and this on the Kodi end<p>
 668
 669 <blockquote><pre>
 670 echo udp://@239.255.0.1:1234 \
 671   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 672 </pre></blockquote>
 673
 674 <p>Note the trick to pick a valid pulseaudio source.  It might not
 675 pick the one you need.  This approach will of course lead to trouble
 676 if more than one source uses the same multicast port and address.
 677 Note the ttl-mc=1 setting, which limit the multicast packages to the
 678 local network.  If the value is increased, your screen will be
 679 broadcasted further, one network "hop" for each increase (read up on
 680 multicast to learn more. :)!</p>
 681
 682 <p>Having cracked how to get Kodi to receive multicast streams, I
 683 could use this VLC command to stream to the same multicast address.
 684 The image quality is way better than the rtsp approach, but gstreamer
 685 seem to be doing a better job.</p>
 686
 687 <blockquote><pre>
 688 cvlc screen:// --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{mux=ts,dst=239.255.0.1,port=1234,sdp=sap}'
 689 </pre></blockquote>
 690
 691 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 692 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 693 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 694
 695       </div>
 696       <div class="tags">
 697
 698
 699         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/kodi">kodi</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
 700
 701
 702       </div>
 703     </div>
 704     <div class="padding"></div>
 705
 706     <div class="entry">
 707       <div class="title">
 708         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_in_2018_.html">What is the most supported MIME type in Debian in 2018?</a>
 709       </div>
 710       <div class="date">
 711          9th July 2018
 712       </div>
 713       <div class="body">
 714         <p>Five years ago,
 715 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_.html">I
 716 measured what the most supported MIME type in Debian was</a>, by
 717 analysing the desktop files in all packages in the archive.  Since
 718 then, the DEP-11 AppStream system has been put into production, making
 719 the task a lot easier.  This made me want to repeat the measurement,
 720 to see how much things changed.  Here are the new numbers, for
 721 unstable only this time:
 722
 723 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
 724
 725 <pre>
 726   count MIME type
 727   ----- -----------------------
 728      56 image/jpeg
 729      55 image/png
 730      49 image/tiff
 731      48 image/gif
 732      39 image/bmp
 733      38 text/plain
 734      37 audio/mpeg
 735      34 application/ogg
 736      33 audio/x-flac
 737      32 audio/x-mp3
 738      30 audio/x-wav
 739      30 audio/x-vorbis+ogg
 740      29 image/x-portable-pixmap
 741      27 inode/directory
 742      27 image/x-portable-bitmap
 743      27 audio/x-mpeg
 744      26 application/x-ogg
 745      25 audio/x-mpegurl
 746      25 audio/ogg
 747      24 text/html
 748 </pre>
 749
 750 <p>The list was created like this using a sid chroot: "cat
 751 /var/lib/apt/lists/*sid*_dep11_Components-amd64.yml.gz| zcat | awk '/^
 752 - \S+\/\S+$/ {print $2 }' | sort | uniq -c | sort -nr | head -20"</p>
 753
 754 <p>It is interesting to see how image formats have passed text/plain
 755 as the most announced supported MIME type.  These days, thanks to the
 756 AppStream system, if you run into a file format you do not know, and
 757 want to figure out which packages support the format, you can find the
 758 MIME type of the file using "file --mime &lt;filename&gt;", and then
 759 look up all packages announcing support for this format in their
 760 AppStream metadata (XML or .desktop file) using "appstreamcli
 761 what-provides mimetype &lt;mime-type&gt;.  For example if you, like
 762 me, want to know which packages support inode/directory, you can get a
 763 list like this:</p>
 764
 765 <p><blockquote><pre>
 766 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype inode/directory | grep Package: | sort
 767 Package: anjuta
 768 Package: audacious
 769 Package: baobab
 770 Package: cervisia
 771 Package: chirp
 772 Package: dolphin
 773 Package: doublecmd-common
 774 Package: easytag
 775 Package: enlightenment
 776 Package: ephoto
 777 Package: filelight
 778 Package: gwenview
 779 Package: k4dirstat
 780 Package: kaffeine
 781 Package: kdesvn
 782 Package: kid3
 783 Package: kid3-qt
 784 Package: nautilus
 785 Package: nemo
 786 Package: pcmanfm
 787 Package: pcmanfm-qt
 788 Package: qweborf
 789 Package: ranger
 790 Package: sirikali
 791 Package: spacefm
 792 Package: spacefm
 793 Package: vifm
 794 %
 795 </pre></blockquote></p>
 796
 797 <p>Using the same method, I can quickly discover that the Sketchup file
 798 format is not yet supported by any package in Debian:</p>
 799
 800 <p><blockquote><pre>
 801 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/vnd.sketchup.skp
 802 Could not find component providing 'mimetype::application/vnd.sketchup.skp'.
 803 %
 804 </pre></blockquote></p>
 805
 806 <p>Yesterday I used it to figure out which packages support the STL 3D
 807 format:</p>
 808
 809 <p><blockquote><pre>
 810 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/sla|grep Package
 811 Package: cura
 812 Package: meshlab
 813 Package: printrun
 814 %
 815 </pre></blockquote></p>
 816
 817 <p>PS: A new version of Cura was uploaded to Debian yesterday.</p>
 818
 819 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 820 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 821 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 822
 823       </div>
 824       <div class="tags">
 825
 826
 827         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>.
 828
 829
 830       </div>
 831     </div>
 832     <div class="padding"></div>
 833
 834     <div class="entry">
 835       <div class="title">
 836         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_APT_upgrade_without_enough_free_space_on_the_disk___.html">Debian APT upgrade without enough free space on the disk...</a>
 837       </div>
 838       <div class="date">
 839          8th July 2018
 840       </div>
 841       <div class="body">
 842         <p>Quite regularly, I let my Debian Sid/Unstable chroot stay untouch
 843 for a while, and when I need to update it there is not enough free
 844 space on the disk for apt to do a normal 'apt upgrade'.  I normally
 845 would resolve the issue by doing 'apt install &lt;somepackages&gt;' to
 846 upgrade only some of the packages in one batch, until the amount of
 847 packages to download fall below the amount of free space available.
 848 Today, I had about 500 packages to upgrade, and after a while I got
 849 tired of trying to install chunks of packages manually.  I concluded
 850 that I did not have the spare hours required to complete the task, and
 851 decided to see if I could automate it.  I came up with this small
 852 script which I call 'apt-in-chunks':</p>
 853
 854 <p><blockquote><pre>
 855 #!/bin/sh
 856 #
 857 # Upgrade packages when the disk is too full to upgrade every
 858 # upgradable package in one lump.  Fetching packages to upgrade using
 859 # apt, and then installing using dpkg, to avoid changing the package
 860 # flag for manual/automatic.
 861
 862 set -e
 863
 864 ignore() {
 865     if [ "$1" ]; then
 866         grep -v "$1"
 867     else
 868         cat
 869     fi
 870 }
 871
 872 for p in $(apt list --upgradable | ignore "$@" |cut -d/ -f1 | grep -v '^Listing...'); do
 873     echo "Upgrading $p"
 874     apt clean
 875     apt install --download-only -y $p
 876     for f in /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb; do
 877         if [ -e "$f" ]; then
 878             dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb
 879             break
 880         fi
 881     done
 882 done
 883 </pre></blockquote></p>
 884
 885 <p>The script will extract the list of packages to upgrade, try to
 886 download the packages needed to upgrade one package, install the
 887 downloaded packages using dpkg.  The idea is to upgrade packages
 888 without changing the APT mark for the package (ie the one recording of
 889 the package was manually requested or pulled in as a dependency).  To
 890 use it, simply run it as root from the command line.  If it fail, try
 891 'apt install -f' to clean up the mess and run the script again.  This
 892 might happen if the new packages conflict with one of the old
 893 packages.  dpkg is unable to remove, while apt can do this.</p>
 894
 895 <p>It take one option, a package to ignore in the list of packages to
 896 upgrade.  The option to ignore a package is there to be able to skip
 897 the packages that are simply too large to unpack.  Today this was
 898 'ghc', but I have run into other large packages causing similar
 899 problems earlier (like TeX).</p>
 900
 901 <p>Update 2018-07-08: Thanks to Paul Wise, I am aware of two
 902 alternative ways to handle this.  The "unattended-upgrades
 903 --minimal-upgrade-steps" option will try to calculate upgrade sets for
 904 each package to upgrade, and then upgrade them in order, smallest set
 905 first.  It might be a better option than my above mentioned script.
 906 Also, "aptutude upgrade" can upgrade single packages, thus avoiding
 907 the need for using "dpkg -i" in the script above.</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>.
 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/Version_3_1_of_Cura__the_3D_print_slicer__is_now_in_Debian.html">Version 3.1 of Cura, the 3D print slicer, is now in Debian</a>
 927       </div>
 928       <div class="date">
 929         13th February 2018
 930       </div>
 931       <div class="body">
 932         <p>A new version of the
 933 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura">3D printer slicer
 934 software Cura</a>, version 3.1.0, is now available in Debian Testing
 935 (aka Buster) and Debian Unstable (aka Sid).  I hope you find it
 936 useful.  It was uploaded the last few days, and the last update will
 937 enter testing tomorrow.  See the
 938 <a href="https://ultimaker.com/en/products/cura-software/release-notes">release
 939 notes</a> for the list of bug fixes and new features.  Version 3.2
 940 was announced 6 days ago.  We will try to get it into Debian as
 941 well.</p>
 942
 943 <p>More information related to 3D printing is available on the
 944 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/3DPrinting">3D printing</a> and
 945 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/3D-printer">3D printer</a> wiki pages
 946 in Debian.</p>
 947
 948 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 949 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 950 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 951
 952       </div>
 953       <div class="tags">
 954
 955
 956         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>.
 957
 958
 959       </div>
 960     </div>
 961     <div class="padding"></div>
 962
 963     <div class="entry">
 964       <div class="title">
 965         <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>
 966       </div>
 967       <div class="date">
 968         17th December 2017
 969       </div>
 970       <div class="body">
 971         <p>After several months of working and waiting, I am happy to report
 972 that the nice and user friendly 3D printer slicer software Cura just
 973 entered Debian Unstable.  It consist of five packages,
 974 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura">cura</a>,
 975 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura-engine">cura-engine</a>,
 976 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libarcus">libarcus</a>,
 977 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/fdm-materials">fdm-materials</a>,
 978 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libsavitar">libsavitar</a> and
 979 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/uranium">uranium</a>.  The last
 980 two, uranium and cura, entered Unstable yesterday.  This should make
 981 it easier for Debian users to print on at least the Ultimaker class of
 982 3D printers.  My nearest 3D printer is an Ultimaker 2+, so it will
 983 make life easier for at least me. :)</p>
 984
 985 <p>The work to make this happen was done by Gregor Riepl, and I was
 986 happy to assist him in sponsoring the packages.  With the introduction
 987 of Cura, Debian is up to three 3D printer slicers at your service,
 988 Cura, Slic3r and Slic3r Prusa.  If you own or have access to a 3D
 989 printer, give it a go. :)</p>
 990
 991 <p>The 3D printer software is maintained by the 3D printer Debian
 992 team, flocking together on the
 993 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/3dprinter-general">3dprinter-general</a>
 994 mailing list and the
 995 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-3dprinting">#debian-3dprinting</a>
 996 IRC channel.</p>
 997
 998 <p>The next step for Cura in Debian is to update the cura package to
 999 version 3.0.3 and then update the entire set of packages to version
1000 3.1.0 which showed up the last few days.</p>
1001
1002       </div>
1003       <div class="tags">
1004
1005
1006         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>.
1007
1008
1009       </div>
1010     </div>
1011     <div class="padding"></div>
1012
1013     <div class="entry">
1014       <div class="title">
1015         <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>
1016       </div>
1017       <div class="date">
1018          9th October 2017
1019       </div>
1020       <div class="body">
1021         <p>At my nearby maker space,
1022 <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Sonen</a>, I heard the story that it
1023 was easier to generate gcode files for theyr 3D printers (Ultimake 2+)
1024 on Windows and MacOS X than Linux, because the software involved had
1025 to be manually compiled and set up on Linux while premade packages
1026 worked out of the box on Windows and MacOS X.  I found this annoying,
1027 as the software involved,
1028 <a href="https://github.com/Ultimaker/Cura">Cura</a>, is free software
1029 and should be trivial to get up and running on Linux if someone took
1030 the time to package it for the relevant distributions.  I even found
1031 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/706656">a request for adding into
1032 Debian</a> from 2013, which had seem some activity over the years but
1033 never resulted in the software showing up in Debian.  So a few days
1034 ago I offered my help to try to improve the situation.</p>
1035
1036 <p>Now I am very happy to see that all the packages required by a
1037 working Cura in Debian are uploaded into Debian and waiting in the NEW
1038 queue for the ftpmasters to have a look.  You can track the progress
1039 on
1040 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?email=3dprinter-general%40lists.alioth.debian.org">the
1041 status page for the 3D printer team</a>.</p>
1042
1043 <p>The uploaded packages are a bit behind upstream, and was uploaded
1044 now to get slots in <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW
1045 queue</a> while we work up updating the packages to the latest
1046 upstream version.</p>
1047
1048 <p>On a related note, two competitors for Cura, which I found harder
1049 to use and was unable to configure correctly for Ultimaker 2+ in the
1050 short time I spent on it, are already in Debian.  If you are looking
1051 for 3D printer "slicers" and want something already available in
1052 Debian, check out
1053 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r">slic3r</a> and
1054 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r-prusa">slic3r-prusa</a>.
1055 The latter is a fork of the former.</p>
1056
1057 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1058 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1059 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1060
1061       </div>
1062       <div class="tags">
1063
1064
1065         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>.
1066
1067
1068       </div>
1069     </div>
1070     <div class="padding"></div>
1071
1072     <div class="entry">
1073       <div class="title">
1074         <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>
1075       </div>
1076       <div class="date">
1077         29th September 2017
1078       </div>
1079       <div class="body">
1080         <p>Every mobile phone announce its existence over radio to the nearby
1081 mobile cell towers.  And this radio chatter is available for anyone
1082 with a radio receiver capable of receiving them.  Details about the
1083 mobile phones with very good accuracy is of course collected by the
1084 phone companies, but this is not the topic of this blog post.  The
1085 mobile phone radio chatter make it possible to figure out when a cell
1086 phone is nearby, as it include the SIM card ID (IMSI).  By paying
1087 attention over time, one can see when a phone arrive and when it leave
1088 an area.  I believe it would be nice to make this information more
1089 available to the general public, to make more people aware of how
1090 their phones are announcing their whereabouts to anyone that care to
1091 listen.</p>
1092
1093 <p>I am very happy to report that we managed to get something
1094 visualizing this information up and running for
1095 <a href="http://norwaymakers.org/osf17">Oslo Skaperfestival 2017</a>
1096 (Oslo Makers Festival) taking place today and tomorrow at Deichmanske
1097 library.  The solution is based on the
1098 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Easier_recipe_to_observe_the_cell_phones_around_you.html">simple
1099 recipe for listening to GSM chatter</a> I posted a few days ago, and
1100 will show up at the stand of <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Åpen
1101 Sone from the Computer Science department of the University of
1102 Oslo</a>.  The presentation will show the nearby mobile phones (aka
1103 IMSIs) as dots in a web browser graph, with lines to the dot
1104 representing mobile base station it is talking to. It was working in
1105 the lab yesterday, and was moved into place this morning.</p>
1106
1107 <p>We set up a fairly powerful desktop machine using Debian
1108 Buster/Testing with several (five, I believe) RTL2838 DVB-T receivers
1109 connected and visualize the visible cell phone towers using an
1110 <a href="https://github.com/marlow925/hopglass">English version of
1111 Hopglass</a>.  A fairly powerfull machine is needed as the
1112 grgsm_livemon_headless processes from
1113 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a> converting
1114 the radio signal to data packages is quite CPU intensive.</p>
1115
1116 <p>The frequencies to listen to, are identified using a slightly
1117 patched scan-and-livemon (to set the --args values for each receiver),
1118 and the Hopglass data is generated using the
1119 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/IMSI-catcher/tree/meshviewer-output">patches
1120 in my meshviewer-output branch</a>.  For some reason we could not get
1121 more than four SDRs working.  There is also a geographical map trying
1122 to show the location of the base stations, but I believe their
1123 coordinates are hardcoded to some random location in Germany, I
1124 believe.  The code should be replaced with code to look up location in
1125 a text file, a sqlite database or one of the online databases
1126 mentioned in
1127 <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher/issues/14">the github
1128 issue for the topic</a>.
1129
1130 <p>If this sound interesting, visit the stand at the festival!</p>
1131
1132       </div>
1133       <div class="tags">
1134
1135
1136         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>.
1137
1138
1139       </div>
1140     </div>
1141     <div class="padding"></div>
1142
1143     <div class="entry">
1144       <div class="title">
1145         <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>
1146       </div>
1147       <div class="date">
1148         24th September 2017
1149       </div>
1150       <div class="body">
1151         <p>A little more than a month ago I wrote
1152 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simpler_recipe_on_how_to_make_a_simple__7_IMSI_Catcher_using_Debian.html">how
1153 to observe the SIM card ID (aka IMSI number) of mobile phones talking
1154 to nearby mobile phone base stations using Debian GNU/Linux and a
1155 cheap USB software defined radio</a>, and thus being able to pinpoint
1156 the location of people and equipment (like cars and trains) with an
1157 accuracy of a few kilometer.  Since then we have worked to make the
1158 procedure even simpler, and it is now possible to do this without any
1159 manual frequency tuning and without building your own packages.</p>
1160
1161 <p>The <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a>
1162 package is now included in Debian testing and unstable, and the
1163 IMSI-catcher code no longer require root access to fetch and decode
1164 the GSM data collected using gr-gsm.</p>
1165
1166 <p>Here is an updated recipe, using packages built by Debian and a git
1167 clone of two python scripts:</p>
1168
1169 <ol>
1170
1171 <li>Start with a Debian machine running the Buster version (aka
1172   testing).</li>
1173
1174 <li>Run '<tt>apt install gr-gsm python-numpy python-scipy
1175   python-scapy</tt>' as root to install required packages.</li>
1176
1177 <li>Fetch the code decoding GSM packages using '<tt>git clone
1178   github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher.git</tt>'.</li>
1179
1180 <li>Insert USB software defined radio supported by GNU Radio.</li>
1181
1182 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
1183   scan-and-livemon</tt>' to locate the frequency of nearby base
1184   stations and start listening for GSM packages on one of them.</li>
1185
1186 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
1187   simple_IMSI-catcher.py</tt>' to display the collected information.</li>
1188
1189 </ol>
1190
1191 <p>Note, due to a bug somewhere the scan-and-livemon program (actually
1192 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/issues/336">its underlying
1193 program grgsm_scanner</a>) do not work with the HackRF radio.  It does
1194 work with RTL 8232 and other similar USB radio receivers you can get
1195 very cheaply
1196 (<a href="https://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=rtl+2832">for example
1197 from ebay</a>), so for now the solution is to scan using the RTL radio
1198 and only use HackRF for fetching GSM data.</p>
1199
1200 <p>As far as I can tell, a cell phone only show up on one of the
1201 frequencies at the time, so if you are going to track and count every
1202 cell phone around you, you need to listen to all the frequencies used.
1203 To listen to several frequencies, use the --numrecv argument to
1204 scan-and-livemon to use several receivers.  Further, I am not sure if
1205 phones using 3G or 4G will show as talking GSM to base stations, so
1206 this approach might not see all phones around you.  I typically see
1207 0-400 IMSI numbers an hour when looking around where I live.</p>
1208
1209 <p>I've tried to run the scanner on a
1210 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi 2 and 3
1211 running Debian Buster</a>, but the grgsm_livemon_headless process seem
1212 to be too CPU intensive to keep up.  When GNU Radio print 'O' to
1213 stdout, I am told there it is caused by a buffer overflow between the
1214 radio and GNU Radio, caused by the program being unable to read the
1215 GSM data fast enough.  If you see a stream of 'O's from the terminal
1216 where you started scan-and-livemon, you need a give the process more
1217 CPU power.  Perhaps someone are able to optimize the code to a point
1218 where it become possible to set up RPi3 based GSM sniffers?  I tried
1219 using Raspbian instead of Debian, but there seem to be something wrong
1220 with GNU Radio on raspbian, causing glibc to abort().</p>
1221
1222       </div>
1223       <div class="tags">
1224
1225
1226         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>.
1227
1228
1229       </div>
1230     </div>
1231     <div class="padding"></div>
1232
1233     <div class="entry">
1234       <div class="title">
1235         <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>
1236       </div>
1237       <div class="date">
1238          9th August 2017
1239       </div>
1240       <div class="body">
1241         <p>On friday, I came across an interesting article in the Norwegian
1242 web based ICT news magazine digi.no on
1243 <a href="https://www.digi.no/artikler/sikkerhetsforsker-lagde-enkel-imsi-catcher-for-60-kroner-na-kan-mobiler-kartlegges-av-alle/398588">how
1244 to collect the IMSI numbers of nearby cell phones</a> using the cheap
1245 DVB-T software defined radios.  The article refered to instructions
1246 and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjwgNd_as30">a recipe by
1247 Keld Norman on Youtube on how to make a simple $7 IMSI Catcher</a>, and I decided to test them out.</p>
1248
1249 <p>The instructions said to use Ubuntu, install pip using apt (to
1250 bypass apt), use pip to install pybombs (to bypass both apt and pip),
1251 and the ask pybombs to fetch and build everything you need from
1252 scratch.  I wanted to see if I could do the same on the most recent
1253 Debian packages, but this did not work because pybombs tried to build
1254 stuff that no longer build with the most recent openssl library or
1255 some other version skew problem.  While trying to get this recipe
1256 working, I learned that the apt->pip->pybombs route was a long detour,
1257 and the only piece of software dependency missing in Debian was the
1258 gr-gsm package.  I also found out that the lead upstream developer of
1259 gr-gsm (the name stand for GNU Radio GSM) project already had a set of
1260 Debian packages provided in an Ubuntu PPA repository.  All I needed to
1261 do was to dget the Debian source package and built it.</p>
1262
1263 <p>The IMSI collector is a python script listening for packages on the
1264 loopback network device and printing to the terminal some specific GSM
1265 packages with IMSI numbers in them.  The code is fairly short and easy
1266 to understand.  The reason this work is because gr-gsm include a tool
1267 to read GSM data from a software defined radio like a DVB-T USB stick
1268 and other software defined radios, decode them and inject them into a
1269 network device on your Linux machine (using the loopback device by
1270 default).  This proved to work just fine, and I've been testing the
1271 collector for a few days now.</p>
1272
1273 <p>The updated and simpler recipe is thus to</p>
1274
1275 <ol>
1276
1277 <li>start with a Debian machine running Stretch or newer,</li>
1278
1279 <li>build and install the gr-gsm package available from
1280 <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>
1281
1282 <li>clone the git repostory from <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher">https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher</a>,</li>
1283
1284 <li>run grgsm_livemon and adjust the frequency until the terminal
1285 where it was started is filled with a stream of text (meaning you
1286 found a GSM station).</li>
1287
1288 <li>go into the IMSI-catcher directory and run 'sudo python simple_IMSI-catcher.py' to extract the IMSI numbers.</li>
1289
1290 </ol>
1291
1292 <p>To make it even easier in the future to get this sniffer up and
1293 running, I decided to package
1294 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/">the gr-gsm project</a>
1295 for Debian (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/871055">WNPP
1296 #871055</a>), and the package was uploaded into the NEW queue today.
1297 Luckily the gnuradio maintainer has promised to help me, as I do not
1298 know much about gnuradio stuff yet.</p>
1299
1300 <p>I doubt this "IMSI cacher" is anywhere near as powerfull as
1301 commercial tools like
1302 <a href="https://www.thespyphone.com/portable-imsi-imei-catcher/">The
1303 Spy Phone Portable IMSI / IMEI Catcher</a> or the
1304 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_phone_tracker">Harris
1305 Stingray</a>, but I hope the existance of cheap alternatives can make
1306 more people realise how their whereabouts when carrying a cell phone
1307 is easily tracked.  Seeing the data flow on the screen, realizing that
1308 I live close to a police station and knowing that the police is also
1309 wearing cell phones, I wonder how hard it would be for criminals to
1310 track the position of the police officers to discover when there are
1311 police near by, or for foreign military forces to track the location
1312 of the Norwegian military forces, or for anyone to track the location
1313 of government officials...</p>
1314
1315 <p>It is worth noting that the data reported by the IMSI-catcher
1316 script mentioned above is only a fraction of the data broadcasted on
1317 the GSM network.  It will only collect one frequency at the time,
1318 while a typical phone will be using several frequencies, and not all
1319 phones will be using the frequencies tracked by the grgsm_livemod
1320 program.  Also, there is a lot of radio chatter being ignored by the
1321 simple_IMSI-catcher script, which would be collected by extending the
1322 parser code.  I wonder if gr-gsm can be set up to listen to more than
1323 one frequency?</p>
1324
1325       </div>
1326       <div class="tags">
1327
1328
1329         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>.
1330
1331
1332       </div>
1333     </div>
1334     <div class="padding"></div>
1335
1336     <div class="entry">
1337       <div class="title">
1338         <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>
1339       </div>
1340       <div class="date">
1341         25th July 2017
1342       </div>
1343       <div class="body">
1344         <p align="center"><img align="center" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-07-25-debian-handbook-nb-testprint.png"/></p>
1345
1346 <p>I finally received a copy of the Norwegian Bokmål edition of
1347 "<a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian Administrator's
1348 Handbook</a>".  This test copy arrived in the mail a few days ago, and
1349 I am very happy to hold the result in my hand.   We spent around one and a half year translating it. This paperbook edition
1350 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/#norwegian">is available
1351 from lulu.com</a>.  If you buy it quickly, you save 25% on the list
1352 price.  The book is also available for download in electronic form as
1353 PDF, EPUB and Mobipocket, as can be
1354 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/browse/nb-NO/stable/">read online
1355 as a web page</a>.</p>
1356
1357 <p>This is the second book I publish (the first was the book
1358 "<a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a>" by Lawrence Lessig
1359 in
1360 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22440520.html">English</a>,
1361 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/culture-libre/paperback/product-22645082.html">French</a>
1362 and
1363 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/fri-kultur/paperback/product-22441576.html">Norwegian
1364 Bokmål</a>), and I am very excited to finally wrap up this
1365 project.  I hope
1366 "<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
1367 for Debian-administratoren</a>" will be well received.</p>
1368
1369       </div>
1370       <div class="tags">
1371
1372
1373         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>.
1374
1375
1376       </div>
1377     </div>
1378     <div class="padding"></div>
1379
1380     <div class="entry">
1381       <div class="title">
1382         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/N_r_nynorskoversettelsen_svikter_til_eksamen___.html">Når nynorskoversettelsen svikter til eksamen...</a>
1383       </div>
1384       <div class="date">
1385          3rd June 2017
1386       </div>
1387       <div class="body">
1388         <p><a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/norge/Krever-at-elever-ma-fa-annullert-eksamen-etter-rot-med-oppgavetekster-622459b.html">Aftenposten
1389 melder i dag</a> om feil i eksamensoppgavene for eksamen i politikk og
1390 menneskerettigheter, der teksten i bokmåls og nynorskutgaven ikke var
1391 like.  Oppgaveteksten er gjengitt i artikkelen, og jeg ble nysgjerring
1392 på om den fri oversetterløsningen
1393 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium</a> ville gjort en bedre
1394 jobb enn Utdanningsdirektoratet.  Det kan se slik ut.</p>
1395
1396 <p>Her er bokmålsoppgaven fra eksamenen:</p>
1397
1398 <blockquote>
1399 <p>Drøft utfordringene knyttet til nasjonalstatenes og andre aktørers
1400 rolle og muligheter til å håndtere internasjonale utfordringer, som
1401 for eksempel flykningekrisen.</p>
1402
1403 <p>Vedlegge er eksempler på tekster som kan gi relevante perspektiver
1404 på temaet:</p>
1405 <ol>
1406 <li>Flykningeregnskapet 2016, UNHCR og IDMC
1407 <li>«Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015
1408 </ol>
1409
1410 </blockquote>
1411
1412 <p>Dette oversetter Apertium slik:</p>
1413
1414 <blockquote>
1415 <p>Drøft utfordringane knytte til nasjonalstatane sine og rolla til
1416 andre aktørar og høve til å handtera internasjonale utfordringar, som
1417 til dømes *flykningekrisen.</p>
1418
1419 <p>Vedleggja er døme på tekster som kan gje relevante perspektiv på
1420 temaet:</p>
1421
1422 <ol>
1423 <li>*Flykningeregnskapet 2016, *UNHCR og *IDMC</li>
1424 <li>«*Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015</li>
1425 </ol>
1426
1427 </blockquote>
1428
1429 <p>Ord som ikke ble forstått er markert med stjerne (*), og trenger
1430 ekstra språksjekk.  Men ingen ord er forsvunnet, slik det var i
1431 oppgaven elevene fikk presentert på eksamen.  Jeg mistenker dog at
1432 "andre aktørers rolle og muligheter til ..." burde vært oversatt til
1433 "rolla til andre aktørar og deira høve til ..." eller noe slikt, men
1434 det er kanskje flisespikking.  Det understreker vel bare at det alltid
1435 trengs korrekturlesning etter automatisk oversettelse.</p>
1436
1437       </div>
1438       <div class="tags">
1439
1440
1441         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>.
1442
1443
1444       </div>
1445     </div>
1446     <div class="padding"></div>
1447
1448     <div class="entry">
1449       <div class="title">
1450         <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>
1451       </div>
1452       <div class="date">
1453          9th March 2017
1454       </div>
1455       <div class="body">
1456         <p>Over the years, administrating thousand of NFS mounting linux
1457 computers at the time, I often needed a way to detect if the machine
1458 was experiencing NFS hang.  If you try to use <tt>df</tt> or look at a
1459 file or directory affected by the hang, the process (and possibly the
1460 shell) will hang too.  So you want to be able to detect this without
1461 risking the detection process getting stuck too.  It has not been
1462 obvious how to do this.  When the hang has lasted a while, it is
1463 possible to find messages like these in dmesg:</p>
1464
1465 <p><blockquote>
1466 nfs: server nfsserver not responding, still trying
1467 <br>nfs: server nfsserver OK
1468 </blockquote></p>
1469
1470 <p>It is hard to know if the hang is still going on, and it is hard to
1471 be sure looking in dmesg is going to work.  If there are lots of other
1472 messages in dmesg the lines might have rotated out of site before they
1473 are noticed.</p>
1474
1475 <p>While reading through the nfs client implementation in linux kernel
1476 code, I came across some statistics that seem to give a way to detect
1477 it.  The om_timeouts sunrpc value in the kernel will increase every
1478 time the above log entry is inserted into dmesg.  And after digging a
1479 bit further, I discovered that this value show up in
1480 /proc/self/mountstats on Linux.</p>
1481
1482 <p>The mountstats content seem to be shared between files using the
1483 same file system context, so it is enough to check one of the
1484 mountstats files to get the state of the mount point for the machine.
1485 I assume this will not show lazy umounted NFS points, nor NFS mount
1486 points in a different process context (ie with a different filesystem
1487 view), but that does not worry me.</p>
1488
1489 <p>The content for a NFS mount point look similar to this:</p>
1490
1491 <p><blockquote><pre>
1492 [...]
1493 device /dev/mapper/Debian-var mounted on /var with fstype ext3
1494 device nfsserver:/mnt/nfsserver/home0 mounted on /mnt/nfsserver/home0 with fstype nfs statvers=1.1
1495         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
1496         age:    7863311
1497         caps:   caps=0x3fe7,wtmult=4096,dtsize=8192,bsize=0,namlen=255
1498         sec:    flavor=1,pseudoflavor=1
1499         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
1500         bytes:  166253035039 219519120027 0 0 40783504807 185466229638 11677877 45561809
1501         RPC iostats version: 1.0  p/v: 100003/3 (nfs)
1502         xprt:   tcp 925 1 6810 0 0 111505412 111480497 109 2672418560317 0 248 53869103 22481820
1503         per-op statistics
1504                 NULL: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1505              GETATTR: 61063106 61063108 0 9621383060 6839064400 453650 77291321 78926132
1506              SETATTR: 463469 463470 0 92005440 66739536 63787 603235 687943
1507               LOOKUP: 17021657 17021657 0 3354097764 4013442928 57216 35125459 35566511
1508               ACCESS: 14281703 14290009 5 2318400592 1713803640 1709282 4865144 7130140
1509             READLINK: 125 125 0 20472 18620 0 1112 1118
1510                 READ: 4214236 4214237 0 715608524 41328653212 89884 22622768 22806693
1511                WRITE: 8479010 8494376 22 187695798568 1356087148 178264904 51506907 231671771
1512               CREATE: 171708 171708 0 38084748 46702272 873 1041833 1050398
1513                MKDIR: 3680 3680 0 773980 993920 26 23990 24245
1514              SYMLINK: 903 903 0 233428 245488 6 5865 5917
1515                MKNOD: 80 80 0 20148 21760 0 299 304
1516               REMOVE: 429921 429921 0 79796004 61908192 3313 2710416 2741636
1517                RMDIR: 3367 3367 0 645112 484848 22 5782 6002
1518               RENAME: 466201 466201 0 130026184 121212260 7075 5935207 5961288
1519                 LINK: 289155 289155 0 72775556 67083960 2199 2565060 2585579
1520              READDIR: 2933237 2933237 0 516506204 13973833412 10385 3190199 3297917
1521          READDIRPLUS: 1652839 1652839 0 298640972 6895997744 84735 14307895 14448937
1522               FSSTAT: 6144 6144 0 1010516 1032192 51 9654 10022
1523               FSINFO: 2 2 0 232 328 0 1 1
1524             PATHCONF: 1 1 0 116 140 0 0 0
1525               COMMIT: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1526
1527 device binfmt_misc mounted on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc with fstype binfmt_misc
1528 [...]
1529 </pre></blockquote></p>
1530
1531 <p>The key number to look at is the third number in the per-op list.
1532 It is the number of NFS timeouts experiences per file system
1533 operation.  Here 22 write timeouts and 5 access timeouts.  If these
1534 numbers are increasing, I believe the machine is experiencing NFS
1535 hang.  Unfortunately the timeout value do not start to increase right
1536 away.  The NFS operations need to time out first, and this can take a
1537 while.  The exact timeout value depend on the setup.  For example the
1538 defaults for TCP and UDP mount points are quite different, and the
1539 timeout value is affected by the soft, hard, timeo and retrans NFS
1540 mount options.</p>
1541
1542 <p>The only way I have been able to get working on Debian and RedHat
1543 Enterprise Linux for getting the timeout count is to peek in /proc/.
1544 But according to
1545 <ahref="http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19253-01/816-4555/netmonitor-12/index.html">Solaris
1546 10 System Administration Guide: Network Services</a>, the 'nfsstat -c'
1547 command can be used to get these timeout values.  But this do not work
1548 on Linux, as far as I can tell.  I
1549 <ahref="http://bugs.debian.org/857043">asked Debian about this</a>,
1550 but have not seen any replies yet.</p>
1551
1552 <p>Is there a better way to figure out if a Linux NFS client is
1553 experiencing NFS hangs?  Is there a way to detect which processes are
1554 affected?  Is there a way to get the NFS mount going quickly once the
1555 network problem causing the NFS hang has been cleared?  I would very
1556 much welcome some clues, as we regularly run into NFS hangs.</p>
1557
1558       </div>
1559       <div class="tags">
1560
1561
1562         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>.
1563
1564
1565       </div>
1566     </div>
1567     <div class="padding"></div>
1568
1569     <div class="entry">
1570       <div class="title">
1571         <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>
1572       </div>
1573       <div class="date">
1574          3rd March 2017
1575       </div>
1576       <div class="body">
1577         <p>For almost a year now, we have been working on making a Norwegian
1578 Bokmål edition of <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian
1579 Administrator's Handbook</a>.  Now, thanks to the tireless effort of
1580 Ole-Erik, Ingrid and Andreas, the initial translation is complete, and
1581 we are working on the proof reading to ensure consistent language and
1582 use of correct computer science terms.  The plan is to make the book
1583 available on paper, as well as in electronic form.  For that to
1584 happen, the proof reading must be completed and all the figures need
1585 to be translated.  If you want to help out, get in touch.</p>
1586
1587 <p><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-handbook/debian-handbook-nb-NO.pdf">A
1588
1589 fresh PDF edition</a> in A4 format (the final book will have smaller
1590 pages) of the book created every morning is available for
1591 proofreading.  If you find any errors, please
1592 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">visit
1593 Weblate and correct the error</a>.  The
1594 <a href="http://l.github.io/debian-handbook/stat/nb-NO/index.html">state
1595 of the translation including figures</a> is a useful source for those
1596 provide Norwegian bokmål screen shots and figures.</p>
1597
1598       </div>
1599       <div class="tags">
1600
1601
1602         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>.
1603
1604
1605       </div>
1606     </div>
1607     <div class="padding"></div>
1608
1609     <div class="entry">
1610       <div class="title">
1611         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlimited_randomness_with_the_ChaosKey_.html">Unlimited randomness with the ChaosKey?</a>
1612       </div>
1613       <div class="date">
1614          1st March 2017
1615       </div>
1616       <div class="body">
1617         <p>A few days ago I ordered a small batch of
1618 <a href="http://altusmetrum.org/ChaosKey/">the ChaosKey</a>, a small
1619 USB dongle for generating entropy created by Bdale Garbee and Keith
1620 Packard.  Yesterday it arrived, and I am very happy to report that it
1621 work great!  According to its designers, to get it to work out of the
1622 box, you need the Linux kernel version 4.1 or later.  I tested on a
1623 Debian Stretch machine (kernel version 4.9), and there it worked just
1624 fine, increasing the available entropy very quickly.  I wrote a small
1625 test oneliner to test.  It first print the current entropy level,
1626 drain /dev/random, and then print the entropy level for five seconds.
1627 Here is the situation without the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
1628
1629 <blockquote><pre>
1630 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1631   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
1632   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
1633      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1634      sleep 1; \
1635   done
1636 300
1637 0+1 oppføringer inn
1638 0+1 oppføringer ut
1639 28 byte kopiert, 0,000264565 s, 106 kB/s
1640 4
1641 8
1642 12
1643 17
1644 21
1645 %
1646 </pre></blockquote>
1647
1648 <p>The entropy level increases by 3-4 every second.  In such case any
1649 application requiring random bits (like a HTTPS enabled web server)
1650 will halt and wait for more entrpy.  And here is the situation with
1651 the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
1652
1653 <blockquote><pre>
1654 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1655   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
1656   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
1657      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1658      sleep 1; \
1659   done
1660 1079
1661 0+1 oppføringer inn
1662 0+1 oppføringer ut
1663 104 byte kopiert, 0,000487647 s, 213 kB/s
1664 433
1665 1028
1666 1031
1667 1035
1668 1038
1669 %
1670 </pre></blockquote>
1671
1672 <p>Quite the difference. :) I bought a few more than I need, in case
1673 someone want to buy one here in Norway. :)</p>
1674
1675 <p>Update: The dongle was presented at Debconf last year.  You might
1676 find <a href="https://debconf16.debconf.org/talks/94/">the talk
1677 recording illuminating</a>.  It explains exactly what the source of
1678 randomness is, if you are unable to spot it from the schema drawing
1679 available from the ChaosKey web site linked at the start of this blog
1680 post.</p>
1681
1682       </div>
1683       <div class="tags">
1684
1685
1686         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>.
1687
1688
1689       </div>
1690     </div>
1691     <div class="padding"></div>
1692
1693     <div class="entry">
1694       <div class="title">
1695         <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>
1696       </div>
1697       <div class="date">
1698          9th January 2017
1699       </div>
1700       <div class="body">
1701         <p>Did you ever wonder where the web trafic really flow to reach the
1702 web servers, and who own the network equipment it is flowing through?
1703 It is possible to get a glimpse of this from using traceroute, but it
1704 is hard to find all the details.  Many years ago, I wrote a system to
1705 map the Norwegian Internet (trying to figure out if our plans for a
1706 network game service would get low enough latency, and who we needed
1707 to talk to about setting up game servers close to the users.  Back
1708 then I used traceroute output from many locations (I asked my friends
1709 to run a script and send me their traceroute output) to create the
1710 graph and the map.  The output from traceroute typically look like
1711 this:
1712
1713 <p><pre>
1714 traceroute to www.stortinget.no (85.88.67.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
1715  1  uio-gw10.uio.no (129.240.202.1)  0.447 ms  0.486 ms  0.621 ms
1716  2  uio-gw8.uio.no (129.240.24.229)  0.467 ms  0.578 ms  0.675 ms
1717  3  oslo-gw1.uninett.no (128.39.65.17)  0.385 ms  0.373 ms  0.358 ms
1718  4  te3-1-2.br1.fn3.as2116.net (193.156.90.3)  1.174 ms  1.172 ms  1.153 ms
1719  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
1720  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
1721  7  89.191.10.146 (89.191.10.146)  0.931 ms  0.917 ms  0.955 ms
1722  8  * * *
1723  9  * * *
1724 [...]
1725 </pre></p>
1726
1727 <p>This show the DNS names and IP addresses of (at least some of the)
1728 network equipment involved in getting the data traffic from me to the
1729 www.stortinget.no server, and how long it took in milliseconds for a
1730 package to reach the equipment and return to me.  Three packages are
1731 sent, and some times the packages do not follow the same path.  This
1732 is shown for hop 5, where three different IP addresses replied to the
1733 traceroute request.</p>
1734
1735 <p>There are many ways to measure trace routes.  Other good traceroute
1736 implementations I use are traceroute (using ICMP packages) mtr (can do
1737 both ICMP, UDP and TCP) and scapy (python library with ICMP, UDP, TCP
1738 traceroute and a lot of other capabilities).  All of them are easily
1739 available in <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>.</p>
1740
1741 <p>This time around, I wanted to know the geographic location of
1742 different route points, to visualize how visiting a web page spread
1743 information about the visit to a lot of servers around the globe.  The
1744 background is that a web site today often will ask the browser to get
1745 from many servers the parts (for example HTML, JSON, fonts,
1746 JavaScript, CSS, video) required to display the content.  This will
1747 leak information about the visit to those controlling these servers
1748 and anyone able to peek at the data traffic passing by (like your ISP,
1749 the ISPs backbone provider, FRA, GCHQ, NSA and others).</p>
1750
1751 <p>Lets pick an example, the Norwegian parliament web site
1752 www.stortinget.no.  It is read daily by all members of parliament and
1753 their staff, as well as political journalists, activits and many other
1754 citizens of Norway.  A visit to the www.stortinget.no web site will
1755 ask your browser to contact 8 other servers: ajax.googleapis.com,
1756 insights.hotjar.com, script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com,
1757 stats.g.doubleclick.net, www.google-analytics.com,
1758 www.googletagmanager.com and www.netigate.se.  I extracted this by
1759 asking <a href="http://phantomjs.org/">PhantomJS</a> to visit the
1760 Stortinget web page and tell me all the URLs PhantomJS downloaded to
1761 render the page (in HAR format using
1762 <a href="https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/blob/master/examples/netsniff.js">their
1763 netsniff example</a>.  I am very grateful to Gorm for showing me how
1764 to do this).  My goal is to visualize network traces to all IP
1765 addresses behind these DNS names, do show where visitors personal
1766 information is spread when visiting the page.</p>
1767
1768 <p align="center"><a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml"><img
1769 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>
1770
1771 <p>When I had a look around for options, I could not find any good
1772 free software tools to do this, and decided I needed my own traceroute
1773 wrapper outputting KML based on locations looked up using GeoIP.  KML
1774 is easy to work with and easy to generate, and understood by several
1775 of the GIS tools I have available.  I got good help from by NUUG
1776 colleague Anders Einar with this, and the result can be seen in
1777 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/kmltraceroute">my
1778 kmltraceroute git repository</a>.  Unfortunately, the quality of the
1779 free GeoIP databases I could find (and the for-pay databases my
1780 friends had access to) is not up to the task.  The IP addresses of
1781 central Internet infrastructure would typically be placed near the
1782 controlling companies main office, and not where the router is really
1783 located, as you can see from <a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml">the
1784 KML file I created</a> using the GeoLite City dataset from MaxMind.
1785
1786 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg"><img
1787 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>
1788
1789 <p>I also had a look at the visual traceroute graph created by
1790 <a href="http://www.secdev.org/projects/scapy/">the scrapy project</a>,
1791 showing IP network ownership (aka AS owner) for the IP address in
1792 question.
1793 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg">The
1794 graph display a lot of useful information about the traceroute in SVG
1795 format</a>, and give a good indication on who control the network
1796 equipment involved, but it do not include geolocation.  This graph
1797 make it possible to see the information is made available at least for
1798 UNINETT, Catchcom, Stortinget, Nordunet, Google, Amazon, Telia, Level
1799 3 Communications and NetDNA.</p>
1800
1801 <p align="center"><a href="https://geotraceroute.com/index.php?node=4&host=www.stortinget.no"><img
1802 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>
1803
1804 <p>In the process, I came across the
1805 <a href="https://geotraceroute.com/">web service GeoTraceroute</a> by
1806 Salim Gasmi.  Its methology of combining guesses based on DNS names,
1807 various location databases and finally use latecy times to rule out
1808 candidate locations seemed to do a very good job of guessing correct
1809 geolocation.  But it could only do one trace at the time, did not have
1810 a sensor in Norway and did not make the geolocations easily available
1811 for postprocessing.  So I contacted the developer and asked if he
1812 would be willing to share the code (he refused until he had time to
1813 clean it up), but he was interested in providing the geolocations in a
1814 machine readable format, and willing to set up a sensor in Norway.  So
1815 since yesterday, it is possible to run traces from Norway in this
1816 service thanks to a sensor node set up by
1817 <a href="https://www.nuug.no/">the NUUG assosiation</a>, and get the
1818 trace in KML format for further processing.</p>
1819
1820 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.kml"><img
1821 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>
1822
1823 <p>Here we can see a lot of trafic passes Sweden on its way to
1824 Denmark, Germany, Holland and Ireland.  Plenty of places where the
1825 Snowden confirmations verified the traffic is read by various actors
1826 without your best interest as their top priority.</p>
1827
1828 <p>Combining KML files is trivial using a text editor, so I could loop
1829 over all the hosts behind the urls imported by www.stortinget.no and
1830 ask for the KML file from GeoTraceroute, and create a combined KML
1831 file with all the traces (unfortunately only one of the IP addresses
1832 behind the DNS name is traced this time.  To get them all, one would
1833 have to request traces using IP number instead of DNS names from
1834 GeoTraceroute).  That might be the next step in this project.</p>
1835
1836 <p>Armed with these tools, I find it a lot easier to figure out where
1837 the IP traffic moves and who control the boxes involved in moving it.
1838 And every time the link crosses for example the Swedish border, we can
1839 be sure Swedish Signal Intelligence (FRA) is listening, as GCHQ do in
1840 Britain and NSA in USA and cables around the globe.  (Hm, what should
1841 we tell them? :) Keep that in mind if you ever send anything
1842 unencrypted over the Internet.</p>
1843
1844 <p>PS: KML files are drawn using
1845 <a href="http://ivanrublev.me/kml/">the KML viewer from Ivan
1846 Rublev<a/>, as it was less cluttered than the local Linux application
1847 Marble.  There are heaps of other options too.</p>
1848
1849 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1850 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1851 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1852
1853       </div>
1854       <div class="tags">
1855
1856
1857         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>.
1858
1859
1860       </div>
1861     </div>
1862     <div class="padding"></div>
1863
1864     <div class="entry">
1865       <div class="title">
1866         <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>
1867       </div>
1868       <div class="date">
1869         23rd December 2016
1870       </div>
1871       <div class="body">
1872         <p>I received a very nice Christmas present today.  As my regular
1873 readers probably know, I have been working on the
1874 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the Isenkram
1875 system</a> for many years.  The goal of the Isenkram system is to make
1876 it easier for users to figure out what to install to get a given piece
1877 of hardware to work in Debian, and a key part of this system is a way
1878 to map hardware to packages.  Isenkram have its own mapping database,
1879 and also uses data provided by each package using the AppStream
1880 metadata format.  And today,
1881 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/appstream">AppStream</a> in
1882 Debian learned to look up hardware the same way Isenkram is doing it,
1883 ie using fnmatch():</p>
1884
1885 <p><pre>
1886 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias \
1887   usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
1888 Identifier: pymissile [generic]
1889 Name: pymissile
1890 Summary: Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher
1891 Package: pymissile
1892 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias usb:v0694p0002d0000
1893 Identifier: libnxt [generic]
1894 Name: libnxt
1895 Summary: utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NXT brick
1896 Package: libnxt
1897 ---
1898 Identifier: t2n [generic]
1899 Name: t2n
1900 Summary: Simple command-line tool for Lego NXT
1901 Package: t2n
1902 ---
1903 Identifier: python-nxt [generic]
1904 Name: python-nxt
1905 Summary: Python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot
1906 Package: python-nxt
1907 ---
1908 Identifier: nbc [generic]
1909 Name: nbc
1910 Summary: C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks
1911 Package: nbc
1912 %
1913 </pre></p>
1914
1915 <p>A similar query can be done using the combined AppStream and
1916 Isenkram databases using the isenkram-lookup tool:</p>
1917
1918 <p><pre>
1919 % isenkram-lookup usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
1920 pymissile
1921 % isenkram-lookup usb:v0694p0002d0000
1922 libnxt
1923 nbc
1924 python-nxt
1925 t2n
1926 %
1927 </pre></p>
1928
1929 <p>You can find modalias values relevant for your machine using
1930 <tt>cat $(find /sys/devices/ -name modalias)</tt>.
1931
1932 <p>If you want to make this system a success and help Debian users
1933 make the most of the hardware they have, please
1934 help<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add
1935 AppStream metadata for your package following the guidelines</a>
1936 documented in the wiki.  So far only 11 packages provide such
1937 information, among the several hundred hardware specific packages in
1938 Debian. The Isenkram database on the other hand contain 101 packages,
1939 mostly related to USB dongles.  Most of the packages with hardware
1940 mapping in AppStream are LEGO Mindstorms related, because I have, as
1941 part of my involvement in
1942 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the Debian LEGO
1943 team</a> given priority to making sure LEGO users get proposed the
1944 complete set of packages in Debian for that particular hardware.  The
1945 team also got a nice Christmas present today.  The
1946 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/nxt-firmware">nxt-firmware
1947 package</a> made it into Debian.  With this package in place, it is
1948 now possible to use the LEGO Mindstorms NXT unit with only free
1949 software, as the nxt-firmware package contain the source and firmware
1950 binaries for the NXT brick.</p>
1951
1952 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1953 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1954 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1955
1956       </div>
1957       <div class="tags">
1958
1959
1960         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>.
1961
1962
1963       </div>
1964     </div>
1965     <div class="padding"></div>
1966
1967     <div class="entry">
1968       <div class="title">
1969         <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>
1970       </div>
1971       <div class="date">
1972         20th December 2016
1973       </div>
1974       <div class="body">
1975         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
1976 system</a> I wrote two years ago to make it easier in Debian to find
1977 and install packages to get your hardware dongles to work, is still
1978 going strong.  It is a system to look up the hardware present on or
1979 connected to the current system, and map the hardware to Debian
1980 packages.  It can either be done using the tools in isenkram-cli or
1981 using the user space daemon in the isenkram package.  The latter will
1982 notify you, when inserting new hardware, about what packages to
1983 install to get the dongle working.  It will even provide a button to
1984 click on to ask packagekit to install the packages.</p>
1985
1986 <p>Here is an command line example from my Thinkpad laptop:</p>
1987
1988 <p><pre>
1989 % isenkram-lookup
1990 bluez
1991 cheese
1992 ethtool
1993 fprintd
1994 fprintd-demo
1995 gkrellm-thinkbat
1996 hdapsd
1997 libpam-fprintd
1998 pidgin-blinklight
1999 thinkfan
2000 tlp
2001 tp-smapi-dkms
2002 tp-smapi-source
2003 tpb
2004 %
2005 </pre></p>
2006
2007 <p>It can also list the firware package providing firmware requested
2008 by the load kernel modules, which in my case is an empty list because
2009 I have all the firmware my machine need:
2010
2011 <p><pre>
2012 % /usr/sbin/isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
2013 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
2014 %
2015 </pre></p>
2016
2017 <p>The last few days I had a look at several of the around 250
2018 packages in Debian with udev rules.  These seem like good candidates
2019 to install when a given hardware dongle is inserted, and I found
2020 several that should be proposed by isenkram.  I have not had time to
2021 check all of them, but am happy to report that now there are 97
2022 packages packages mapped to hardware by Isenkram.  11 of these
2023 packages provide hardware mapping using AppStream, while the rest are
2024 listed in the modaliases file provided in isenkram.</p>
2025
2026 <p>These are the packages with hardware mappings at the moment.  The
2027 <strong>marked packages</strong> are also announcing their hardware
2028 support using AppStream, for everyone to use:</p>
2029
2030 <p>air-quality-sensor, alsa-firmware-loaders, argyll,
2031 <strong>array-info</strong>, avarice, avrdude, b43-fwcutter,
2032 bit-babbler, bluez, bluez-firmware, <strong>brltty</strong>,
2033 <strong>broadcom-sta-dkms</strong>, calibre, cgminer, cheese, colord,
2034 <strong>colorhug-client</strong>, dahdi-firmware-nonfree, dahdi-linux,
2035 dfu-util, dolphin-emu, ekeyd, ethtool, firmware-ipw2x00, fprintd,
2036 fprintd-demo, <strong>galileo</strong>, gkrellm-thinkbat, gphoto2,
2037 gpsbabel, gpsbabel-gui, gpsman, gpstrans, gqrx-sdr, gr-fcdproplus,
2038 gr-osmosdr, gtkpod, hackrf, hdapsd, hdmi2usb-udev, hpijs-ppds, hplip,
2039 ipw3945-source, ipw3945d, kde-config-tablet, kinect-audio-setup,
2040 <strong>libnxt</strong>, libpam-fprintd, <strong>lomoco</strong>,
2041 madwimax, minidisc-utils, mkgmap, msi-keyboard, mtkbabel,
2042 <strong>nbc</strong>, <strong>nqc</strong>, nut-hal-drivers, ola,
2043 open-vm-toolbox, open-vm-tools, openambit, pcgminer, pcmciautils,
2044 pcscd, pidgin-blinklight, printer-driver-splix,
2045 <strong>pymissile</strong>, python-nxt, qlandkartegt,
2046 qlandkartegt-garmin, rosegarden, rt2x00-source, sispmctl,
2047 soapysdr-module-hackrf, solaar, squeak-plugins-scratch, sunxi-tools,
2048 <strong>t2n</strong>, thinkfan, thinkfinger-tools, tlp, tp-smapi-dkms,
2049 tp-smapi-source, tpb, tucnak, uhd-host, usbmuxd, viking,
2050 virtualbox-ose-guest-x11, w1retap, xawtv, xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse,
2051 xserver-xorg-input-wacom, xserver-xorg-video-qxl,
2052 xserver-xorg-video-vmware, yubikey-personalization and
2053 zd1211-firmware</p>
2054
2055 <p>If you know of other packages, please let me know with a wishlist
2056 bug report against the isenkram-cli package, and ask the package
2057 maintainer to
2058 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add AppStream
2059 metadata according to the guidelines</a> to provide the information
2060 for everyone.  In time, I hope to get rid of the isenkram specific
2061 hardware mapping and depend exclusively on AppStream.</p>
2062
2063 <p>Note, the AppStream metadata for broadcom-sta-dkms is matching too
2064 much hardware, and suggest that the package with with any ethernet
2065 card.  See <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/838735">bug #838735</a> for
2066 the details.  I hope the maintainer find time to address it soon.  In
2067 the mean time I provide an override in isenkram.</p>
2068
2069       </div>
2070       <div class="tags">
2071
2072
2073         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>.
2074
2075
2076       </div>
2077     </div>
2078     <div class="padding"></div>
2079
2080     <div class="entry">
2081       <div class="title">
2082         <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>
2083       </div>
2084       <div class="date">
2085         11th December 2016
2086       </div>
2087       <div class="body">
2088         <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-12-11-nice-oolite.png"/></p>
2089
2090 <p>In my early years, I played
2091 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Classic_Elite">the epic game
2092 Elite</a> on my PC.  I spent many months trading and fighting in
2093 space, and reached the 'elite' fighting status before I moved on.  The
2094 original Elite game was available on Commodore 64 and the IBM PC
2095 edition I played had a 64 KB executable.  I am still impressed today
2096 that the authors managed to squeeze both a 3D engine and details about
2097 more than 2000 planet systems across 7 galaxies into a binary so
2098 small.</p>
2099
2100 <p>I have known about <a href="http://www.oolite.org/">the free
2101 software game Oolite inspired by Elite</a> for a while, but did not
2102 really have time to test it properly until a few days ago.  It was
2103 great to discover that my old knowledge about trading routes were
2104 still valid.  But my fighting and flying abilities were gone, so I had
2105 to retrain to be able to dock on a space station.  And I am still not
2106 able to make much resistance when I am attacked by pirates, so I
2107 bougth and mounted the most powerful laser in the rear to be able to
2108 put up at least some resistance while fleeing for my life. :)</p>
2109
2110 <p>When playing Elite in the late eighties, I had to discover
2111 everything on my own, and I had long lists of prices seen on different
2112 planets to be able to decide where to trade what.  This time I had the
2113 advantages of the
2114 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Main_Page">Elite wiki</a>,
2115 where information about each planet is easily available with common
2116 price ranges and suggested trading routes.  This improved my ability
2117 to earn money and I have been able to earn enough to buy a lot of
2118 useful equipent in a few days.  I believe I originally played for
2119 months before I could get a docking computer, while now I could get it
2120 after less then a week.</p>
2121
2122 <p>If you like science fiction and dreamed of a life as a vagabond in
2123 space, you should try out Oolite.  It is available for Linux, MacOSX
2124 and Windows, and is included in Debian and derivatives since 2011.</p>
2125
2126 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2127 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2128 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2129
2130       </div>
2131       <div class="tags">
2132
2133
2134         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>.
2135
2136
2137       </div>
2138     </div>
2139     <div class="padding"></div>
2140
2141     <div class="entry">
2142       <div class="title">
2143         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Quicker_Debian_installations_using_eatmydata.html">Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</a>
2144       </div>
2145       <div class="date">
2146         25th November 2016
2147       </div>
2148       <div class="body">
2149         <p>Two years ago, I did some experiments with eatmydata and the Debian
2150 installation system, observing how using
2151 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">eatmydata
2152 could speed up the installation</a> quite a bit.  My testing measured
2153 speedup around 20-40 percent for Debian Edu, where we install around
2154 1000 packages from within the installer.  The eatmydata package
2155 provide a way to disable/delay file system flushing.  This is a bit
2156 risky in the general case, as files that should be stored on disk will
2157 stay only in memory a bit longer than expected, causing problems if a
2158 machine crashes at an inconvenient time.  But for an installation, if
2159 the machine crashes during installation the process is normally
2160 restarted, and avoiding disk operations as much as possible to speed
2161 up the process make perfect sense.
2162
2163 <p>I added code in the Debian Edu specific installation code to enable
2164 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libeatmydata">eatmydata</a>,
2165 but did not have time to push it any further.  But a few months ago I
2166 picked it up again and worked with the libeatmydata package maintainer
2167 Mattia Rizzolo to make it easier for everyone to get this installation
2168 speedup in Debian.  Thanks to our cooperation There is now an
2169 eatmydata-udeb package in Debian testing and unstable, and simply
2170 enabling/installing it in debian-installer (d-i) is enough to get the
2171 quicker installations.  It can be enabled using preseeding.  The
2172 following untested kernel argument should do the trick:</p>
2173
2174 <blockquote><pre>
2175 preseed/early_command="anna-install eatmydata-udeb"
2176 </pre></blockquote>
2177
2178 <p>This should ask d-i to install the package inside the d-i
2179 environment early in the installation sequence.  Having it installed
2180 in d-i in turn will make sure the relevant scripts are called just
2181 after debootstrap filled /target/ with the freshly installed Debian
2182 system to configure apt to run dpkg with eatmydata.  This is enough to
2183 speed up the installation process.  There is a proposal to
2184 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/841153">extend the idea a bit further
2185 by using /etc/ld.so.preload instead of apt.conf</a>, but I have not
2186 tested its impact.</p>
2187
2188
2189       </div>
2190       <div class="tags">
2191
2192
2193         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>.
2194
2195
2196       </div>
2197     </div>
2198     <div class="padding"></div>
2199
2200     <div class="entry">
2201       <div class="title">
2202         <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>
2203       </div>
2204       <div class="date">
2205         24th November 2016
2206       </div>
2207       <div class="body">
2208         <p>I Norge er det mange som trenger å skrive både bokmål og nynorsk.
2209 Eksamensoppgaver, offentlige brev og nyheter er eksempler på tekster
2210 der det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skoleoppgavene som
2211 elever over det ganske land skal levere inn hvert år.  Det mange ikke
2212 vet er at selv om de kommersielle alternativene
2213 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google Translate</a> og
2214 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing Translator</a> ikke kan
2215 bidra med å oversette mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finnes det et
2216 utmerket fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Oversetterverktøyet
2217 Apertium har støtte for en rekke språkkombinasjoner, og takket være
2218 den utrettelige innsatsen til blant annet Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
2219 en bruke webtjenesten til å fylle inn en tekst på bokmål eller
2220 nynorsk, og få den automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
2221 Resultatet er ikke perfekt, men et svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og til
2222 er resultatet så bra at det kan benyttes uten endringer.  Jeg vet
2223 f.eks. at store deler av Joomla ble oversatt til nynorsk ved hjelp
2224 Apertium.  Høres det ut som noe du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så fall
2225 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
2226 teksten din i webskjemaet der.
2227
2228 <p>Hvis du trenger maskinell tilgang til den bakenforliggende
2229 teknologien kan du enten installere pakken
2230 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">apertium-nno-nob</a>
2231 på en Debian-maskin eller bruke web-API-et tilgjengelig fra
2232 api.apertium.org.  Se
2233 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">API-dokumentasjonen</a>
2234 for detaljer om web-API-et.  Her kan du se hvordan resultatet blir for
2235 denne teksten som ble skrevet på bokmål over maskinoversatt til
2236 nynorsk.</p>
2237
2238 <hr/>
2239
2240 <p>I Noreg er det mange som treng å skriva både bokmål og nynorsk.
2241 Eksamensoppgåver, offentlege brev og nyhende er døme på tekster der
2242 det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skuleoppgåvene som
2243 elevar over det ganske land skal levera inn kvart år.  Det mange ikkje
2244 veit er at sjølv om dei kommersielle alternativa
2245 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google *Translate</a> og
2246 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing *Translator</a> ikkje
2247 kan bidra med å omsetja mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finst det eit
2248 utmerka fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Omsetjarverktøyet
2249 *Apertium har støtte for ei rekkje språkkombinasjonar, og takka vera
2250 den utrøyttelege innsatsen til blant anna Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
2251 ein bruka *webtjenesten til å fylla inn ei tekst på bokmål eller
2252 nynorsk, og få den *automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
2253 Resultatet er ikkje perfekt, men eit svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og
2254 til er resultatet så bra at det kan nyttast utan endringar.  Eg veit
2255 t.d. at store delar av *Joomla vart omsett til nynorsk ved hjelp
2256 *Apertium.  Høyrast det ut som noko du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så
2257 fall <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">*Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
2258 teksta di i *webskjemaet der.
2259
2260 <p>Viss du treng *maskinell tilgjenge til den *bakenforliggende
2261 teknologien kan du anten installera pakken
2262 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">*apertium-*nno-*nob</a>
2263 på ein *Debian-maskin eller bruka *web-*API-eit tilgjengeleg frå
2264 *api.*apertium.org.  Sjå
2265 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">*API-dokumentasjonen</a>
2266 for detaljar om *web-*API-eit.  Her kan du sjå korleis resultatet vert
2267 for denne teksta som vart skreva på bokmål over *maskinoversatt til
2268 nynorsk.</p>
2269
2270       </div>
2271       <div class="tags">
2272
2273
2274         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>.
2275
2276
2277       </div>
2278     </div>
2279     <div class="padding"></div>
2280
2281     <div class="entry">
2282       <div class="title">
2283         <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>
2284       </div>
2285       <div class="date">
2286         13th November 2016
2287       </div>
2288       <div class="body">
2289         <p><a href="http://coz-profiler.org/">The Coz profiler</a>, a nice
2290 profiler able to run benchmarking experiments on the instrumented
2291 multi-threaded program, finally
2292 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/coz-profiler">made it into
2293 Debian unstable yesterday</A>.  Lluís Vilanova and I have spent many
2294 months since
2295 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">I
2296 blogged about the coz tool</a> in August working with upstream to make
2297 it suitable for Debian.  There are still issues with clang
2298 compatibility, inline assembly only working x86 and minimized
2299 JavaScript libraries.</p>
2300
2301 <p>To test it, install 'coz-profiler' using apt and run it like this:</p>
2302
2303 <p><blockquote>
2304 <tt>coz run --- /path/to/binary-with-debug-info</tt>
2305 </blockquote></p>
2306
2307 <p>This will produce a profile.coz file in the current working
2308 directory with the profiling information.  This is then given to a
2309 JavaScript application provided in the package and available from
2310 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">a project web page</a>.
2311 To start the local copy, invoke it in a browser like this:</p>
2312
2313 <p><blockquote>
2314 <tt>sensible-browser /usr/share/coz-profiler/viewer/index.htm</tt>
2315 </blockquote></p>
2316
2317 <p>See the project home page and the
2318 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">USENIX
2319 ;login: article on Coz</a> for more information on how it is
2320 working.</p>
2321
2322       </div>
2323       <div class="tags">
2324
2325
2326         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>.
2327
2328
2329       </div>
2330     </div>
2331     <div class="padding"></div>
2332
2333     <div class="entry">
2334       <div class="title">
2335         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_own_self_balancing_Lego_Segway.html">My own self balancing Lego Segway</a>
2336       </div>
2337       <div class="date">
2338          4th November 2016
2339       </div>
2340       <div class="body">
2341         <p>A while back I received a Gyro sensor for the NXT
2342 <a href="mindstorms.lego.com">Mindstorms</a> controller as a birthday
2343 present.  It had been on my wishlist for a while, because I wanted to
2344 build a Segway like balancing lego robot.  I had already built
2345 <a href="http://www.nxtprograms.com/NXT2/segway/">a simple balancing
2346 robot</a> with the kids, using the light/color sensor included in the
2347 NXT kit as the balance sensor, but it was not working very well.  It
2348 could balance for a while, but was very sensitive to the light
2349 condition in the room and the reflective properties of the surface and
2350 would fall over after a short while.  I wanted something more robust,
2351 and had
2352 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=NGY1044">the
2353 gyro sensor from HiTechnic</a> I believed would solve it on my
2354 wishlist for some years before it suddenly showed up as a gift from my
2355 loved ones. :)</p>
2356
2357 <p>Unfortunately I have not had time to sit down and play with it
2358 since then.  But that changed some days ago, when I was searching for
2359 lego segway information and came across a recipe from HiTechnic for
2360 building
2361 <a href="http://www.hitechnic.com/blog/gyro-sensor/htway/">the
2362 HTWay</a>, a segway like balancing robot.  Build instructions and
2363 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/upload/786-HTWayC.nxc">source
2364 code</a> was included, so it was just a question of putting it all
2365 together.  And thanks to the great work of many Debian developers, the
2366 compiler needed to build the source for the NXT is already included in
2367 Debian, so I was read to go in less than an hour.  The resulting robot
2368 do not look very impressive in its simplicity:</p>
2369
2370 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-robot.jpeg"></p>
2371
2372 <p>Because I lack the infrared sensor used to control the robot in the
2373 design from HiTechnic, I had to comment out the last task
2374 (taskControl).  I simply placed /* and */ around it get the program
2375 working without that sensor present.  Now it balances just fine until
2376 the battery status run low:</p>
2377
2378 <p align="center"><video width="70%" controls="true">
2379    <source src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-balancing.ogv" type="video/ogg">
2380 </video></p>
2381
2382 <p>Now we would like to teach it how to follow a line and take remote
2383 control instructions using the included Bluetooth receiver in the NXT.</p>
2384
2385 <p>If you, like me, love LEGO and want to make sure we find the tools
2386 they need to work with LEGO in Debian and all our derivative
2387 distributions like Ubuntu, check out
2388 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the LEGO designers
2389 project page</a> and join the Debian LEGO team.  Personally I own a
2390 RCX and NXT controller (no EV3), and would like to make sure the
2391 Debian tools needed to program the systems I own work as they
2392 should.</p>
2393
2394       </div>
2395       <div class="tags">
2396
2397
2398         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>.
2399
2400
2401       </div>
2402     </div>
2403     <div class="padding"></div>
2404
2405     <div class="entry">
2406       <div class="title">
2407         <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>
2408       </div>
2409       <div class="date">
2410         10th October 2016
2411       </div>
2412       <div class="body">
2413         <p>In July
2414 <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
2415 wrote how to get the Signal Chrome/Chromium app working</a> without
2416 the ability to receive SMS messages (aka without a cell phone).  It is
2417 time to share some experiences and provide an updated setup.</p>
2418
2419 <p>The Signal app have worked fine for several months now, and I use
2420 it regularly to chat with my loved ones.  I had a major snag at the
2421 end of my summer vacation, when the the app completely forgot my
2422 setup, identity and keys.  The reason behind this major mess was
2423 running out of disk space.  To avoid that ever happening again I have
2424 started storing everything in <tt>userdata/</tt> in git, to be able to
2425 roll back to an earlier version if the files are wiped by mistake.  I
2426 had to use it once after introducing the git backup.  When rolling
2427 back to an earlier version, one need to use the 'reset session' option
2428 in Signal to get going, and notify the people you talk with about the
2429 problem.  I assume there is some sequence number tracking in the
2430 protocol to detect rollback attacks.  The git repository is rather big
2431 (674 MiB so far), but I have not tried to figure out if some of the
2432 content can be added to a .gitignore file due to lack of spare
2433 time.</p>
2434
2435 <p>I've also hit the 90 days timeout blocking, and noticed that this
2436 make it impossible to send messages using Signal.  I could still
2437 receive them, but had to patch the code with a new timestamp to send.
2438 I believe the timeout is added by the developers to force people to
2439 upgrade to the latest version of the app, even when there is no
2440 protocol changes, to reduce the version skew among the user base and
2441 thus try to keep the number of support requests down.</p>
2442
2443 <p>Since my original recipe, the Signal source code changed slightly,
2444 making the old patch fail to apply cleanly.  Below is an updated
2445 patch, including the shell wrapper I use to start Signal.  The
2446 original version required a new user to locate the JavaScript console
2447 and call a function from there.  I got help from a friend with more
2448 JavaScript knowledge than me to modify the code to provide a GUI
2449 button instead.  This mean that to get started you just need to run
2450 the wrapper and click the 'Register without mobile phone' to get going
2451 now.  I've also modified the timeout code to always set it to 90 days
2452 in the future, to avoid having to patch the code regularly.</p>
2453
2454 <p>So, the updated recipe for Debian Jessie:</p>
2455
2456 <ol>
2457
2458 <li>First, install required packages to get the source code and the
2459 browser you need.  Signal only work with Chrome/Chromium, as far as I
2460 know, so you need to install it.
2461
2462 <pre>
2463 apt install git tor chromium
2464 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
2465 </pre></li>
2466
2467 <li>Modify the source code using command listed in the the patch
2468 block below.</li>
2469
2470 <li>Start Signal using the run-signal-app wrapper (for example using
2471 <tt>`pwd`/run-signal-app</tt>).
2472
2473 <li>Click on the 'Register without mobile phone', will in a phone
2474 number you can receive calls to the next minute, receive the
2475 verification code and enter it into the form field and press
2476 'Register'.  Note, the phone number you use will be user Signal
2477 username, ie the way others can find you on Signal.</li>
2478
2479 <li>You can now use Signal to contact others.  Note, new contacts do
2480 not show up in the contact list until you restart Signal, and there is
2481 no way to assign names to Contacts.  There is also no way to create or
2482 update chat groups.  I suspect this is because the web app do not have
2483 a associated contact database.</li>
2484
2485 </ol>
2486
2487 <p>I am still a bit uneasy about using Signal, because of the way its
2488 main author moxie0 reject federation and accept dependencies to major
2489 corporations like Google (part of the code is fetched from Google) and
2490 Amazon (the central coordination point is owned by Amazon).  See for
2491 example
2492 <a href="https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37">the
2493 LibreSignal issue tracker</a> for a thread documenting the authors
2494 view on these issues.  But the network effect is strong in this case,
2495 and several of the people I want to communicate with already use
2496 Signal.  Perhaps we can all move to <a href="https://ring.cx/">Ring</a>
2497 once it <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/830265">work on my
2498 laptop</a>?  It already work on Windows and Android, and is included
2499 in <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/ring">Debian</a> and
2500 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ring">Ubuntu</a>, but not
2501 working on Debian Stable.</p>
2502
2503 <p>Anyway, this is the patch I apply to the Signal code to get it
2504 working.  It switch to the production servers, disable to timeout,
2505 make registration easier and add the shell wrapper:</p>
2506
2507 <pre>
2508 cd Signal-Desktop; cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p1
2509 diff --git a/js/background.js b/js/background.js
2510 index 24b4c1d..579345f 100644
2511 --- a/js/background.js
2512 +++ b/js/background.js
2513 @@ -33,9 +33,9 @@
2514          });
2515      });
2516
2517 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
2518 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org';
2519      var SERVER_PORTS = [80, 4433, 8443];
2520 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
2521 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
2522      var messageReceiver;
2523      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
2524          if (messageReceiver) {
2525 diff --git a/js/expire.js b/js/expire.js
2526 index 639aeae..beb91c3 100644
2527 --- a/js/expire.js
2528 +++ b/js/expire.js
2529 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
2530  ;(function() {
2531      'use strict';
2532 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
2533 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = Date.now() + (90 * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
2534
2535      window.extension = window.extension || {};
2536
2537 diff --git a/js/views/install_view.js b/js/views/install_view.js
2538 index 7816f4f..1d6233b 100644
2539 --- a/js/views/install_view.js
2540 +++ b/js/views/install_view.js
2541 @@ -38,7 +38,8 @@
2542              return {
2543                  'click .step1': this.selectStep.bind(this, 1),
2544                  'click .step2': this.selectStep.bind(this, 2),
2545 -                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3)
2546 +                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3),
2547 +                'click .callreg': function() { extension.install('standalone') },
2548              };
2549          },
2550          clearQR: function() {
2551 diff --git a/options.html b/options.html
2552 index dc0f28e..8d709f6 100644
2553 --- a/options.html
2554 +++ b/options.html
2555 @@ -14,7 +14,10 @@
2556          &lt;div class='nav'>
2557            &lt;h1>{{ installWelcome }}&lt;/h1>
2558            &lt;p>{{ installTagline }}&lt;/p>
2559 -          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a> &lt;/div>
2560 +          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a>
2561 +           &lt;br> &lt;a class="button callreg">Register without mobile phone&lt;/a>
2562 +
2563 +         &lt;/div>
2564            &lt;span class='dot step1 selected'>&lt;/span>
2565            &lt;span class='dot step2'>&lt;/span>
2566            &lt;span class='dot step3'>&lt;/span>
2567 --- /dev/null   2016-10-07 09:55:13.730181472 +0200
2568 +++ b/run-signal-app   2016-10-10 08:54:09.434172391 +0200
2569 @@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
2570 +#!/bin/sh
2571 +set -e
2572 +cd $(dirname $0)
2573 +mkdir -p userdata
2574 +userdata="`pwd`/userdata"
2575 +if [ -d "$userdata" ] && [ ! -d "$userdata/.git" ] ; then
2576 +    (cd $userdata && git init)
2577 +fi
2578 +(cd $userdata && git add . && git commit -m "Current status." || true)
2579 +exec chromium \
2580 +  --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
2581 +  --user-data-dir=$userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
2582 EOF
2583 chmod a+rx run-signal-app
2584 </pre>
2585
2586 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2587 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2588 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2589
2590       </div>
2591       <div class="tags">
2592
2593
2594         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>.
2595
2596
2597       </div>
2598     </div>
2599     <div class="padding"></div>
2600
2601     <div class="entry">
2602       <div class="title">
2603         <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>
2604       </div>
2605       <div class="date">
2606          7th October 2016
2607       </div>
2608       <div class="body">
2609         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
2610 system</a> provide a practical and easy way to figure out which
2611 packages support the hardware in a given machine.  The command line
2612 tool <tt>isenkram-lookup</tt> and the tasksel options provide a
2613 convenient way to list and install packages relevant for the current
2614 hardware during system installation, both user space packages and
2615 firmware packages. The GUI background daemon on the other hand provide
2616 a pop-up proposing to install packages when a new dongle is inserted
2617 while using the computer.  For example, if you plug in a smart card
2618 reader, the system will ask if you want to install <tt>pcscd</tt> if
2619 that package isn't already installed, and if you plug in a USB video
2620 camera the system will ask if you want to install <tt>cheese</tt> if
2621 cheese is currently missing.  This already work just fine.</p>
2622
2623 <p>But Isenkram depend on a database mapping from hardware IDs to
2624 package names.  When I started no such database existed in Debian, so
2625 I made my own data set and included it with the isenkram package and
2626 made isenkram fetch the latest version of this database from git using
2627 http.  This way the isenkram users would get updated package proposals
2628 as soon as I learned more about hardware related packages.</p>
2629
2630 <p>The hardware is identified using modalias strings.  The modalias
2631 design is from the Linux kernel where most hardware descriptors are
2632 made available as a strings that can be matched using filename style
2633 globbing.  It handle USB, PCI, DMI and a lot of other hardware related
2634 identifiers.</p>
2635
2636 <p>The downside to the Isenkram specific database is that there is no
2637 information about relevant distribution / Debian version, making
2638 isenkram propose obsolete packages too.  But along came AppStream, a
2639 cross distribution mechanism to store and collect metadata about
2640 software packages.  When I heard about the proposal, I contacted the
2641 people involved and suggested to add a hardware matching rule using
2642 modalias strings in the specification, to be able to use AppStream for
2643 mapping hardware to packages.  This idea was accepted and AppStream is
2644 now a great way for a package to announce the hardware it support in a
2645 distribution neutral way.  I wrote
2646 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">a
2647 recipe on how to add such meta-information</a> in a blog post last
2648 December.  If you have a hardware related package in Debian, please
2649 announce the relevant hardware IDs using AppStream.</p>
2650
2651 <p>In Debian, almost all packages that can talk to a LEGO Mindestorms
2652 RCX or NXT unit, announce this support using AppStream.  The effect is
2653 that when you insert such LEGO robot controller into your Debian
2654 machine, Isenkram will propose to install the packages needed to get
2655 it working.  The intention is that this should allow the local user to
2656 start programming his robot controller right away without having to
2657 guess what packages to use or which permissions to fix.</p>
2658
2659 <p>But when I sat down with my son the other day to program our NXT
2660 unit using his Debian Stretch computer, I discovered something
2661 annoying.  The local console user (ie my son) did not get access to
2662 the USB device for programming the unit.  This used to work, but no
2663 longer in Jessie and Stretch.  After some investigation and asking
2664 around on #debian-devel, I discovered that this was because udev had
2665 changed the mechanism used to grant access to local devices.  The
2666 ConsoleKit mechanism from <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>
2667 no longer applied, because LDAP users no longer was added to the
2668 plugdev group during login.  Michael Biebl told me that this method
2669 was obsolete and the new method used ACLs instead.  This was good
2670 news, as the plugdev mechanism is a mess when using a remote user
2671 directory like LDAP.  Using ACLs would make sure a user lost device
2672 access when she logged out, even if the user left behind a background
2673 process which would retain the plugdev membership with the ConsoleKit
2674 setup.  Armed with this knowledge I moved on to fix the access problem
2675 for the LEGO Mindstorms related packages.</p>
2676
2677 <p>The new system uses a udev tag, 'uaccess'.  It can either be
2678 applied directly for a device, or is applied in
2679 /lib/udev/rules.d/70-uaccess.rules for classes of devices.  As the
2680 LEGO Mindstorms udev rules did not have a class, I decided to add the
2681 tag directly in the udev rules files included in the packages.  Here
2682 is one example.  For the nqc C compiler for the RCX, the
2683 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/60-nqc.rules</tt> file now look like this:
2684
2685 <p><pre>
2686 SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ACTION=="add", ATTR{idVendor}=="0694", ATTR{idProduct}=="0001", \
2687     SYMLINK+="rcx-%k", TAG+="uaccess"
2688 </pre></p>
2689
2690 <p>The key part is the 'TAG+="uaccess"' at the end.  I suspect all
2691 packages using plugdev in their /lib/udev/rules.d/ files should be
2692 changed to use this tag (either directly or indirectly via
2693 <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>).  Perhaps a lintian check should be created
2694 to detect this?</p>
2695
2696 <p>I've been unable to find good documentation on the uaccess feature.
2697 It is unclear to me if the uaccess tag is an internal implementation
2698 detail like the udev-acl tag used by
2699 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>.  If it is, I guess the
2700 indirect method is the preferred way.  Michael
2701 <a href="https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/4288">asked for more
2702 documentation from the systemd project</a> and I hope it will make
2703 this clearer.  For now I use the generic classes when they exist and
2704 is already handled by <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>, and add the tag
2705 directly if no such class exist.</p>
2706
2707 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
2708 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
2709 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
2710
2711 <p>To help out making life for LEGO constructors in Debian easier,
2712 please join us on our IRC channel
2713 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> and join
2714 the <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/debian-lego/">Debian
2715 LEGO team</a> in the Alioth project we created yesterday.  A mailing
2716 list is not yet created, but we are working on it. :)</p>
2717
2718 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2719 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2720 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2721
2722       </div>
2723       <div class="tags">
2724
2725
2726         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>.
2727
2728
2729       </div>
2730     </div>
2731     <div class="padding"></div>
2732
2733     <div class="entry">
2734       <div class="title">
2735         <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>
2736       </div>
2737       <div class="date">
2738         30th August 2016
2739       </div>
2740       <div class="body">
2741         <p>In April we
2742 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">started
2743 to work</a> on a Norwegian Bokmål edition of the "open access" book on
2744 how to set up and administrate a Debian system.  Today I am happy to
2745 report that the first draft is now publicly available.  You can find
2746 it on <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/">get the Debian
2747 Administrator's Handbook page</a> (under Other languages).  The first
2748 eight chapters have a first draft translation, and we are working on
2749 proofreading the content.  If you want to help out, please start
2750 contributing using
2751 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
2752 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
2753 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
2754 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
2755 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
2756 contributors</a>.  A good way to contribute is to proofread the text
2757 and update weblate if you find errors.</p>
2758
2759 <p>Our goal is still to make the Norwegian book available on paper as well as
2760 electronic form.</p>
2761
2762       </div>
2763       <div class="tags">
2764
2765
2766         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>.
2767
2768
2769       </div>
2770     </div>
2771     <div class="padding"></div>
2772
2773     <div class="entry">
2774       <div class="title">
2775         <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>
2776       </div>
2777       <div class="date">
2778         11th August 2016
2779       </div>
2780       <div class="body">
2781         <p>This summer, I read a great article
2782 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">coz:
2783 This Is the Profiler You're Looking For</a>" in USENIX ;login: about
2784 how to profile multi-threaded programs.  It presented a system for
2785 profiling software by running experiences in the running program,
2786 testing how run time performance is affected by "speeding up" parts of
2787 the code to various degrees compared to a normal run.  It does this by
2788 slowing down parallel threads while the "faster up" code is running
2789 and measure how this affect processing time.  The processing time is
2790 measured using probes inserted into the code, either using progress
2791 counters (COZ_PROGRESS) or as latency meters (COZ_BEGIN/COZ_END).  It
2792 can also measure unmodified code by measuring complete the program
2793 runtime and running the program several times instead.</p>
2794
2795 <p>The project and presentation was so inspiring that I would like to
2796 get the system into Debian.  I
2797 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=830708">created
2798 a WNPP request for it</a> and contacted upstream to try to make the
2799 system ready for Debian by sending patches.  The build process need to
2800 be changed a bit to avoid running 'git clone' to get dependencies, and
2801 to include the JavaScript web page used to visualize the collected
2802 profiling information included in the source package.
2803 But I expect that should work out fairly soon.</p>
2804
2805 <p>The way the system work is fairly simple.  To run an coz experiment
2806 on a binary with debug symbols available, start the program like this:
2807
2808 <p><blockquote><pre>
2809 coz run --- program-to-run
2810 </pre></blockquote></p>
2811
2812 <p>This will create a text file profile.coz with the instrumentation
2813 information.  To show what part of the code affect the performance
2814 most, use a web browser and either point it to
2815 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/</a>
2816 or use the copy from git (in the gh-pages branch).  Check out this web
2817 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
2818 profiling more useful you include &lt;coz.h&gt; and insert the
2819 COZ_PROGRESS or COZ_BEGIN and COZ_END at appropriate places in the
2820 code, rebuild and run the profiler.  This allow coz to do more
2821 targeted experiments.</p>
2822
2823 <p>A video published by ACM
2824 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE0V-p1odPg">presenting the
2825 Coz profiler</a> is available from Youtube.  There is also a paper
2826 from the 25th Symposium on Operating Systems Principles available
2827 titled
2828 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/conference/atc16/technical-sessions/presentation/curtsinger">Coz:
2829 finding code that counts with causal profiling</a>.</p>
2830
2831 <p><a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz">The source code</a>
2832 for Coz is available from github.  It will only build with clang
2833 because it uses a
2834 <a href="https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=55606">C++
2835 feature missing in GCC</a>, but I've submitted
2836 <a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz/pull/67">a patch to solve
2837 it</a> and hope it will be included in the upstream source soon.</p>
2838
2839 <p>Please get in touch if you, like me, would like to see this piece
2840 of software in Debian.  I would very much like some help with the
2841 packaging effort, as I lack the in depth knowledge on how to package
2842 C++ libraries.</p>
2843
2844       </div>
2845       <div class="tags">
2846
2847
2848         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>.
2849
2850
2851       </div>
2852     </div>
2853     <div class="padding"></div>
2854
2855     <div class="entry">
2856       <div class="title">
2857         <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>
2858       </div>
2859       <div class="date">
2860          7th July 2016
2861       </div>
2862       <div class="body">
2863         <p>Yesterday, I tried to unlock a HTC Desire HD phone, and it proved
2864 to be a slight challenge.  Here is the recipe if I ever need to do it
2865 again.  It all started by me wanting to try the recipe to set up
2866 <a href="https://blog.torproject.org/blog/mission-impossible-hardening-android-security-and-privacy">an
2867 hardened Android installation</a> from the Tor project blog on a
2868 device I had access to.  It is a old mobile phone with a broken
2869 microphone The initial idea had been to just
2870 <a href="http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Install_CM_for_ace">install
2871 CyanogenMod on it</a>, but did not quite find time to start on it
2872 until a few days ago.</p>
2873
2874 <p>The unlock process is supposed to be simple: (1) Boot into the boot
2875 loader (press volume down and power at the same time), (2) select
2876 'fastboot' before (3) connecting the device via USB to a Linux
2877 machine, (4) request the device identifier token by running 'fastboot
2878 oem get_identifier_token', (5) request the device unlocking key using
2879 the <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader/">HTC developer web
2880 site</a> and unlock the phone using the key file emailed to you.</p>
2881
2882 <p>Unfortunately, this only work fi you have hboot version 2.00.0029
2883 or newer, and the device I was working on had 2.00.0027.  This
2884 apparently can be easily fixed by downloading a Windows program and
2885 running it on your Windows machine, if you accept the terms Microsoft
2886 require you to accept to use Windows - which I do not.  So I had to
2887 come up with a different approach.  I got a lot of help from AndyCap
2888 on #nuug, and would not have been able to get this working without
2889 him.</p>
2890
2891 <p>First I needed to extract the hboot firmware from
2892 <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/ruu/PD9810000_Ace_Sense30_S_hboot_2.00.0029.exe">the
2893 windows binary for HTC Desire HD</a> downloaded as 'the RUU' from HTC.
2894 For this there is is <a href="https://github.com/kmdm/unruu/">a github
2895 project named unruu</a> using libunshield.  The unshield tool did not
2896 recognise the file format, but unruu worked and extracted rom.zip,
2897 containing the new hboot firmware and a text file describing which
2898 devices it would work for.</p>
2899
2900 <p>Next, I needed to get the new firmware into the device.  For this I
2901 followed some instructions
2902 <a href="http://www.htc1guru.com/2013/09/new-ruu-zips-posted/">available
2903 from HTC1Guru.com</a>, and ran these commands as root on a Linux
2904 machine with Debian testing:</p>
2905
2906 <p><pre>
2907 adb reboot-bootloader
2908 fastboot oem rebootRUU
2909 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
2910 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
2911 fastboot reboot
2912 </pre></p>
2913
2914 <p>The flash command apparently need to be done twice to take effect,
2915 as the first is just preparations and the second one do the flashing.
2916 The adb command is just to get to the boot loader menu, so turning the
2917 device on while holding volume down and the power button should work
2918 too.</p>
2919
2920 <p>With the new hboot version in place I could start following the
2921 instructions on the HTC developer web site.  I got the device token
2922 like this:</p>
2923
2924 <p><pre>
2925 fastboot oem get_identifier_token 2>&1 | sed 's/(bootloader) //'
2926 </pre>
2927
2928 <p>And once I got the unlock code via email, I could use it like
2929 this:</p>
2930
2931 <p><pre>
2932 fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin
2933 </pre></p>
2934
2935 <p>And with that final step in place, the phone was unlocked and I
2936 could start stuffing the software of my own choosing into the device.
2937 So far I only inserted a replacement recovery image to wipe the phone
2938 before I start.  We will see what happen next.  Perhaps I should
2939 install <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> on it. :)</p>
2940
2941       </div>
2942       <div class="tags">
2943
2944
2945         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>.
2946
2947
2948       </div>
2949     </div>
2950     <div class="padding"></div>
2951
2952     <div class="entry">
2953       <div class="title">
2954         <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>
2955       </div>
2956       <div class="date">
2957          3rd July 2016
2958       </div>
2959       <div class="body">
2960         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to test
2961 <a href="https://whispersystems.org/">the Signal app</a>, as it is
2962 said to provide end to end encrypted communication and several of my
2963 friends and family are already using it.  As I by choice do not own a
2964 mobile phone, this proved to be harder than expected.  And I wanted to
2965 have the source of the client and know that it was the code used on my
2966 machine.  But yesterday I managed to get it working.  I used the
2967 Github source, compared it to the source in
2968 <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/signal-private-messenger/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk?hl=en-US">the
2969 Signal Chrome app</a> available from the Chrome web store, applied
2970 patches to use the production Signal servers, started the app and
2971 asked for the hidden "register without a smart phone" form.  Here is
2972 the recipe how I did it.</p>
2973
2974 <p>First, I fetched the Signal desktop source from Github, using
2975
2976 <pre>
2977 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
2978 </pre>
2979
2980 <p>Next, I patched the source to use the production servers, to be
2981 able to talk to other Signal users:</p>
2982
2983 <pre>
2984 cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p0
2985 diff -ur ./js/background.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js
2986 --- ./js/background.js  2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
2987 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js    2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
2988 @@ -47,8 +47,8 @@
2989          });
2990      });
2991
2992 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
2993 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
2994 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org:4433';
2995 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
2996      var messageReceiver;
2997      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
2998          if (messageReceiver) {
2999 diff -ur ./js/expire.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js
3000 --- ./js/expire.js      2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
3001 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
3002 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
3003  ;(function() {
3004      'use strict';
3005 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
3006 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 1474492690000;
3007
3008      window.extension = window.extension || {};
3009
3010 EOF
3011 </pre>
3012
3013 <p>The first part is changing the servers, and the second is updating
3014 an expiration timestamp.  This timestamp need to be updated regularly.
3015 It is set 90 days in the future by the build process (Gruntfile.js).
3016 The value is seconds since 1970 times 1000, as far as I can tell.</p>
3017
3018 <p>Based on a tip and good help from the #nuug IRC channel, I wrote a
3019 script to launch Signal in Chromium.</p>
3020
3021 <pre>
3022 #!/bin/sh
3023 cd $(dirname $0)
3024 mkdir -p userdata
3025 exec chromium \
3026   --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
3027   --user-data-dir=`pwd`/userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
3028 </pre>
3029
3030 <p> The script start the app and configure Chromium to use the Tor
3031 SOCKS5 proxy to make sure those controlling the Signal servers (today
3032 Amazon and Whisper Systems) as well as those listening on the lines
3033 will have a harder time location my laptop based on the Signal
3034 connections if they use source IP address.</p>
3035
3036 <p>When the script starts, one need to follow the instructions under
3037 "Standalone Registration" in the CONTRIBUTING.md file in the git
3038 repository.  I right clicked on the Signal window to get up the
3039 Chromium debugging tool, visited the 'Console' tab and wrote
3040 'extension.install("standalone")' on the console prompt to get the
3041 registration form.  Then I entered by land line phone number and
3042 pressed 'Call'.  5 seconds later the phone rang and a robot voice
3043 repeated the verification code three times.  After entering the number
3044 into the verification code field in the form, I could start using
3045 Signal from my laptop.
3046
3047 <p>As far as I can tell, The Signal app will leak who is talking to
3048 whom and thus who know who to those controlling the central server,
3049 but such leakage is hard to avoid with a centrally controlled server
3050 setup.  It is something to keep in mind when using Signal - the
3051 content of your chats are harder to intercept, but the meta data
3052 exposing your contact network is available to people you do not know.
3053 So better than many options, but not great.  And sadly the usage is
3054 connected to my land line, thus allowing those controlling the server
3055 to associate it to my home and person.  I would prefer it if only
3056 those I knew could tell who I was on Signal.  There are options
3057 avoiding such information leakage, but most of my friends are not
3058 using them, so I am stuck with Signal for now.</p>
3059
3060 <p><strong>Update 2017-01-10</strong>: There is an updated blog post
3061 on this topic in
3062 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience
3063 and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile
3064 phone</a>.</p>
3065
3066       </div>
3067       <div class="tags">
3068
3069
3070         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>.
3071
3072
3073       </div>
3074     </div>
3075     <div class="padding"></div>
3076
3077     <div class="entry">
3078       <div class="title">
3079         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_new__best__multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?</a>
3080       </div>
3081       <div class="date">
3082          6th June 2016
3083       </div>
3084       <div class="body">
3085         <p>When I set out a few weeks ago to figure out
3086 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">which
3087 multimedia player in Debian claimed to support most file formats /
3088 MIME types</a>, I was a bit surprised how varied the sets of MIME types
3089 the various players claimed support for.  The range was from 55 to 130
3090 MIME types.  I suspect most media formats are supported by all
3091 players, but this is not really reflected in the MimeTypes values in
3092 their desktop files.  There are probably also some bogus MIME types
3093 listed, but it is hard to identify which one this is.</p>
3094
3095 <p>Anyway, in the mean time I got in touch with upstream for some of
3096 the players suggesting to add more MIME types to their desktop files,
3097 and decided to spend some time myself improving the situation for my
3098 favorite media player VLC.  The fixes for VLC entered Debian unstable
3099 yesterday. The complete list of MIME types can be seen on the
3100 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">Multimedia
3101 player MIME type support status</a> Debian wiki page.</p>
3102
3103 <p>The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?  It is VLC, followed by
3104 totem, parole, kplayer, gnome-mpv, mpv, smplayer, mplayer-gui and
3105 kmplayer.  I am sure some of the other players desktop files support
3106 several of the formats currently listed as working only with vlc,
3107 toten and parole.</p>
3108
3109 <p>A sad observation is that only 14 MIME types are listed as
3110 supported by all the tested multimedia players in Debian in their
3111 desktop files: audio/mpeg, audio/vnd.rn-realaudio, audio/x-mpegurl,
3112 audio/x-ms-wma, audio/x-scpls, audio/x-wav, video/mp4, video/mpeg,
3113 video/quicktime, video/vnd.rn-realvideo, video/x-matroska,
3114 video/x-ms-asf, video/x-ms-wmv and video/x-msvideo.  Personally I find
3115 it sad that video/ogg and video/webm is not supported by all the media
3116 players in Debian.  As far as I can tell, all of them can handle both
3117 formats.</p>
3118
3119       </div>
3120       <div class="tags">
3121
3122
3123         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>.
3124
3125
3126       </div>
3127     </div>
3128     <div class="padding"></div>
3129
3130     <div class="entry">
3131       <div class="title">
3132         <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>
3133       </div>
3134       <div class="date">
3135          5th June 2016
3136       </div>
3137       <div class="body">
3138         <p>Many years ago, when koffice was fresh and with few users, I
3139 decided to test its presentation tool when making the slides for a
3140 talk I was giving for NUUG on Japhar, a free Java virtual machine.  I
3141 wrote the first draft of the slides, saved the result and went to bed
3142 the day before I would give the talk.  The next day I took a plane to
3143 the location where the meeting should take place, and on the plane I
3144 started up koffice again to polish the talk a bit, only to discover
3145 that kpresenter refused to load its own data file.  I cursed a bit and
3146 started making the slides again from memory, to have something to
3147 present when I arrived.  I tested that the saved files could be
3148 loaded, and the day seemed to be rescued.  I continued to polish the
3149 slides until I suddenly discovered that the saved file could no longer
3150 be loaded into kpresenter.  In the end I had to rewrite the slides
3151 three times, condensing the content until the talk became shorter and
3152 shorter.  After the talk I was able to pinpoint the problem &ndash;
3153 kpresenter wrote inline images in a way itself could not understand.
3154 Eventually that bug was fixed and kpresenter ended up being a great
3155 program to make slides.  The point I'm trying to make is that we
3156 expect a program to be able to load its own data files, and it is
3157 embarrassing to its developers if it can't.</p>
3158
3159 <p>Did you ever experience a program failing to load its own data
3160 files from the desktop file browser?  It is not a uncommon problem.  A
3161 while back I discovered that the screencast recorder
3162 gtk-recordmydesktop would save an Ogg Theora video file the KDE file
3163 browser would refuse to open.  No video player claimed to understand
3164 such file.  I tracked down the cause being <tt>file --mime-type</tt>
3165 returning the application/ogg MIME type, which no video player I had
3166 installed listed as a MIME type they would understand.  I asked for
3167 <a href="http://bugs.gw.com/view.php?id=382">file to change its
3168 behavour</a> and use the MIME type video/ogg instead.  I also asked
3169 several video players to add video/ogg to their desktop files, to give
3170 the file browser an idea what to do about Ogg Theora files.  After a
3171 while, the desktop file browsers in Debian started to handle the
3172 output from gtk-recordmydesktop properly.</p>
3173
3174 <p>But history repeats itself.  A few days ago I tested the music
3175 system Rosegarden again, and I discovered that the KDE and xfce file
3176 browsers did not know what to do with the Rosegarden project files
3177 (*.rg).  I've reported <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/825993">the
3178 rosegarden problem to BTS</a> and a fix is commited to git and will be
3179 included in the next upload.  To increase the chance of me remembering
3180 how to fix the problem next time some program fail to load its files
3181 from the file browser, here are some notes on how to fix it.</p>
3182
3183 <p>The file browsers in Debian in general operates on MIME types.
3184 There are two sources for the MIME type of a given file.  The output from
3185 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> mentioned above, and the content of the
3186 shared MIME type registry (under /usr/share/mime/).  The file MIME
3187 type is mapped to programs supporting the MIME type, and this
3188 information is collected from
3189 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/desktop-entry-spec/">the
3190 desktop files</a> available in /usr/share/applications/.  If there is
3191 one desktop file claiming support for the MIME type of the file, it is
3192 activated when asking to open a given file.  If there are more, one
3193 can normally select which one to use by right-clicking on the file and
3194 selecting the wanted one using 'Open with' or similar.  In general
3195 this work well.  But it depend on each program picking a good MIME
3196 type (preferably
3197 <a href="http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">a
3198 MIME type registered with IANA</a>), file and/or the shared MIME
3199 registry recognizing the file and the desktop file to list the MIME
3200 type in its list of supported MIME types.</p>
3201
3202 <p>The <tt>/usr/share/mime/packages/rosegarden.xml</tt> entry for
3203 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/shared-mime-info-spec">the
3204 Shared MIME database</a> look like this:</p>
3205
3206 <p><blockquote><pre>
3207 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
3208 &lt;mime-info xmlns="http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info"&gt;
3209   &lt;mime-type type="audio/x-rosegarden"&gt;
3210     &lt;sub-class-of type="application/x-gzip"/&gt;
3211     &lt;comment&gt;Rosegarden project file&lt;/comment&gt;
3212     &lt;glob pattern="*.rg"/&gt;
3213   &lt;/mime-type&gt;
3214 &lt;/mime-info&gt;
3215 </pre></blockquote></p>
3216
3217 <p>This states that audio/x-rosegarden is a kind of application/x-gzip
3218 (it is a gzipped XML file).  Note, it is much better to use an
3219 official MIME type registered with IANA than it is to make up ones own
3220 unofficial ones like the x-rosegarden type used by rosegarden.</p>
3221
3222 <p>The desktop file of the rosegarden program failed to list
3223 audio/x-rosegarden in its list of supported MIME types, causing the
3224 file browsers to have no idea what to do with *.rg files:</p>
3225
3226 <p><blockquote><pre>
3227 % grep Mime /usr/share/applications/rosegarden.desktop
3228 MimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition;audio/x-rosegarden-device;audio/x-rosegarden-project;audio/x-rosegarden-template;audio/midi;
3229 X-KDE-NativeMimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition
3230 %
3231 </pre></blockquote></p>
3232
3233 <p>The fix was to add "audio/x-rosegarden;" at the end of the
3234 MimeType= line.</p>
3235
3236 <p>If you run into a file which fail to open the correct program when
3237 selected from the file browser, please check out the output from
3238 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> for the file, ensure the file ending and
3239 MIME type is registered somewhere under /usr/share/mime/ and check
3240 that some desktop file under /usr/share/applications/ is claiming
3241 support for this MIME type.  If not, please report a bug to have it
3242 fixed. :)</p>
3243
3244       </div>
3245       <div class="tags">
3246
3247
3248         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>.
3249
3250
3251       </div>
3252     </div>
3253     <div class="padding"></div>
3254
3255     <div class="entry">
3256       <div class="title">
3257         <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>
3258       </div>
3259       <div class="date">
3260         25th May 2016
3261       </div>
3262       <div class="body">
3263         <p><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">The isenkram
3264 system</a> is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware
3265 related packages.  The idea is to have a database of mappings between
3266 hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to
3267 install the packages to use a given hardware dongle.  Some use cases
3268 are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software
3269 needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it
3270 proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader;
3271 and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to
3272 install the driver for it.  The system work well, and even have a few
3273 command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the
3274 hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).</p>
3275
3276 <p>The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found
3277 good documentation and example code on how to use it.  But aptdaemon
3278 is going away and is generally being replaced by
3279 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/">PackageKit</a>,
3280 so Isenkram needed a rewrite.  And today, thanks to the great patch
3281 from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the
3282 rewrite finally took place.  I've just uploaded a new version of
3283 Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default
3284 for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit.  To check it out,
3285 install the <tt>isenkram</tt> package and insert some hardware dongle
3286 and see if it is recognised.</p>
3287
3288 <p>If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for
3289 the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup
3290 program.  This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:</p>
3291
3292 <p><blockquote><pre>
3293 % isenkram-lookup
3294 bluez
3295 cheese
3296 fprintd
3297 fprintd-demo
3298 gkrellm-thinkbat
3299 hdapsd
3300 libpam-fprintd
3301 pidgin-blinklight
3302 thinkfan
3303 tleds
3304 tp-smapi-dkms
3305 tp-smapi-source
3306 tpb
3307 %p
3308 </pre></blockquote></p>
3309
3310 <p>The hardware mappings come from several places.  The preferred way
3311 is for packages to announce their hardware support using
3312 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
3313 cross distribution appstream system</a>.
3314 See
3315 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">previous
3316 blog posts about isenkram</a> to learn how to do that.</p>
3317
3318       </div>
3319       <div class="tags">
3320
3321
3322         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>.
3323
3324
3325       </div>
3326     </div>
3327     <div class="padding"></div>
3328
3329     <div class="entry">
3330       <div class="title">
3331         <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>
3332       </div>
3333       <div class="date">
3334         23rd May 2016
3335       </div>
3336       <div class="body">
3337         <p>Yesterday I updated the
3338 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats
3339 package in Debian</a> with a few patches sent to me by skilled and
3340 enterprising users.  There were some nice user and visible changes.
3341 First of all, both desktop menu entries now work.  A design flaw in
3342 one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was
3343 dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available.
3344 The script worked when called from the command line, but not when
3345 called from the desktop menu.  I changed this to look for a DISPLAY
3346 variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the
3347 graph window pop up as expected.</p>
3348
3349 <p>The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the
3350 graphs (the one showing the last few hours).  New is also the user of
3351 colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red.  The percentages
3352 of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design
3353 capacity.</p>
3354
3355 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-rate.png"/></p>
3356
3357 <p>The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery
3358 statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to
3359 visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time.  The red
3360 line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent:
3361
3362 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-history.png"/></p>
3363
3364 <p>In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80
3365 percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is
3366 shrinking. :(</p>
3367
3368 <p>The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle
3369 more hardware models.  On some hardware, Linux power supply
3370 information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the
3371 collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/.  Now
3372 both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the
3373 machine.</p>
3374
3375 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
3376 check out the
3377 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
3378 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
3379 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from <a
3380 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3381 Patches are very welcome.</p>
3382
3383 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
3384 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
3385 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
3386
3387       </div>
3388       <div class="tags">
3389
3390
3391         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>.
3392
3393
3394       </div>
3395     </div>
3396     <div class="padding"></div>
3397
3398     <div class="entry">
3399       <div class="title">
3400         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_with_ZFS_on_Linux_included.html">Debian now with ZFS on Linux included</a>
3401       </div>
3402       <div class="date">
3403         12th May 2016
3404       </div>
3405       <div class="body">
3406         <p>Today, after many years of hard work from many people,
3407 <a href="http://zfsonlinux.org/">ZFS for Linux</a> finally entered
3408 Debian.  The package status can be seen on
3409 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/zfs-linux">the package tracker
3410 for zfs-linux</a>.  and
3411 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
3412 team status page</a>. If you want to help out, please join us.
3413 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">The
3414 source code</a> is available via git on Alioth.  It would also be
3415 great if you could help out with
3416 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/dkms">the dkms package</a>, as
3417 it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.</p>
3418
3419       </div>
3420       <div class="tags">
3421
3422
3423         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>.
3424
3425
3426       </div>
3427     </div>
3428     <div class="padding"></div>
3429
3430     <div class="entry">
3431       <div class="title">
3432         <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>
3433       </div>
3434       <div class="date">
3435          8th May 2016
3436       </div>
3437       <div class="body">
3438         <p><strong>Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in
3439 Debian claim support for most file formats.</strong></p>
3440
3441 <p>A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser
3442 plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian
3443 Edu.  I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types
3444 for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser
3445 plugin supported most file formats / media types.
3446 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">The
3447 result</a> can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have
3448 not been updated for a while.  But browser plugins are less relevant
3449 these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone
3450 players.</p>
3451
3452 <p>A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable
3453 player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National
3454 Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why.  The cause is a
3455 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/822245">missing MIME type in the VLC
3456 desktop file</a>.  In the process I wrote a script to compare the set
3457 of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin,
3458 only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the
3459 two for VLC.  This discovery made me dig up the script I used to
3460 compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files
3461 instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian
3462 support most file formats.</p>
3463
3464 <p>The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as
3465 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">a
3466 table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included
3467 in the table</a>, with the package supporting most MIME types being
3468 listed first in the table.</p>
3469
3470 </p>The best multimedia player in Debian?  It is totem, followed by
3471 parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and
3472 kmplayer.  Time for the other players to update their announced MIME
3473 support?</p>
3474
3475       </div>
3476       <div class="tags">
3477
3478
3479         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>.
3480
3481
3482       </div>
3483     </div>
3484     <div class="padding"></div>
3485
3486     <div class="entry">
3487       <div class="title">
3488         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Pyra___handheld_computer_with_Debian_preinstalled.html">The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled</a>
3489       </div>
3490       <div class="date">
3491          4th May 2016
3492       </div>
3493       <div class="body">
3494         A friend of mine made me aware of
3495 <a href="https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/">The Pyra</a>, a
3496 handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled.  I
3497 would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)</p>
3498
3499 <p>The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB
3500 plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5"
3501 LCD touch screen.  The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole
3502 day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests
3503 confirming this.  The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the
3504 last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before
3505 production started.</p>
3506
3507 <p>As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with
3508 Debian.  Please let me know if you know of any others.  Is it the
3509 first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?</p>
3510
3511       </div>
3512       <div class="tags">
3513
3514
3515         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>.
3516
3517
3518       </div>
3519     </div>
3520     <div class="padding"></div>
3521
3522     <div class="entry">
3523       <div class="title">
3524         <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>
3525       </div>
3526       <div class="date">
3527         10th April 2016
3528       </div>
3529       <div class="body">
3530         <p>During this weekends
3531 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Oslo__Takk_for_feilfiksingsfesten.shtml">bug
3532 squashing party and developer gathering</a>, we decided to do our part
3533 to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian
3534 Bokmål, and got in touch with the people behind the
3535 <a href="http://debian-handbook.info/">Debian Administrator's Handbook
3536 project</a> to get started.  If you want to help out, please start
3537 contributing using
3538 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
3539 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
3540 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
3541 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
3542 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
3543 contributors</a>.</p>
3544
3545 <p>The book is already available on paper in English, French and
3546 Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian
3547 Bokmål too.  In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and
3548 Mobi versions available.  And there are incomplete translations
3549 available for many more languages.</p>
3550
3551       </div>
3552       <div class="tags">
3553
3554
3555         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>.
3556
3557
3558       </div>
3559     </div>
3560     <div class="padding"></div>
3561
3562     <div class="entry">
3563       <div class="title">
3564         <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>
3565       </div>
3566       <div class="date">
3567          7th April 2016
3568       </div>
3569       <div class="body">
3570         <p>Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related
3571 packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found.  I use
3572 ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so.
3573 But I might be wrong.</p>
3574
3575 <p>According to
3576 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=spl-linux">the popcon
3577 results for spl-linux</a>, there are 1019 Debian installations, or
3578 0.53% of the population, with the package installed.  As far as I know
3579 the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS
3580 on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS
3581 installation on Linux in Debian.  In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian
3582 the ZFS feature is already available, and there
3583 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=zfsutils">the popcon
3584 results for zfsutils</a> show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of
3585 the population.  So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.</p>
3586
3587 <p>But even though the Debian project leader Lucas Nussbaum
3588 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2015/04/msg00006.html">announced
3589 in April 2015</a> that the legal obstacles blocking ZFS on Debian were
3590 cleared, the package is still not in Debian.  The package is again in
3591 the NEW queue.  Several uploads have been rejected so far because the
3592 debian/copyright file was incomplete or wrong, but there is no reason
3593 to give up.  The current status can be seen on
3594 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
3595 team status page</a>, and
3596 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">the
3597 source code</a> is available on Alioth.</p>
3598
3599 <p>As I want ZFS to be included in next version of Debian to make sure
3600 my home server can function in the future using only official Debian
3601 packages, and the current blocker is to get the debian/copyright file
3602 accepted by the FTP masters in Debian, I decided a while back to try
3603 to help out the team.  This was the background for my blog post about
3604 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">creating,
3605 updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>, and I
3606 used the techniques I explored there to try to find any errors in the
3607 copyright file.  It is not very easy to check every one of the around
3608 2000 files in the source package, but I hope we this time got it
3609 right.  If you want to help out, check out the git source and try to
3610 find missing entries in the debian/copyright file.</p>
3611
3612       </div>
3613       <div class="tags">
3614
3615
3616         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>.
3617
3618
3619       </div>
3620     </div>
3621     <div class="padding"></div>
3622
3623     <div class="entry">
3624       <div class="title">
3625         <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>
3626       </div>
3627       <div class="date">
3628         23rd March 2016
3629       </div>
3630       <div class="body">
3631         <p>Since this morning, the battery-stats package in Debian include an
3632 extended collector that will collect the complete battery history for
3633 later processing and graphing.  The original collector store the
3634 battery level as percentage of last full level, while the new
3635 collector also record battery vendor, model, serial number, design
3636 full level, last full level and current battery level.  This make it
3637 possible to predict the lifetime of the battery as well as visualise
3638 the energy flow when the battery is charging or discharging.</p>
3639
3640 <p>The new tools are available in <tt>/usr/share/battery-stats/</tt>
3641 in the version 0.5.1 package in unstable.  Get the new battery level graph
3642 and lifetime prediction by running:
3643
3644 <p><pre>
3645 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph /var/log/battery-stats.csv
3646 </pre></p>
3647
3648 <p>Or select the 'Battery Level Graph' from your application menu.</p>
3649
3650 <p>The flow in/out of the battery can be seen by running (no menu
3651 entry yet):</p>
3652
3653 <p><pre>
3654 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph-flow
3655 </pre></p>
3656
3657 <p>I'm not quite happy with the way the data is visualised, at least
3658 when there are few data points.  The graphs look a bit better with a
3659 few years of data.</p>
3660
3661 <p>A while back one important feature I use in the battery stats
3662 collector broke in Debian.  The scripts in
3663 <tt>/usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/</tt> were no longer executed.  I
3664 suspect it happened when Jessie started using systemd, but I do not
3665 know.  The issue is reported as
3666 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/818649">bug #818649</a> against
3667 pm-utils.  I managed to work around it by adding an udev rule to call
3668 the collector script every time the power connector is connected and
3669 disconnected.  With this fix in place it was finally time to make a
3670 new release of the package, and get it into Debian.</p>
3671
3672 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
3673 check out the
3674 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
3675 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
3676 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from
3677 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3678 As always, patches are very welcome.</p>
3679
3680       </div>
3681       <div class="tags">
3682
3683
3684         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>.
3685
3686
3687       </div>
3688     </div>
3689     <div class="padding"></div>
3690
3691     <div class="entry">
3692       <div class="title">
3693         <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>
3694       </div>
3695       <div class="date">
3696         15th March 2016
3697       </div>
3698       <div class="body">
3699         <p>Back in September, I blogged about
3700 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">the
3701 system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery</a>, and
3702 how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced).  I
3703 created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing,
3704 but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already
3705 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">a battery-stats
3706 package in Debian</a> that should do the same thing, and I did not see
3707 a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be
3708 fixed instead.  I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and
3709 hoped someone would step in and fix it.  But no-one did.</p>
3710
3711 <p>I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own
3712 hands.  The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of
3713 battery stats (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">available from github</a>) and part of the team maintaining
3714 battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally
3715 able to collect battery status using the <tt>/sys/class/power_supply/</tt>
3716 information provided by the Linux kernel.  If you install the
3717 battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a
3718 graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the
3719 status of the battery.  The source package build and work just fine in
3720 Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not
3721 tested).  The default graph you get for that system look like this:</p>
3722
3723 <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>
3724
3725 <p>My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the
3726 battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details
3727 about the battery.  The scripts are merged into the upstream
3728 battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work
3729 yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way.  Will have to test a
3730 bit more before I make a new release.</p>
3731
3732 <p>I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I
3733 suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it
3734 impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing
3735 and graphing.</p>
3736
3737 <p>If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop
3738 battery, check out the battery-stats package in
3739 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">Debian</a> and
3740 on
3741 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3742 I would love some help to improve the system further.</p>
3743
3744       </div>
3745       <div class="tags">
3746
3747
3748         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>.
3749
3750
3751       </div>
3752     </div>
3753     <div class="padding"></div>
3754
3755     <div class="entry">
3756       <div class="title">
3757         <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>
3758       </div>
3759       <div class="date">
3760         19th February 2016
3761       </div>
3762       <div class="body">
3763         <p>Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to
3764 details.  And one of the details is the content of the
3765 debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by
3766 the code in the package in question, preferably in
3767 <a href="https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/">machine
3768 readable DEP5 format</a>.</p>
3769
3770 <p>For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write
3771 and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the
3772 package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters.  So getting it right
3773 the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save
3774 both you and the ftpmasters some work..  Today, while trying to figure
3775 out what was wrong with
3776 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=686447">the
3777 zfsonlinux copyright file</a>, I decided to spend some time on
3778 figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least
3779 semi-automatically.</p>
3780
3781 <p>Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the
3782 file based on the code in the source package,
3783 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/debmake">debmake</a></tt>
3784 and <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cme">cme</a></tt>.  I'm
3785 not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to
3786 create a sensible draft file.  As far as I can tell, none of them can
3787 be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be
3788 polished a bit before the file is OK to upload.  I found the debmake
3789 option in
3790 <a href="http://goofying-with-debian.blogspot.com/2014/07/debmake-checking-source-against-dep-5.html">a
3791 blog posts from 2014</a>.
3792
3793 <p>To generate using debmake, use the -cc option:
3794
3795 <p><pre>
3796 debmake -cc > debian/copyright
3797 </pre></p>
3798
3799 <p>Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so
3800 this might not be the best option.</p>
3801
3802 <p>The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found
3803 this approach in
3804 <a href="https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2015/04/05/improving-creation-of-debian-copyright-file/">a
3805 blog post from 2015</a>.  To generate using cme, use the 'update
3806 dpkg-copyright' option:
3807
3808 <p><pre>
3809 cme update dpkg-copyright
3810 </pre></p>
3811
3812 <p>This will create or update debian/copyright.  The cme tool seem to
3813 handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.</p>
3814
3815 <p>When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to
3816 check if the file is correct.  For this I found two good options,
3817 <tt>debmake -k</tt> and <tt>license-reconcile</tt>.  The former seem
3818 to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect
3819 ineffective blocks in the copyright file.  The latter reports missing
3820 copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license
3821 names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0).  I suspect it is good to use both and
3822 fix all issues reported by them before uploading.  But I do not know
3823 if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a
3824 copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.</p>
3825
3826 <p>The devscripts tool <tt>licensecheck</tt> deserve mentioning.  It
3827 will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements.
3828 It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but
3829 can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.</p>
3830
3831 <p>Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update
3832 debian/copyright file.  Please let me know, or blog about it on
3833 planet.debian.org.</p>
3834
3835 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
3836 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
3837 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
3838
3839 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-20</strong>: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel
3840 on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file
3841
3842 <p><pre>
3843 licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
3844   /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
3845 </pre></p>
3846
3847 <p>He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the
3848 version control system to make it easier to discover license and
3849 copyright changes in the upstream source.  I will try to do the same
3850 with my packages in the future.</p>
3851
3852 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-21</strong>: The cme author recommended
3853 against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed
3854 command line.</p>
3855
3856       </div>
3857       <div class="tags">
3858
3859
3860         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>.
3861
3862
3863       </div>
3864     </div>
3865     <div class="padding"></div>
3866
3867     <div class="entry">
3868       <div class="title">
3869         <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>
3870       </div>
3871       <div class="date">
3872          4th February 2016
3873       </div>
3874       <div class="body">
3875         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">appstream system</a>
3876 is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very
3877 convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given
3878 firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it.  This can
3879 be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog
3880 about. :)</p>
3881
3882 <p>Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware
3883 file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly
3884 picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian
3885 unstable.  In general you would be looking for the firmware requested
3886 by the kernel during kernel module loading.  To find the package
3887 providing the example file, do like this:</p>
3888
3889 <blockquote><pre>
3890 % apt install appstream
3891 [...]
3892 % apt update
3893 [...]
3894 % appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
3895   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
3896 firmware-qlogic
3897 %
3898 </pre></blockquote>
3899
3900 <p>See <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">the
3901 appstream wiki</a> page to learn how to embed the package metadata in
3902 a way appstream can use.</p>
3903
3904 <p>This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a
3905 given MIME type.  This is very useful when you get a file you do not
3906 know how to handle.  First find the mime type using <tt>file
3907 --mime-type</tt>, and next look up the package providing support for
3908 it.  Lets say you got an SVG file.  Its MIME type is image/svg+xml,
3909 and you can find all packages handling this type like this:</p>
3910
3911 <blockquote><pre>
3912 % apt install appstream
3913 [...]
3914 % apt update
3915 [...]
3916 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
3917   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
3918 bkchem
3919 phototonic
3920 inkscape
3921 shutter
3922 tetzle
3923 geeqie
3924 xia
3925 pinta
3926 gthumb
3927 karbon
3928 comix
3929 mirage
3930 viewnior
3931 postr
3932 ristretto
3933 kolourpaint4
3934 eog
3935 eom
3936 gimagereader
3937 midori
3938 %
3939 </pre></blockquote>
3940
3941 <p>I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for
3942 packages providing appstream metadata.</p>
3943
3944       </div>
3945       <div class="tags">
3946
3947
3948         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>.
3949
3950
3951       </div>
3952     </div>
3953     <div class="padding"></div>
3954
3955     <div class="entry">
3956       <div class="title">
3957         <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>
3958       </div>
3959       <div class="date">
3960         24th January 2016
3961       </div>
3962       <div class="body">
3963         <p>Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around
3964 with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their
3965 position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long
3966 time (like every time a SMS is received or sent).  And if their
3967 computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called
3968 mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often
3969 also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access
3970 during installation).  And when these programs send out information to
3971 central collection points, the location is often included, unless
3972 extra care is taken to not send the location.  The provided
3973 information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is
3974 good and bad, depend on your point of view).  What is certain, is that
3975 the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and
3976 perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way,
3977 when they share their whereabouts with private and public
3978 entities.</p>
3979
3980 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-01-24-nice-creepy-desktop-window.png"></p>
3981
3982 <p>The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out
3983 when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing.  It is
3984 unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government
3985 officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from
3986 unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information.  But the
3987 public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software
3988 tool to do so is called
3989 <a href="http://www.geocreepy.com/">Creepy or Cree.py</a>.  I
3990 discovered it when I read
3991 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Slik-kan-du-bli-overvaket-pa-Twitter-og-Instagram-uten-a-ane-det-7787884.html">an
3992 article about Creepy</a> in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i
3993 November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian.
3994 The python program was in Debian, but
3995 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/creepy">the version in
3996 Debian</a> was completely broken and practically unmaintained.  I
3997 uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not
3998 have time to fix it then.  This Christmas I decided to finally try to
3999 get Creepy operational in Debian.  Now a fixed version is available in
4000 Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches
4001 are now included
4002 <a href="https://github.com/jkakavas/creepy">upstream</a>.</p>
4003
4004 <p>The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from
4005 Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a
4006 complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a
4007 given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all
4008 these services.  Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at
4009 least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these
4010 days it is impossible.  This mean that to use Creepy, you need to
4011 configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide
4012 information to them about your search interests.  This should be taken
4013 into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information
4014 about yourself with the services.</p>
4015
4016 <p>The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least
4017 geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital
4018 of Norway.  One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at
4019 information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the
4020 information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area.
4021 I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in
4022 twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a
4023 Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time,
4024 making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other
4025 things.  A similar technique have been
4026 <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl">used
4027 to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine</a>, and it is both a powerful
4028 tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people
4029 understand the value of the private information they provide to the
4030 public.</p>
4031
4032 <p>The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as
4033 it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at
4034 least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and
4035 python-requests-toolbelt).</p>
4036
4037 <p>(I have uploaded
4038 <a href="https://screenshots.debian.net/package/creepy">the image to
4039 screenshots.debian.net</a> and licensed it under the same terms as the
4040 Creepy program in Debian.)</p>
4041
4042       </div>
4043       <div class="tags">
4044
4045
4046         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>.
4047
4048
4049       </div>
4050     </div>
4051     <div class="padding"></div>
4052
4053     <div class="entry">
4054       <div class="title">
4055         <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>
4056       </div>
4057       <div class="date">
4058         15th January 2016
4059       </div>
4060       <div class="body">
4061         <p>During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum
4062 <a href="https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/meeting/331/what-is-to-be-done/">observed
4063 that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to
4064 believe a computer have a given security hole</a> if it download a
4065 security fix from a Debian mirror.  This is a good reason to always
4066 use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those
4067 listening do not know which IP address to attack.  In August, Richard
4068 Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible
4069 to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that
4070 download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and
4071 <a href="http://richardhartmann.de/blog/posts/2015/08/24-Tor-enabled_Debian_mirror/">proposed
4072 to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror</a>.  He
4073 was not the first to propose this, as the
4074 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/apt-transport-tor">apt-transport-tor</a></tt>
4075 package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt
4076 to use <a href="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</a>, but I was not
4077 aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.</p>
4078
4079 <p>Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian
4080 sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central
4081 Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making
4082 it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes,
4083 making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.</p>
4084
4085 <p>Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by
4086 installing <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> and replacing http and https
4087 urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead
4088 of the official Debian mirror site.  I recommend installing
4089 <tt>etckeeper</tt> before you start to have a history of the changes
4090 done in /etc/.</p>
4091
4092 <blockquote><pre>
4093 apt install apt-transport-tor
4094 sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
4095 sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
4096 </pre></blockquote>
4097
4098 <p>If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run
4099 the sed commands for these too.  The sed command is assuming your are
4100 using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror.  Adjust the command (or just
4101 edit the file manually) to match your mirror.</p>
4102
4103 <p>This work in Debian Jessie and later.  Note that tools like
4104 <tt>apt-file</tt> only recently started using the apt transport
4105 system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs.  For
4106 <tt>apt-file</tt> you need the version currently in experimental,
4107 which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable.  So if you
4108 need a working <tt>apt-file</tt>, this is not for you.</p>
4109
4110 <p>Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start
4111 using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you
4112 update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus
4113 masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine.  Using Tor will
4114 become normal for the machine in question.</p>
4115
4116 <p>On <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox</a>, APT
4117 is set up by default to use <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> when Tor is
4118 enabled.  It would be great if it was the default on any Debian
4119 system.</p>
4120
4121       </div>
4122       <div class="tags">
4123
4124
4125         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>.
4126
4127
4128       </div>
4129     </div>
4130     <div class="padding"></div>
4131
4132     <div class="entry">
4133       <div class="title">
4134         <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>
4135       </div>
4136       <div class="date">
4137         23rd December 2015
4138       </div>
4139       <div class="body">
4140         <p>When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to
4141 call the car license plate numbers in those days.  I would write the
4142 numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids
4143 to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some
4144 exotic or special region codes and numbers.  It was a fun game to pass
4145 time, as we kids have plenty of it.</p>
4146
4147 <p>A few days I came across
4148 <a href="https://github.com/openalpr/openalpr">the OpenALPR
4149 project</a>, a free software project to automatically discover and
4150 report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the
4151 "car numbers" in a machine readable format.  I've been looking for
4152 such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the
4153 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition">automatic
4154 number plate recognition</a> tool only is available in the hands of
4155 the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to
4156 even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance.  I
4157 discovered the developer
4158 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/747509">wanted to get the tool into
4159 Debian</a>, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to
4160 help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian
4161 archive.</p>
4162
4163 <p>Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded
4164 it into Debian, where it currently
4165 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org//new/openalpr_2.2.1-1.html">waits
4166 in the NEW queue</a> for review by the Debian ftpmasters.</p>
4167
4168 <p>I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful
4169 for the common folks, ie those not running a large government
4170 surveillance system?  Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike
4171 and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified
4172 when number plates on my watch list are discovered.  Another use case
4173 was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home
4174 to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his
4175 car.  When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone
4176 capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to
4177 open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway.  I
4178 guess for such use case it make sense.  I am sure there are other use
4179 cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.</p>
4180
4181 <p>If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check
4182 out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/
4183 before running "debuild" to build the source.  Or wait a bit until the
4184 package show up in unstable.</p>
4185
4186       </div>
4187       <div class="tags">
4188
4189
4190         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>.
4191
4192
4193       </div>
4194     </div>
4195     <div class="padding"></div>
4196
4197     <div class="entry">
4198       <div class="title">
4199         <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>
4200       </div>
4201       <div class="date">
4202         20th December 2015
4203       </div>
4204       <div class="body">
4205         <p>Around three years ago, I created
4206 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the isenkram
4207 system</a> to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing
4208 hardware related packages.  A GUI system in the isenkram package will
4209 present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by
4210 relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine.  The same
4211 lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line
4212 tools in the isenkram-cli package.  In addition to mapping hardware,
4213 it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to
4214 install needed firmware packages automatically.  The key for this
4215 system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other
4216 words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work
4217 with.</p>
4218
4219 <p>I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and
4220 adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run
4221 time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available.
4222 I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in
4223 the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I
4224 was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings,
4225 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
4226 appstream system</a> was announced.  I got in touch and suggested to
4227 add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use
4228 appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the
4229 Debian version of appstream.</p>
4230
4231 <p>A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible,
4232 and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for
4233 appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages.  The only
4234 package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my
4235 pymissile package.  I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out
4236 how do add the required
4237 <a href="https://appstream.debian.org/html/sid/main/metainfo/pymissile.html">metadata
4238 in pymissile</a>.  I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with
4239 this content:</p>
4240
4241 <blockquote><pre>
4242 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
4243 &lt;component&gt;
4244   &lt;id&gt;pymissile&lt;/id&gt;
4245   &lt;metadata_license&gt;MIT&lt;/metadata_license&gt;
4246   &lt;name&gt;pymissile&lt;/name&gt;
4247   &lt;summary&gt;Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher&lt;/summary&gt;
4248   &lt;description&gt;
4249     &lt;p&gt;
4250       Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
4251       Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
4252       motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
4253       launcher.
4254     &lt;/p&gt;
4255   &lt;/description&gt;
4256   &lt;provides&gt;
4257     &lt;modalias&gt;usb:v1130p0202d*&lt;/modalias&gt;
4258   &lt;/provides&gt;
4259 &lt;/component&gt;
4260 </pre></blockquote>
4261
4262 <p>The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value,
4263 which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings
4264 (modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel.  In this case, it
4265 will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code
4266 0202.</p>
4267
4268 <p>Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files
4269 are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide
4270 appstream files.  Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for
4271 these files.  A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as
4272 it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions
4273 (in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use).  But
4274 it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as
4275 upstream for this project is dormant.</p>
4276
4277 <p>To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the
4278 mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the
4279 appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary
4280 package under /usr/share/appdata/.  I did this by adding the following
4281 line to debian/pymissile.install:</p>
4282
4283 <blockquote><pre>
4284 debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
4285 </pre></blockquote>
4286
4287 <p>With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list
4288 all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI
4289 pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already
4290 installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in
4291 question.</p>
4292
4293 <p>Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the
4294 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a> proposal.</p>
4295
4296 <p>To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine,
4297 try running this command on the command line:</p>
4298
4299 <blockquote><pre>
4300 cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
4301 </pre></blockquote>
4302
4303 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
4304 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
4305 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
4306
4307       </div>
4308       <div class="tags">
4309
4310
4311         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>.
4312
4313
4314       </div>
4315     </div>
4316     <div class="padding"></div>
4317
4318     <div class="entry">
4319       <div class="title">
4320         <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>
4321       </div>
4322       <div class="date">
4323         30th November 2015
4324       </div>
4325       <div class="body">
4326         <p>A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled
4327 "<a href="http://bonedaddy.net/pabs3/log/2015/11/27/sfc-supporter/">The
4328 GPL is not magic pixie dust</a>" explain the importance of making sure
4329 the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GPL</a> is enforced.
4330 I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:<p>
4331
4332 <blockquote>
4333
4334 <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>
4335
4336 <blockquote>
4337 The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.<br/>
4338
4339 The first step is to choose a
4340 <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft</a> license for your
4341 code.<br/>
4342
4343 The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license,
4344 <b>it must be enforced</b><br/>
4345
4346 and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of
4347 work<br/>
4348
4349 is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do.
4350 </blockquote>
4351
4352 <p><small>-- <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/">Bradley Kuhn</a>, in
4353 <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in Freedom">FaiF</a>
4354 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode
4355 0x57</a></small></p>
4356
4357 <p>As the Debian Website
4358 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/794116">used</a>
4359 <a href="https://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/webwml/webwml/english/intro/free.wml?r1=1.24&amp;r2=1.25">to</a>
4360 imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to
4361 the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful
4362 software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or
4363 software products.  Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created
4364 to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but
4365 such licenses are not enough.  With the ongoing adoption of Free
4366 Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's
4367 expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of
4368 ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always.  As Karen
4369 and Bradley explained in <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in
4370 Freedom">FaiF</a>
4371 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode 0x57</a>,
4372 copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court
4373 to protect it.  The reality of today's world is that legal
4374 representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming.  With
4375 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/">gpl-violations.org</a> in hiatus
4376 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/news/20151027-homepage-recovers/">until</a>
4377 some time in 2016, the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software
4378 Freedom Conservancy</a> (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender
4379 of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations.
4380 In March the SFC supported a
4381 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">lawsuit
4382 by Christoph Hellwig</a> against VMware for refusing to
4383 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/vmware-lawsuit-faq.html">comply
4384 with the GPL</a> in relation to their use of parts of the Linux
4385 kernel.  Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and
4386 conferences
4387 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">blocked
4388 or cancelled their talks</a>.  As a result they have decided to rely
4389 less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of
4390 individuals who support Free Software and copyleft.  So the SFC has
4391 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/23/2015fundraiser/">launched</a>
4392 a <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">campaign</a> to create
4393 a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by
4394 supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free
4395 Software.</p>
4396
4397 <p>If you support Free Software,
4398 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/26/like-what-I-do/">like</a>
4399 what the SFC do, agree with their
4400 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">compliance
4401 principles</a>, are happy about their
4402 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">successes</a> in 2015,
4403 work on a project that is an SFC
4404 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/members/current/">member</a> and or
4405 just want to stand up for copyleft, please join
4406 <a href="https://identi.ca/cwebber/image/JQGPA4qbTyyp3-MY8QpvuA">Christopher
4407 Allan Webber</a>,
4408 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">Carol
4409 Smith</a>,
4410 <a href="http://www.jonobacon.org/2015/11/25/supporting-software-freedom-conservancy/">Jono
4411 Bacon</a>, myself and
4412 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/sponsors/#supporters">others</a> in
4413 becoming a
4414 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">supporter</a>.  For the
4415 next week your donation will be
4416 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/27/black-friday/">matched</a>
4417 by an anonymous donor.  Please also consider asking your employer to
4418 match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC.  Don't forget to
4419 spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or
4420 social media accounts.</p>
4421
4422 </blockquote>
4423
4424 <p>I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter
4425 of Software Freedom Conservancy myself.  Perhaps you should be a
4426 supporter too?</p>
4427
4428       </div>
4429       <div class="tags">
4430
4431
4432         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>.
4433
4434
4435       </div>
4436     </div>
4437     <div class="padding"></div>
4438
4439     <div class="entry">
4440       <div class="title">
4441         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/PGP_key_transition_statement_for_key_EE4E02F9.html">PGP key transition statement for key EE4E02F9</a>
4442       </div>
4443       <div class="date">
4444         17th November 2015
4445       </div>
4446       <div class="body">
4447         <p>I've needed a new OpenPGP key for a while, but have not had time to
4448 set it up properly.  I wanted to generate it offline and have it
4449 available on <a href="http://shop.kernelconcepts.de/#openpgp">a OpenPGP
4450 smart card</a> for daily use, and learning how to do it and finding
4451 time to sit down with an offline machine almost took forever.  But
4452 finally I've been able to complete the process, and have now moved
4453 from my old GPG key to a new GPG key.  See
4454 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-11-17-new-gpg-key-transition.txt">the
4455 full transition statement, signed with both my old and new key</a> for
4456 the details.  This is my new key:</p>
4457
4458 <pre>
4459 pub   3936R/<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/111D6B29EE4E02F9.html">111D6B29EE4E02F9</a> 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-14]
4460       Key fingerprint = 3AC7 B2E3 ACA5 DF87 78F1  D827 111D 6B29 EE4E 02F9
4461 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
4462 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@debian.org&gt;
4463 sub   4096R/87BAFB0E 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4464 sub   4096R/F91E6DE9 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4465 sub   4096R/A0439BAB 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4466 </pre>
4467
4468 <p>The key can be downloaded from the OpenPGP key servers, signed by
4469 my old key.</p>
4470
4471 <p>If you signed my old key
4472 (<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/DB4CCC4B2A30D729.html">DB4CCC4B2A30D729</a>),
4473 I'd very much appreciate a signature on my new key, details and
4474 instructions in the transition statement. I m happy to reciprocate if
4475 you have a similarly signed transition statement to present.</p>
4476
4477       </div>
4478       <div class="tags">
4479
4480
4481         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>.
4482
4483
4484       </div>
4485     </div>
4486     <div class="padding"></div>
4487
4488     <div class="entry">
4489       <div class="title">
4490         <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>
4491       </div>
4492       <div class="date">
4493         24th September 2015
4494       </div>
4495       <div class="body">
4496         <p>When I get a new laptop, the battery life time at the start is OK.
4497 But this do not last.  The last few laptops gave me a feeling that
4498 within a year, the life time is just a fraction of what it used to be,
4499 and it slowly become painful to use the laptop without power connected
4500 all the time.  Because of this, when I got a new Thinkpad X230 laptop
4501 about two years ago, I decided to monitor its battery state to have
4502 more hard facts when the battery started to fail.</p>
4503
4504 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-24-laptop-battery-graph.png"/>
4505
4506 <p>First I tried to find a sensible Debian package to record the
4507 battery status, assuming that this must be a problem already handled
4508 by someone else.  I found
4509 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>,
4510 which collects statistics from the battery, but it was completely
4511 broken.  I sent a few suggestions to the maintainer, but decided to
4512 write my own collector as a shell script while I waited for feedback
4513 from him.  Via
4514 <a href="http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html">a
4515 blog post about the battery development on a MacBook Air</a> I also
4516 discovered
4517 <a href="https://github.com/jradavenport/batlog.git">batlog</a>, not
4518 available in Debian.</p>
4519
4520 <p>I started my collector 2013-07-15, and it has been collecting
4521 battery stats ever since. Now my
4522 /var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log file contain around 115,000
4523 measurements, from the time the battery was working great until now,
4524 when it is unable to charge above 7% of original capacity.  My
4525 collector shell script is quite simple and look like this:</p>
4526
4527 <pre>
4528 #!/bin/sh
4529 # Inspired by
4530 # http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html
4531 # See also
4532 # http://blog.sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/01/02/debian-how-to-monitor-battery-capacity/
4533 logfile=/var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log
4534
4535 files="manufacturer model_name technology serial_number \
4536     energy_full energy_full_design energy_now cycle_count status"
4537
4538 if [ ! -e "$logfile" ] ; then
4539     (
4540         printf "timestamp,"
4541         for f in $files; do
4542             printf "%s," $f
4543         done
4544         echo
4545     ) > "$logfile"
4546 fi
4547
4548 log_battery() {
4549     # Print complete message in one echo call, to avoid race condition
4550     # when several log processes run in parallel.
4551     msg=$(printf "%s," $(date +%s); \
4552         for f in $files; do \
4553             printf "%s," $(cat $f); \
4554         done)
4555     echo "$msg"
4556 }
4557
4558 cd /sys/class/power_supply
4559
4560 for bat in BAT*; do
4561     (cd $bat && log_battery >> "$logfile")
4562 done
4563 </pre>
4564
4565 <p>The script is called when the power management system detect a
4566 change in the power status (power plug in or out), and when going into
4567 and out of hibernation and suspend.  In addition, it collect a value
4568 every 10 minutes.  This make it possible for me know when the battery
4569 is discharging, charging and how the maximum charge change over time.
4570 The code for the Debian package
4571 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-status">is now
4572 available on github</a>.</p>
4573
4574 <p>The collected log file look like this:</p>
4575
4576 <pre>
4577 timestamp,manufacturer,model_name,technology,serial_number,energy_full,energy_full_design,energy_now,cycle_count,status,
4578 1376591133,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,62800000,62160000,39050000,0,Discharging,
4579 [...]
4580 1443090528,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
4581 1443090601,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
4582 </pre>
4583
4584 <p>I wrote a small script to create a graph of the charge development
4585 over time.  This graph depicted above show the slow death of my laptop
4586 battery.</p>
4587
4588 <p>But why is this happening?  Why are my laptop batteries always
4589 dying in a year or two, while the batteries of space probes and
4590 satellites keep working year after year.  If we are to believe
4591 <a href="http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries">Battery
4592 University</a>, the cause is me charging the battery whenever I have a
4593 chance, and the fix is to not charge the Lithium-ion batteries to 100%
4594 all the time, but to stay below 90% of full charge most of the time.
4595 I've been told that the Tesla electric cars
4596 <a href="http://my.teslamotors.com/de_CH/forum/forums/battery-charge-limit">limit
4597 the charge of their batteries to 80%</a>, with the option to charge to
4598 100% when preparing for a longer trip (not that I would want a car
4599 like Tesla where rights to privacy is abandoned, but that is another
4600 story), which I guess is the option we should have for laptops on
4601 Linux too.</p>
4602
4603 <p>Is there a good and generic way with Linux to tell the battery to
4604 stop charging at 80%, unless requested to charge to 100% once in
4605 preparation for a longer trip?  I found
4606 <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/34452/how-can-i-limit-battery-charging-to-80-capacity">one
4607 recipe on askubuntu for Ubuntu to limit charging on Thinkpad to
4608 80%</a>, but could not get it to work (kernel module refused to
4609 load).</p>
4610
4611 <p>I wonder why the battery capacity was reported to be more than 100%
4612 at the start.  I also wonder why the "full capacity" increases some
4613 times, and if it is possible to repeat the process to get the battery
4614 back to design capacity.  And I wonder if the discharge and charge
4615 speed change over time, or if this stay the same.  I did not yet try
4616 to write a tool to calculate the derivative values of the battery
4617 level, but suspect some interesting insights might be learned from
4618 those.</p>
4619
4620 <p>Update 2015-09-24: I got a tip to install the packages
4621 acpi-call-dkms and tlp (unfortunately missing in Debian stable)
4622 packages instead of the tp-smapi-dkms package I had tried to use
4623 initially, and use 'tlp setcharge 40 80' to change when charging start
4624 and stop.  I've done so now, but expect my existing battery is toast
4625 and need to be replaced.  The proposal is unfortunately Thinkpad
4626 specific.</p>
4627
4628       </div>
4629       <div class="tags">
4630
4631
4632         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>.
4633
4634
4635       </div>
4636     </div>
4637     <div class="padding"></div>
4638
4639     <div class="entry">
4640       <div class="title">
4641         <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>
4642       </div>
4643       <div class="date">
4644          5th July 2015
4645       </div>
4646       <div class="body">
4647         <p>Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my
4648 need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback.  I wish to
4649 thank every one of these.  Several pointed me to the possibility of
4650 fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to
4651 do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the
4652 machine.  But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it
4653 with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live
4654 for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement.  If I did
4655 not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts
4656 using <a href="http://www.francecrans.com/">FrancEcrans</a>, but it
4657 might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.</p>
4658
4659 <p>One tip I got was to use the
4660 <a href="https://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=nb">Skinflint</a> web service to
4661 compare laptop models.  It seem to have more models available than
4662 prisjakt.no.  Another tip I got from someone I know have similar
4663 keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not
4664 very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook
4665 keyboards I tested.  Because of this, I will not consider it any further.
4666
4667 <p>When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the
4668 newest Thinkpad X model.  The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons
4669 (which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with
4670 Debian Sid/Unstable according to
4671 <a href="http://www.corsac.net/X250/">Corsac.net</a>.  The reports I
4672 got on the keyboard quality are not consistent.  Some say the keyboard
4673 is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good.
4674 Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250
4675 keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I
4676 keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to
4677 replace it.  I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk
4678 activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230.  I'm
4679 also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit
4680 noisy.  In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian
4681 Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.</p>
4682
4683 <p>I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was
4684 <a href="http://pro-star.com">Pro-Star</a>, another was
4685 <a href="http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/product/libreboot-x200/">Libreboot</a>.
4686 The latter look very attractive to me.</p>
4687
4688 <p>Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback.  It help a lot
4689 as I keep looking for a replacement.</p>
4690
4691 <p>Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the
4692 <a href="">lapstore.de</a> web shop for used laptops.  They got several
4693 different
4694 <a href="http://www.lapstore.de/f.php/shop/lapstore/f/411/lang/x/kw/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X_Serie/">old
4695 thinkpad X models</a>, and provide one year warranty.</p>
4696
4697       </div>
4698       <div class="tags">
4699
4700
4701         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>.
4702
4703
4704       </div>
4705     </div>
4706     <div class="padding"></div>
4707
4708     <div class="entry">
4709       <div class="title">
4710         <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>
4711       </div>
4712       <div class="date">
4713          3rd July 2015
4714       </div>
4715       <div class="body">
4716         <p>My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a
4717 replacement soon.  The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230
4718 started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken
4719 cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the
4720 flickering.</p>
4721
4722 <p>My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is
4723 still as
4724 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">I
4725 described them in 2013</a>.  The last time I bought a laptop, I had
4726 good help from
4727 <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/category.php?k=353">prisjakt.no</a>
4728 where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin,
4729 wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually.  Three button mouse
4730 and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three
4731 laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and
4732 G2) lack three mouse buttons).  It is also unclear to me how good the
4733 keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are.  I hope Lenovo have not messed up
4734 the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have
4735 deteriorated since X41.</p>
4736
4737 <p>I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options
4738 seem sensible to me?  Are there better services around to search the
4739 set of available laptops for features?  Please send me an email if you
4740 have suggestions.</p>
4741
4742 <p>Update 2015-07-23: I got a suggestion to check out the FSF
4743 <a href="http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom">list
4744 of endorsed hardware</a>, which is useful background information.</p>
4745
4746       </div>
4747       <div class="tags">
4748
4749
4750         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>.
4751
4752
4753       </div>
4754     </div>
4755     <div class="padding"></div>
4756
4757     <div class="entry">
4758       <div class="title">
4759         <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>
4760       </div>
4761       <div class="date">
4762         22nd November 2014
4763       </div>
4764       <div class="body">
4765         <p>By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
4766 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
4767 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
4768 courtesy of
4769 <a href="http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html">Erich
4770 Schubert</a> and
4771 <a href="http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/">Simon
4772 McVittie</a>.
4773
4774 <p>If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
4775 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
4776 <tt>/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit</tt> with this content before
4777 you upgrade:</p>
4778
4779 <p><blockquote><pre>
4780 Package: systemd-sysv
4781 Pin: release o=Debian
4782 Pin-Priority: -1
4783 </pre></blockquote><p>
4784
4785 <p>This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
4786 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
4787 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
4788 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
4789 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.</p>
4790
4791 <p>If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
4792 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
4793 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
4794 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
4795 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
4796 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
4797
4798 <p><blockquote><pre>
4799 preseed/late_command="in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core"
4800 </pre></blockquote><p>
4801
4802 <p>Next, the line to use in a preseed file:</p>
4803
4804 <p><blockquote><pre>
4805 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
4806 </pre></blockquote><p>
4807
4808 <p>One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
4809 the sysvinit-core package.</p>
4810
4811 <p>I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
4812 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
4813 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
4814 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
4815 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
4816 Jessie is released.</p>
4817
4818 <p>Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
4819 <ahref="https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg">a
4820 blog post by Torsten Glaser</a>, added --purge to the preseed
4821 line.</p>
4822
4823       </div>
4824       <div class="tags">
4825
4826
4827         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>.
4828
4829
4830       </div>
4831     </div>
4832     <div class="padding"></div>
4833
4834     <div class="entry">
4835       <div class="title">
4836         <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>
4837       </div>
4838       <div class="date">
4839         10th November 2014
4840       </div>
4841       <div class="body">
4842         <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
4843 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
4844 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.</p>
4845
4846 <p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
4847 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
4848 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
4849 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
4850 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
4851 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
4852 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
4853 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed
4854 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a
4855 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
4856 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
4857 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
4858 <a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the
4859 Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems
4860 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p>
4861
4862 <p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
4863 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
4864 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
4865 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
4866 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
4867 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
4868 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
4869 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
4870 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
4871 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
4872 were fairly easy, and
4873 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the
4874 source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github.  I
4875 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
4876 useful approach.</p>
4877
4878 <p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
4879 mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to
4880 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
4881 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
4882 <tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow
4883 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
4884 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
4885 this:</p>
4886
4887 <p><blockquote><pre>
4888 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
4889   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
4890 </pre></blockquote></p>
4891
4892 <p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
4893 address with your own address to test your server. :)</p>
4894
4895 <p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
4896 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
4897 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
4898 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
4899 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
4900 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
4901 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
4902 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
4903 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
4904 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
4905 system.</p>
4906
4907 <p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
4908 <tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over
4909 SMTorP. :)</p>
4910
4911       </div>
4912       <div class="tags">
4913
4914
4915         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>.
4916
4917
4918       </div>
4919     </div>
4920     <div class="padding"></div>
4921
4922     <div class="entry">
4923       <div class="title">
4924         <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>
4925       </div>
4926       <div class="date">
4927         22nd October 2014
4928       </div>
4929       <div class="body">
4930         <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
4931 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
4932 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
4933 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
4934 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
4935 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
4936 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
4937 <a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the
4938 listadmin program</a>.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
4939 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
4940 lists I recently took over:</p>
4941
4942 <p><blockquote><pre>
4943 % time listadmin xiph
4944 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4945 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4946
4947 real    0m1.709s
4948 user    0m0.232s
4949 sys     0m0.012s
4950 %
4951 </pre></blockquote></p>
4952
4953 <p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
4954 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
4955 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
4956 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
4957 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
4958 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
4959 program.</p>
4960
4961 <p>If you install
4962 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin
4963 package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt>
4964 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p>
4965
4966 <p><blockquote><pre>
4967 username username@example.org
4968 spamlevel 23
4969 default discard
4970 discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
4971
4972 password secret
4973 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
4974 mailman-list@lists.example.com
4975
4976 password hidden
4977 other-list@otherserver.example.org
4978 </pre></blockquote></p>
4979
4980 <p>There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
4981 learn the details.</p>
4982
4983 <p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
4984 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
4985 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
4986 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p>
4987
4988 <p><blockquote><pre>
4989 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
4990 </pre></blockquote></p>
4991
4992 <p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
4993 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
4994 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
4995 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
4996 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
4997 email.</p>
4998
4999 <p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
5000 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
5001 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
5002 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
5003 software.</p>
5004
5005 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
5006 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
5007 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
5008
5009 <p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in
5010 configuration example.  Also, I've been told that the
5011 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
5012 sure why.</p>
5013
5014       </div>
5015       <div class="tags">
5016
5017
5018         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>.
5019
5020
5021       </div>
5022     </div>
5023     <div class="padding"></div>
5024
5025     <div class="entry">
5026       <div class="title">
5027         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html">Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</a>
5028       </div>
5029       <div class="date">
5030         17th October 2014
5031       </div>
5032       <div class="body">
5033         <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
5034 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
5035 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
5036 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
5037 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram
5038 package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
5039 to do this using simple preseeding.</p>
5040
5041 <p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
5042 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
5043 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
5044 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
5045 of this story.)</p>
5046
5047 <p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
5048 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
5049 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
5050 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
5051 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
5052 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
5053 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
5054 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
5055 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
5056 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p>
5057
5058 <p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
5059 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
5060 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
5061 hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p>
5062
5063 <p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
5064 firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p>
5065
5066 <p><blockquote><pre>
5067 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
5068 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
5069 </pre></blockquote></p>
5070
5071 <p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
5072 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
5073 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
5074 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
5075 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
5076 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
5077 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
5078 implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p>
5079
5080 <p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
5081 this recipe work for you. :)</p>
5082
5083 <p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
5084 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
5085 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
5086 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
5087 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p>
5088
5089 <p><blockquote><pre>
5090 Task: isenkram-packages
5091 Section: hardware
5092 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5093  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
5094  proposed.
5095 Test-new-install: show show
5096 Relevance: 8
5097 Packages: for-current-hardware
5098
5099 Task: isenkram-firmware
5100 Section: hardware
5101 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5102  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
5103  packages are proposed.
5104 Test-new-install: mark show
5105 Relevance: 8
5106 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
5107 </pre></blockquote></p>
5108
5109 <p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
5110 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
5111 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
5112 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
5113 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
5114
5115 <p><blockquote><pre>
5116 #!/bin/sh
5117 #
5118 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
5119 export PATH
5120 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
5121 </pre></blockquote></p>
5122
5123 <p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
5124 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p>
5125
5126 <p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
5127 installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
5128 --new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would
5129 install.</p>
5130
5131 <p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be
5132 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
5133 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p>
5134
5135       </div>
5136       <div class="tags">
5137
5138
5139         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>.
5140
5141
5142       </div>
5143     </div>
5144     <div class="padding"></div>
5145
5146     <div class="entry">
5147       <div class="title">
5148         <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>
5149       </div>
5150       <div class="date">
5151          4th October 2014
5152       </div>
5153       <div class="body">
5154         <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
5155 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
5156 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
5157 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p>
5158
5159 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p>
5160
5161 <p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
5162 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
5163 <a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p>
5164
5165       </div>
5166       <div class="tags">
5167
5168
5169         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>.
5170
5171
5172       </div>
5173     </div>
5174     <div class="padding"></div>
5175
5176     <div class="entry">
5177       <div class="title">
5178         <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>
5179       </div>
5180       <div class="date">
5181          4th October 2014
5182       </div>
5183       <div class="body">
5184         <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a>
5185 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
5186 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
5187 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
5188 Dibb.</p>
5189
5190 <p>I just wrapped up
5191 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a
5192 new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from
5193 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the
5194 download page</a>.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
5195 0.17.</p>
5196
5197 <ul>
5198
5199  <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li>
5200  <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
5201    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li>
5202  <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li>
5203  <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li>
5204  <li>Fix include orders</li>
5205  <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li>
5206  <li>Fix the chapter count</li>
5207  <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
5208    the palette size is the same.</li>
5209  <li>Fix array printing.</li>
5210  <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li>
5211  <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li>
5212  <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
5213    with more GCC compiler warnings.</li>
5214
5215 </ul>
5216
5217 <p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
5218 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
5219 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)</p>
5220
5221       </div>
5222       <div class="tags">
5223
5224
5225         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>.
5226
5227
5228       </div>
5229     </div>
5230     <div class="padding"></div>
5231
5232     <div class="entry">
5233       <div class="title">
5234         <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>
5235       </div>
5236       <div class="date">
5237         26th September 2014
5238       </div>
5239       <div class="body">
5240         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
5241 project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
5242 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
5243 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
5244 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
5245 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
5246 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
5247 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
5248 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
5249 future.  The
5250 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current
5251 status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
5252 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
5253 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
5254 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p>
5255
5256 <p>First, download the test ISO via
5257 <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>,
5258 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a>
5259 or rsync (use
5260 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
5261 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
5262 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
5263 install with some tweaking.</p>
5264
5265 <p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
5266 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p>
5267
5268 <p><blockquote><pre>
5269 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
5270 </pre></blockquote></p>
5271
5272 <p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
5273 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
5274 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
5275 due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p>
5276
5277 <p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
5278 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
5279 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
5280 your need.</p>
5281
5282 <p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
5283 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
5284 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
5285 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
5286 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
5287 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
5288 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
5289 days.</p>
5290
5291 <p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
5292 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
5293 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
5294 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
5295 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
5296 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
5297 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
5298 provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>.
5299 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p>
5300
5301 <p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
5302 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
5303 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p>
5304
5305       </div>
5306       <div class="tags">
5307
5308
5309         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>.
5310
5311
5312       </div>
5313     </div>
5314     <div class="padding"></div>
5315
5316     <div class="entry">
5317       <div class="title">
5318         <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>
5319       </div>
5320       <div class="date">
5321         25th September 2014
5322       </div>
5323       <div class="body">
5324         <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a>
5325 to handle my fairly large DVD collection.  It is a nice command line
5326 tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length,
5327 etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format.  But lsdvd have not seen
5328 any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting
5329 its use with some DVDs.  Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I
5330 sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the
5331 project, without any reply.  But I use it regularly and would like to
5332 get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version
5333 into Debian</a>.  So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with
5334 the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that
5335 he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take
5336 over.  And yesterday, I became project admin.</p>
5337
5338 <p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian
5339 maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream
5340 project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly,
5341 collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place.
5342 I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git
5343 repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too.  If you got
5344 a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out
5345 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join
5346 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing
5347 list</a>. :)</p>
5348
5349       </div>
5350       <div class="tags">
5351
5352
5353         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>.
5354
5355
5356       </div>
5357     </div>
5358     <div class="padding"></div>
5359
5360     <div class="entry">
5361       <div class="title">
5362         <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>
5363       </div>
5364       <div class="date">
5365         16th September 2014
5366       </div>
5367       <div class="body">
5368         <p>The <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> installer could be
5369 a lot quicker.  When we install more than 2000 packages in
5370 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> using
5371 tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever.
5372 A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in
5373 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/613428">bug #613428</a> about too
5374 much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package
5375 responsible for unpacking the binary packages.  Other parts (like code
5376 executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during
5377 installation.  All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to
5378 me.  If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try
5379 to salvage the half installed system.  So the failure sync-ing is
5380 supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really
5381 relevant while the installer is running.</p>
5382
5383 <p>A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file
5384 system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to
5385 change the code in several packages.  The idea is not new, but I have
5386 not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before.  It
5387 depend on the small and clever package
5388 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/eatmydata">eatmydata</a>, which
5389 uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to
5390 disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live
5391 dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly.  Instead of
5392 modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the
5393 packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages),
5394 it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace
5395 them with a simple shell wrapper calling
5396 "eatmydata&nbsp;$program&nbsp;$@", to get the same effect.
5397 Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple
5398 implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.</p>
5399
5400 <p>The effect was stunning.  In my first test it reduced the running
5401 time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44
5402 minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell
5403 Latitude D505 machine.  I am not quite sure what the optimised time
5404 would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf
5405 priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during
5406 installation.  As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation
5407 along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the
5408 installation.  I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie,
5409 and got these results.  The time measured is the time stamp in
5410 /var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the
5411 "pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement
5412 yourself.  In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the
5413 timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel
5414 dialog.</p>
5415
5416 <p><table>
5417
5418 <tr>
5419 <th>Machine/setup</th>
5420 <th>Original tasksel</th>
5421 <th>Optimised tasksel</th>
5422 <th>Reduction</th>
5423 </tr>
5424
5425 <tr>
5426 <td>Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE</td>
5427 <td>64 min (07:46-08:50)</td>
5428 <td><44 min (11:27-12:11)</td>
5429 <td>>20 min 18%</td>
5430 </tr>
5431
5432 <tr>
5433 <td>Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE</td>
5434 <td>57 min (08:48-09:45)</td>
5435 <td>34 min (07:43-08:17)</td>
5436 <td>23 min 40%</td>
5437 </tr>
5438
5439 <tr>
5440 <td>Latitude D505 Minimal</td>
5441 <td>22 min (10:37-10:59)</td>
5442 <td>11 min (11:16-11:27)</td>
5443 <td>11 min 50%</td>
5444 </tr>
5445
5446 <tr>
5447 <td>Thinkpad X200 Minimal</td>
5448 <td>6 min (08:19-08:25)</td>
5449 <td>4 min (08:04-08:08)</td>
5450 <td>2 min 33%</td>
5451 </tr>
5452
5453 <tr>
5454 <td>Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE</td>
5455 <td>19 min (09:21-09:40)</td>
5456 <td>15 min (10:25-10:40)</td>
5457 <td>4 min 21%</td>
5458 </tr>
5459
5460 </table></p>
5461
5462 <p>The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the
5463 time is spent downloading packages.  The connection to the Internet
5464 was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a
5465 significant factor in the measurement.  Download typically took a few
5466 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being
5467 installed.</p>
5468
5469 <p>The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in
5470 <a href="https://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/">Debian
5471 Installer</a>, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the
5472 finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the
5473 installation.  I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the
5474 post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the
5475 eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in
5476 Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO.  The
5477 negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this
5478 optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i.  If the code is
5479 moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger
5480 for the entire installation.</p>
5481
5482 <p>I've implemented this in the
5483 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-install">debian-edu-install</a>
5484 git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the
5485 Debian Edu installation.  If you want to test this yourself, you can
5486 create two files in the installer (or in an udeb).  One shell script
5487 need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:</p>
5488
5489 <p><blockquote><pre>
5490 #!/bin/sh
5491 set -e
5492 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5493 info() {
5494     logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
5495 }
5496 error() {
5497     logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
5498 }
5499 override_install() {
5500     apt-install eatmydata || true
5501     if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
5502         for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5503             file=/usr/bin/$bin
5504             # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
5505             if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
5506                 info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
5507                 printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
5508                     > /target$file.edu
5509                 chmod 755 /target$file.edu
5510                 in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5511                     --rename --quiet --add $file
5512                 ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
5513             else
5514                 error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
5515             fi
5516         done
5517     else
5518         error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
5519     fi
5520 }
5521
5522 override_install
5523 </pre></blockquote></p>
5524
5525 <p>To clean up, another shell script should go into
5526 /usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this:
5527
5528 <p><blockquote><pre>
5529 #! /bin/sh -e
5530 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5531 error() {
5532     logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
5533 }
5534 remove_install_override() {
5535     for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5536         file=/usr/bin/$bin
5537         if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
5538             rm /target$file
5539             in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5540                 --rename --quiet --remove $file
5541             rm /target$file.edu
5542         else
5543             error "Missing divert for $file."
5544         fi
5545     done
5546     sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
5547 }
5548
5549 remove_install_override
5550 </pre></blockquote></p>
5551
5552 <p>In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script
5553 edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and
5554 finish-install.d scripts.</p>
5555
5556 <p>By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal
5557 Debian installer too?  I suspect it should, but am not sure the
5558 current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough.  It also
5559 depend on the side effects of the change.  I'm not aware of any, but I
5560 guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing.
5561 Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and
5562 fsync() having effect?  Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to
5563 allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting
5564 everyone.</p>
5565
5566 <p>Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization
5567 will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of
5568 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">bug #702711</a>.  An updated
5569 eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.</p>
5570
5571 <p>Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and
5572 the optimization work again.  And I have discovered that the
5573 dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly
5574 simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package.  See
5575 tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.</p>
5576
5577 <p>Update 2014-11-11: Unfortunately, a new
5578 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/765738">bug #765738</a> in eatmydata only
5579 triggering on i386 made it into testing, and broke this installation
5580 optimization again.  If <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/768893">unblock
5581 request 768893</a> is accepted, it should be working again.</p>
5582
5583       </div>
5584       <div class="tags">
5585
5586
5587         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>.
5588
5589
5590       </div>
5591     </div>
5592     <div class="padding"></div>
5593
5594     <div class="entry">
5595       <div class="title">
5596         <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>
5597       </div>
5598       <div class="date">
5599         10th September 2014
5600       </div>
5601       <div class="body">
5602         <p>Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk with the
5603 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> about
5604 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20140909-sks-keyservers/">the
5605 OpenPGP keyserver pool sks-keyservers.net</a>, and was very happy to
5606 learn that there is a large set of publicly available key servers to
5607 use when looking for peoples public key.  So far I have used
5608 subkeys.pgp.net, and some times wwwkeys.nl.pgp.net when the former
5609 were misbehaving, but those days are ended.  The servers I have used
5610 up until yesterday have been slow and some times unavailable.  I hope
5611 those problems are gone now.</p>
5612
5613 <p>Behind the round robin DNS entry of the
5614 <a href="https://sks-keyservers.net/">sks-keyservers.net</a> service
5615 there is a pool of more than 100 keyservers which are checked every
5616 day to ensure they are well connected and up to date.  It must be
5617 better than what I have used so far. :)</p>
5618
5619 <p>Yesterdays speaker told me that the service is the default
5620 keyserver provided by the default configuration in GnuPG, but this do
5621 not seem to be used in Debian.  Perhaps it should?</p>
5622
5623 <p>Anyway, I've updated my ~/.gnupg/options file to now include this
5624 line:</p>
5625
5626 <p><blockquote><pre>
5627 keyserver pool.sks-keyservers.net
5628 </pre></blockquote></p>
5629
5630 <p>With GnuPG version 2 one can also locate the keyserver using SRV
5631 entries in DNS.  Just for fun, I did just that at work, so now every
5632 user of GnuPG at the University of Oslo should find a OpenGPG
5633 keyserver automatically should their need it:</p>
5634
5635 <p><blockquote><pre>
5636 % host -t srv _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no
5637 _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no has SRV record 0 100 11371 pool.sks-keyservers.net.
5638 %
5639 </pre></blockquote></p>
5640
5641 <p>Now if only
5642 <a href="http://ietfreport.isoc.org/idref/draft-shaw-openpgp-hkp/">the
5643 HKP lookup protocol</a> supported finding signature paths, I would be
5644 very happy.  It can look up a given key or search for a user ID, but I
5645 normally do not want that, but to find a trust path from my key to
5646 another key.  Given a user ID or key ID, I would like to find (and
5647 download) the keys representing a signature path from my key to the
5648 key in question, to be able to get a trust path between the two keys.
5649 This is as far as I can tell not possible today.  Perhaps something
5650 for a future version of the protocol?</p>
5651
5652       </div>
5653       <div class="tags">
5654
5655
5656         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>.
5657
5658
5659       </div>
5660     </div>
5661     <div class="padding"></div>
5662
5663     <div class="entry">
5664       <div class="title">
5665         <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>
5666       </div>
5667       <div class="date">
5668         17th June 2014
5669       </div>
5670       <div class="body">
5671         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
5672 project</a> provide an instruction manual for teachers, system
5673 administrators and other users that contain useful tips for setting up
5674 and maintaining a Debian Edu installation.  This text is about how the
5675 text processing of this manual is handled in the project.</p>
5676
5677 <p>One goal of the project is to provide information in the native
5678 language of its users, and for this we need to handle translations.
5679 But we also want to make sure each language contain the same
5680 information, so for this we need a good way to keep the translations
5681 in sync.  And we want it to be easy for our users to improve the
5682 documentation, avoiding the need to learn special formats or tools to
5683 contribute, and the obvious way to do this is to make it possible to
5684 edit the documentation using a web browser.  We also want it to be
5685 easy for translators to keep the translation up to date, and give them
5686 help in figuring out what need to be translated. Here is the list of
5687 tools and the process we have found trying to reach all these
5688 goals.</p>
5689
5690 <p>We maintain the authoritative source of our manual in the
5691 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">Debian
5692 wiki</a>, as several wiki pages written in English.  It consist of one
5693 front page with references to the different chapters, several pages
5694 for each chapter, and finally one "collection page" gluing all the
5695 chapters together into one large web page (aka
5696 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/AllInOne">the
5697 AllInOne page</a>).  The AllInOne page is the one used for further
5698 processing and translations.  Thanks to the fact that the
5699 <a href="http://moinmo.in/">MoinMoin</a> installation on
5700 wiki.debian.org support exporting pages in
5701 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">the Docbook format</a>, we can fetch
5702 the list of pages to export using the raw version of the AllInOne
5703 page, loop over each of them to generate a Docbook XML version of the
5704 manual.  This process also download images and transform image
5705 references to use the locally downloaded images.  The generated
5706 Docbook XML files are slightly broken, so some post-processing is done
5707 using the <tt>documentation/scripts/get_manual</tt> program, and the
5708 result is a nice Docbook XML file (debian-edu-wheezy-manual.xml) and
5709 a handfull of images.  The XML file can now be used to generate PDF, HTML
5710 and epub versions of the English manual.  This is the basic step of
5711 our process, making PDF (using dblatex), HTML (using xsltproc) and
5712 epub (using dbtoepub) version from Docbook XML, and the resulting files
5713 are placed in the debian-edu-doc-en binary package.</p>
5714
5715 <p>But English documentation is not enough for us.  We want translated
5716 documentation too, and we want to make it easy for translators to
5717 track the English original.  For this we use the
5718 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/poxml.html">poxml</a> package,
5719 which allow us to transform the English Docbook XML file into a
5720 translation file (a .pot file), usable with the normal gettext based
5721 translation tools used by those translating free software.  The pot
5722 file is used to create and maintain translation files (several .po
5723 files), which the translations update with the native language
5724 translations of all titles, paragraphs and blocks of text in the
5725 original.  The next step is combining the original English Docbook XML
5726 and the translation file (say debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.po), to
5727 create a translated Docbook XML file (in this case
5728 debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.xml).  This translated (or partly
5729 translated, if the translation is not complete) Docbook XML file can
5730 then be used like the original to create a PDF, HTML and epub version
5731 of the documentation.</p>
5732
5733 <p>The translators use different tools to edit the .po files.  We
5734 recommend using
5735 <a href="http://www.kde.org/applications/development/lokalize/">lokalize</a>,
5736 while some use emacs and vi, others can use web based editors like
5737 <a href="http://pootle.translatehouse.org/">Poodle</a> or
5738 <a href="https://www.transifex.com/">Transifex</a>.  All we care about
5739 is where the .po file end up, in our git repository.  Updated
5740 translations can either be committed directly to git, or submitted as
5741 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/src:debian-edu-doc">bug reports
5742 against the debian-edu-doc package</a>.</p>
5743
5744 <p>One challenge is images, which both might need to be translated (if
5745 they show translated user applications), and are needed in different
5746 formats when creating PDF and HTML versions (epub is a HTML version in
5747 this regard).  For this we transform the original PNG images to the
5748 needed density and format during build, and have a way to provide
5749 translated images by storing translated versions in
5750 images/$LANGUAGECODE/.  I am a bit unsure about the details here.  The
5751 package maintainers know more.</p>
5752
5753 <p>If you wonder what the result look like, we provide
5754 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">the content
5755 of the documentation packages on the web</a>.  See for example the
5756 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/it/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.pdf">Italian
5757 PDF version</a> or the
5758 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/de/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.html">German
5759 HTML version</a>.  We do not yet build the epub version by default,
5760 but perhaps it will be done in the future.</p>
5761
5762 <p>To learn more, check out
5763 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-edu-doc.html">the
5764 debian-edu-doc package</a>,
5765 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">the
5766 manual on the wiki</a> and
5767 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/Translations">the
5768 translation instructions</a> in the manual.</p>
5769
5770       </div>
5771       <div class="tags">
5772
5773
5774         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>.
5775
5776
5777       </div>
5778     </div>
5779     <div class="padding"></div>
5780
5781     <div class="entry">
5782       <div class="title">
5783         <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>
5784       </div>
5785       <div class="date">
5786         23rd April 2014
5787       </div>
5788       <div class="body">
5789         <p>It would be nice if it was easier in Debian to get all the hardware
5790 related packages relevant for the computer installed automatically.
5791 So I implemented one, using
5792 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">my Isenkram
5793 package</a>.  To use it, install the tasksel and isenkram packages and
5794 run tasksel as user root.  You should be presented with a new option,
5795 "Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)".  When you
5796 select it, tasksel will install the packages isenkram claim is fit for
5797 the current hardware, hot pluggable or not.<p>
5798
5799 <p>The implementation is in two files, one is the tasksel menu entry
5800 description, and the other is the script used to extract the list of
5801 packages to install.  The first part is in
5802 <tt>/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc</tt> and look like
5803 this:</p>
5804
5805 <p><blockquote><pre>
5806 Task: isenkram
5807 Section: hardware
5808 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5809  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
5810  proposed.
5811 Test-new-install: mark show
5812 Relevance: 8
5813 Packages: for-current-hardware
5814 </pre></blockquote></p>
5815
5816 <p>The second part is in
5817 <tt>/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/for-current-hardware</tt> and look like
5818 this:</p>
5819
5820 <p><blockquote><pre>
5821 #!/bin/sh
5822 #
5823 (
5824     isenkram-lookup
5825     isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
5826 ) | sort -u
5827 </pre></blockquote></p>
5828
5829 <p>All in all, a very short and simple implementation making it
5830 trivial to install the hardware dependent package we all may want to
5831 have installed on our machines.  I've not been able to find a way to
5832 get tasksel to tell you exactly which packages it plan to install
5833 before doing the installation.  So if you are curious or careful,
5834 check the output from the isenkram-* command line tools first.</p>
5835
5836 <p>The information about which packages are handling which hardware is
5837 fetched either from the isenkram package itself in
5838 /usr/share/isenkram/, from git.debian.org or from the APT package
5839 database (using the Modaliases header).  The APT package database
5840 parsing have caused a nasty resource leak in the isenkram daemon (bugs
5841 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/719837">#719837</a> and
5842 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/730704">#730704</a>).  The cause is in
5843 the python-apt code (bug
5844 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/745487">#745487</a>), but using a
5845 workaround I was able to get rid of the file descriptor leak and
5846 reduce the memory leak from ~30 MiB per hardware detection down to
5847 around 2 MiB per hardware detection.  It should make the desktop
5848 daemon a lot more useful.  The fix is in version 0.7 uploaded to
5849 unstable today.</p>
5850
5851 <p>I believe the current way of mapping hardware to packages in
5852 Isenkram is is a good draft, but in the future I expect isenkram to
5853 use the AppStream data source for this.  A proposal for getting proper
5854 AppStream support into Debian is floating around as
5855 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a>, and
5856 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2014/Projects#SummerOfCode2014.2FProjects.2FAppStreamDEP11Implementation.AppStream.2FDEP-11_for_the_Debian_Archive">GSoC
5857 project</a> will take place this summer to improve the situation.  I
5858 look forward to seeing the result, and welcome patches for isenkram to
5859 start using the information when it is ready.</p>
5860
5861 <p>If you want your package to map to some specific hardware, either
5862 add a "Xb-Modaliases" header to your control file like I did in
5863 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">the pymissile
5864 package</a> or submit a bug report with the details to the isenkram
5865 package.  See also
5866 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">all my
5867 blog posts tagged isenkram</a> for details on the notation.  I expect
5868 the information will be migrated to AppStream eventually, but for the
5869 moment I got no better place to store it.</p>
5870
5871       </div>
5872       <div class="tags">
5873
5874
5875         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>.
5876
5877
5878       </div>
5879     </div>
5880     <div class="padding"></div>
5881
5882     <div class="entry">
5883       <div class="title">
5884         <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>
5885       </div>
5886       <div class="date">
5887         15th April 2014
5888       </div>
5889       <div class="body">
5890         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
5891 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware to make
5892 it easy for non-technical people to host their data and communication
5893 at home, and being able to communicate with their friends and family
5894 encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It is still going strong, and
5895 today a major mile stone was reached.</p>
5896
5897 <p>Today, the last of the packages currently used by the project to
5898 created the system images were accepted into Debian Unstable.  It was
5899 the freedombox-setup package, which is used to configure the images
5900 during build and on the first boot.  Now all one need to get going is
5901 the build code from the freedom-maker git repository and packages from
5902 Debian.  And once the freedombox-setup package enter testing, we can
5903 build everything directly from Debian. :)</p>
5904
5905 <p>Some key packages used by Freedombox are
5906 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>,
5907 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/plinth">plinth</a>,
5908 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pagekite">pagekite</a>,
5909 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/tor">tor</a>,
5910 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>,
5911 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/owncloud">owncloud</a> and
5912 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/dnsmasq">dnsmasq</a>.  There
5913 are plans to integrate more packages into the setup.  User
5914 documentation is maintained on the Debian wiki.  Please
5915 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Manual/Jessie">check out
5916 the manual</a> and help us improve it.</p>
5917
5918 <p>To test for yourself and create boot images with the FreedomBox
5919 setup, run this on a Debian machine using a user with sudo rights to
5920 become root:</p>
5921
5922 <p><pre>
5923 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
5924   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
5925   u-boot-tools
5926 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
5927   freedom-maker
5928 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
5929 </pre></p>
5930
5931 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
5932 devices.  See the README in the freedom-maker git repo for more
5933 details on the build.  If you do not want all three images, trim the
5934 make line.  Note that the virtualbox-image target is not really
5935 virtualbox specific.  It create a x86 image usable in kvm, qemu,
5936 vmware and any other x86 virtual machine environment.  You might need
5937 the version of vmdebootstrap in Jessie to get the build working, as it
5938 include fixes for a race condition with kpartx.</p>
5939
5940 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
5941 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
5942 the preseed values:</p>
5943
5944 <p><pre>
5945 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
5946 </pre></p>
5947
5948 <p>I have not tested it myself the last few weeks, so I do not know if
5949 it still work.</p>
5950
5951 <p>If you wonder how to help, one task you could look at is using
5952 systemd as the boot system.  It will become the default for Linux in
5953 Jessie, so we need to make sure it is usable on the Freedombox.  I did
5954 a simple test a few weeks ago, and noticed dnsmasq failed to start
5955 during boot when using systemd.  I suspect there are other problems
5956 too. :) To detect problems, there is a test suite included, which can
5957 be run from the plinth web interface.</p>
5958
5959 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
5960 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
5961 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
5962 irc.debian.org)</a> and
5963 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
5964 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
5965
5966       </div>
5967       <div class="tags">
5968
5969
5970         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>.
5971
5972
5973       </div>
5974     </div>
5975     <div class="padding"></div>
5976
5977     <div class="entry">
5978       <div class="title">
5979         <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>
5980       </div>
5981       <div class="date">
5982          9th April 2014
5983       </div>
5984       <div class="body">
5985         <p>For a while now, I have been looking for a sensible offsite backup
5986 solution for use at home.  My requirements are simple, it must be
5987 cheap and locally encrypted (in other words, I keep the encryption
5988 keys, the storage provider do not have access to my private files).
5989 One idea me and my friends had many years ago, before the cloud
5990 storage providers showed up, was to use Google mail as storage,
5991 writing a Linux block device storing blocks as emails in the mail
5992 service provided by Google, and thus get heaps of free space.  On top
5993 of this one can add encryption, RAID and volume management to have
5994 lots of (fairly slow, I admit that) cheap and encrypted storage.  But
5995 I never found time to implement such system.  But the last few weeks I
5996 have looked at a system called
5997 <a href="https://bitbucket.org/nikratio/s3ql/">S3QL</a>, a locally
5998 mounted network backed file system with the features I need.</p>
5999
6000 <p>S3QL is a fuse file system with a local cache and cloud storage,
6001 handling several different storage providers, any with Amazon S3,
6002 Google Drive or OpenStack API.  There are heaps of such storage
6003 providers.  S3QL can also use a local directory as storage, which
6004 combined with sshfs allow for file storage on any ssh server.  S3QL
6005 include support for encryption, compression, de-duplication, snapshots
6006 and immutable file systems, allowing me to mount the remote storage as
6007 a local mount point, look at and use the files as if they were local,
6008 while the content is stored in the cloud as well.  This allow me to
6009 have a backup that should survive fire.  The file system can not be
6010 shared between several machines at the same time, as only one can
6011 mount it at the time, but any machine with the encryption key and
6012 access to the storage service can mount it if it is unmounted.</p>
6013
6014 <p>It is simple to use.  I'm using it on Debian Wheezy, where the
6015 package is included already.  So to get started, run <tt>apt-get
6016 install s3ql</tt>.  Next, pick a storage provider.  I ended up picking
6017 Greenqloud, after reading their nice recipe on
6018 <a href="https://greenqloud.zendesk.com/entries/44611757-How-To-Use-S3QL-to-mount-a-StorageQloud-bucket-on-Debian-Wheezy">how
6019 to use S3QL with their Amazon S3 service</a>, because I trust the laws
6020 in Iceland more than those in USA when it come to keeping my personal
6021 data safe and private, and thus would rather spend money on a company
6022 in Iceland.  Another nice recipe is available from the article
6023 <a href="http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/Articles/HPC-Cloud-Storage">S3QL
6024 Filesystem for HPC Storage</a> by Jeff Layton in the HPC section of
6025 Admin magazine.  When the provider is picked, figure out how to get
6026 the API key needed to connect to the storage API.  With Greencloud,
6027 the key did not show up until I had added payment details to my
6028 account.</p>
6029
6030 <p>Armed with the API access details, it is time to create the file
6031 system.  First, create a new bucket in the cloud.  This bucket is the
6032 file system storage area.  I picked a bucket name reflecting the
6033 machine that was going to store data there, but any name will do.
6034 I'll refer to it as <tt>bucket-name</tt> below.  In addition, one need
6035 the API login and password, and a locally created password.  Store it
6036 all in ~root/.s3ql/authinfo2 like this:
6037
6038 <p><blockquote><pre>
6039 [s3c]
6040 storage-url: s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6041 backend-login: API-login
6042 backend-password: API-password
6043 fs-passphrase: local-password
6044 </pre></blockquote></p>
6045
6046 <p>I create my local passphrase using <tt>pwget 50</tt> or similar,
6047 but any sensible way to create a fairly random password should do it.
6048 Armed with these details, it is now time to run mkfs, entering the API
6049 details and password to create it:</p>
6050
6051 <p><blockquote><pre>
6052 # mkdir -m 700 /var/lib/s3ql-cache
6053 # mkfs.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6054   --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6055 Enter backend login:
6056 Enter backend password:
6057 Before using S3QL, make sure to read the user's guide, especially
6058 the 'Important Rules to Avoid Loosing Data' section.
6059 Enter encryption password:
6060 Confirm encryption password:
6061 Generating random encryption key...
6062 Creating metadata tables...
6063 Dumping metadata...
6064 ..objects..
6065 ..blocks..
6066 ..inodes..
6067 ..inode_blocks..
6068 ..symlink_targets..
6069 ..names..
6070 ..contents..
6071 ..ext_attributes..
6072 Compressing and uploading metadata...
6073 Wrote 0.00 MB of compressed metadata.
6074 # </pre></blockquote></p>
6075
6076 <p>The next step is mounting the file system to make the storage available.
6077
6078 <p><blockquote><pre>
6079 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6080   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
6081 Using 4 upload threads.
6082 Downloading and decompressing metadata...
6083 Reading metadata...
6084 ..objects..
6085 ..blocks..
6086 ..inodes..
6087 ..inode_blocks..
6088 ..symlink_targets..
6089 ..names..
6090 ..contents..
6091 ..ext_attributes..
6092 Mounting filesystem...
6093 # df -h /s3ql
6094 Filesystem                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
6095 s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name  1.0T     0  1.0T   0% /s3ql
6096 #
6097 </pre></blockquote></p>
6098
6099 <p>The file system is now ready for use.  I use rsync to store my
6100 backups in it, and as the metadata used by rsync is downloaded at
6101 mount time, no network traffic (and storage cost) is triggered by
6102 running rsync.  To unmount, one should not use the normal umount
6103 command, as this will not flush the cache to the cloud storage, but
6104 instead running the umount.s3ql command like this:
6105
6106 <p><blockquote><pre>
6107 # umount.s3ql /s3ql
6108 #
6109 </pre></blockquote></p>
6110
6111 <p>There is a fsck command available to check the file system and
6112 correct any problems detected.  This can be used if the local server
6113 crashes while the file system is mounted, to reset the "already
6114 mounted" flag.  This is what it look like when processing a working
6115 file system:</p>
6116
6117 <p><blockquote><pre>
6118 # fsck.s3ql --force --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6119 Using cached metadata.
6120 File system seems clean, checking anyway.
6121 Checking DB integrity...
6122 Creating temporary extra indices...
6123 Checking lost+found...
6124 Checking cached objects...
6125 Checking names (refcounts)...
6126 Checking contents (names)...
6127 Checking contents (inodes)...
6128 Checking contents (parent inodes)...
6129 Checking objects (reference counts)...
6130 Checking objects (backend)...
6131 ..processed 5000 objects so far..
6132 ..processed 10000 objects so far..
6133 ..processed 15000 objects so far..
6134 Checking objects (sizes)...
6135 Checking blocks (referenced objects)...
6136 Checking blocks (refcounts)...
6137 Checking inode-block mapping (blocks)...
6138 Checking inode-block mapping (inodes)...
6139 Checking inodes (refcounts)...
6140 Checking inodes (sizes)...
6141 Checking extended attributes (names)...
6142 Checking extended attributes (inodes)...
6143 Checking symlinks (inodes)...
6144 Checking directory reachability...
6145 Checking unix conventions...
6146 Checking referential integrity...
6147 Dropping temporary indices...
6148 Backing up old metadata...
6149 Dumping metadata...
6150 ..objects..
6151 ..blocks..
6152 ..inodes..
6153 ..inode_blocks..
6154 ..symlink_targets..
6155 ..names..
6156 ..contents..
6157 ..ext_attributes..
6158 Compressing and uploading metadata...
6159 Wrote 0.89 MB of compressed metadata.
6160 #
6161 </pre></blockquote></p>
6162
6163 <p>Thanks to the cache, working on files that fit in the cache is very
6164 quick, about the same speed as local file access.  Uploading large
6165 amount of data is to me limited by the bandwidth out of and into my
6166 house.  Uploading 685 MiB with a 100 MiB cache gave me 305 kiB/s,
6167 which is very close to my upload speed, and downloading the same
6168 Debian installation ISO gave me 610 kiB/s, close to my download speed.
6169 Both were measured using <tt>dd</tt>.  So for me, the bottleneck is my
6170 network, not the file system code.  I do not know what a good cache
6171 size would be, but suspect that the cache should e larger than your
6172 working set.</p>
6173
6174 <p>I mentioned that only one machine can mount the file system at the
6175 time.  If another machine try, it is told that the file system is
6176 busy:</p>
6177
6178 <p><blockquote><pre>
6179 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6180   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
6181 Using 8 upload threads.
6182 Backend reports that fs is still mounted elsewhere, aborting.
6183 #
6184 </pre></blockquote></p>
6185
6186 <p>The file content is uploaded when the cache is full, while the
6187 metadata is uploaded once every 24 hour by default.  To ensure the
6188 file system content is flushed to the cloud, one can either umount the
6189 file system, or ask S3QL to flush the cache and metadata using
6190 s3qlctrl:
6191
6192 <p><blockquote><pre>
6193 # s3qlctrl upload-meta /s3ql
6194 # s3qlctrl flushcache /s3ql
6195 #
6196 </pre></blockquote></p>
6197
6198 <p>If you are curious about how much space your data uses in the
6199 cloud, and how much compression and deduplication cut down on the
6200 storage usage, you can use s3qlstat on the mounted file system to get
6201 a report:</p>
6202
6203 <p><blockquote><pre>
6204 # s3qlstat /s3ql
6205 Directory entries:    9141
6206 Inodes:               9143
6207 Data blocks:          8851
6208 Total data size:      22049.38 MB
6209 After de-duplication: 21955.46 MB (99.57% of total)
6210 After compression:    21877.28 MB (99.22% of total, 99.64% of de-duplicated)
6211 Database size:        2.39 MB (uncompressed)
6212 (some values do not take into account not-yet-uploaded dirty blocks in cache)
6213 #
6214 </pre></blockquote></p>
6215
6216 <p>I mentioned earlier that there are several possible suppliers of
6217 storage.  I did not try to locate them all, but am aware of at least
6218 <a href="https://www.greenqloud.com/">Greenqloud</a>,
6219 <a href="http://drive.google.com/">Google Drive</a>,
6220 <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/">Amazon S3 web serivces</a>,
6221 <a href="http://www.rackspace.com/">Rackspace</a> and
6222 <a href="http://crowncloud.net/">Crowncloud</A>.  The latter even
6223 accept payment in Bitcoin.  Pick one that suit your need.  Some of
6224 them provide several GiB of free storage, but the prize models are
6225 quite different and you will have to figure out what suits you
6226 best.</p>
6227
6228 <p>While researching this blog post, I had a look at research papers
6229 and posters discussing the S3QL file system.  There are several, which
6230 told me that the file system is getting a critical check by the
6231 science community and increased my confidence in using it.  One nice
6232 poster is titled
6233 "<a href="http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/adtsc/publications/science_highlights_2013/docs/pg68_69.pdf">An
6234 Innovative Parallel Cloud Storage System using OpenStack’s SwiftObject
6235 Store and Transformative Parallel I/O Approach</a>" by Hsing-Bung
6236 Chen, Benjamin McClelland, David Sherrill, Alfred Torrez, Parks Fields
6237 and Pamela Smith.  Please  have a look.</p>
6238
6239 <p>Given my problems with different file systems earlier, I decided to
6240 check out the mounted S3QL file system to see if it would be usable as
6241 a home directory (in other word, that it provided POSIX semantics when
6242 it come to locking and umask handling etc).  Running
6243 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">my
6244 test code to check file system semantics</a>, I was happy to discover that
6245 no error was found.  So the file system can be used for home
6246 directories, if one chooses to do so.</p>
6247
6248 <p>If you do not want a locally file system, and want something that
6249 work without the Linux fuse file system, I would like to mention the
6250 <a href="http://www.tarsnap.com/">Tarsnap service</a>, which also
6251 provide locally encrypted backup using a command line client.  It have
6252 a nicer access control system, where one can split out read and write
6253 access, allowing some systems to write to the backup and others to
6254 only read from it.</p>
6255
6256 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
6257 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
6258 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
6259
6260       </div>
6261       <div class="tags">
6262
6263
6264         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>.
6265
6266
6267       </div>
6268     </div>
6269     <div class="padding"></div>
6270
6271     <div class="entry">
6272       <div class="title">
6273         <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>
6274       </div>
6275       <div class="date">
6276         14th March 2014
6277       </div>
6278       <div class="body">
6279         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
6280 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware for
6281 making it easy for non-technical people to host their data and
6282 communication at home, and being able to communicate with their
6283 friends and family encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It has been
6284 going on for a while, and is slowly progressing towards a new test
6285 release (0.2).</p>
6286
6287 <p>And what day could be better than the Pi day to announce that the
6288 new version will provide "hard drive" / SD card / USB stick images for
6289 Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and VirtualBox (or any other virtualization
6290 system), and can also be installed using a Debian installer preseed
6291 file.  The Debian based Freedombox is now based on Debian Jessie,
6292 where most of the needed packages used are already present.  Only one,
6293 the freedombox-setup package, is missing.  To try to build your own
6294 boot image to test the current status, fetch the freedom-maker scripts
6295 and build using
6296 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/vmdebootstrap">vmdebootstrap</a>
6297 with a user with sudo access to become root:
6298
6299 <pre>
6300 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
6301   freedom-maker
6302 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
6303   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
6304   u-boot-tools
6305 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
6306 </pre>
6307
6308 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
6309 devices.  See the README for more details on the build. If you do not
6310 want all three images, trim the make line.  But note that thanks to <a
6311 href="https://bugs.debian.org/741407">a race condition in
6312 vmdebootstrap</a>, the build might fail without the patch to the
6313 kpartx call.</p>
6314
6315 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
6316 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
6317 the preseed values:</p>
6318
6319 <pre>
6320 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
6321 </pre>
6322
6323 <p>But note that due to <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/740673">a
6324 recently introduced bug in apt in Jessie</a>, the installer will
6325 currently hang while setting up APT sources.  Killing the
6326 '<tt>apt-cdrom ident</tt>' process when it hang a few times during the
6327 installation will get the installation going.  This affect all
6328 installations in Jessie, and I expect it will be fixed soon.</p>
6329
6330 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
6331 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
6332 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
6333 irc.debian.org)</a> and
6334 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6335 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6336
6337       </div>
6338       <div class="tags">
6339
6340
6341         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>.
6342
6343
6344       </div>
6345     </div>
6346     <div class="padding"></div>
6347
6348     <div class="entry">
6349       <div class="title">
6350         <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>
6351       </div>
6352       <div class="date">
6353         22nd February 2014
6354       </div>
6355       <div class="body">
6356         <p>Many years ago, I wrote a GPL licensed version of the netgroup and
6357 innetgr tools, because I needed them in
6358 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>.  I called the project
6359 ng-utils, and it has served me well.  I placed the project under the
6360 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/">Hungry Programmer</a> umbrella, and it was maintained in our CVS
6361 repository.  But many years ago, the CVS repository was dropped (lost,
6362 not migrated to new hardware, not sure), and the project have lacked a
6363 proper home since then.</p>
6364
6365 <p>Last summer, I had a look at the package and made a new release
6366 fixing a irritating crash bug, but was unable to store the changes in
6367 a proper source control system.  I applied for a project on
6368 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/">Alioth</a>, but did not have time
6369 to follow up on it.  Until today. :)</p>
6370
6371 <p>After many hours of cleaning and migration, the ng-utils project
6372 now have a new home, and a git repository with the highlight of the
6373 history of the project.  I published all release tarballs and imported
6374 them into the git repository.  As the project is really stable and not
6375 expected to gain new features any time soon, I decided to make a new
6376 release and call it 1.0.  Visit the new project home on
6377 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/">https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/</a>
6378 if you want to check it out.  The new version is also uploaded into
6379 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/ng-utils.html">Debian Unstable</a>.</p>
6380
6381       </div>
6382       <div class="tags">
6383
6384
6385         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>.
6386
6387
6388       </div>
6389     </div>
6390     <div class="padding"></div>
6391
6392     <div class="entry">
6393       <div class="title">
6394         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_sysvinit_from_experimental_in_Debian_Hurd.html">Testing sysvinit from experimental in Debian Hurd</a>
6395       </div>
6396       <div class="date">
6397          3rd February 2014
6398       </div>
6399       <div class="body">
6400         <p>A few days ago I decided to try to help the Hurd people to get
6401 their changes into sysvinit, to allow them to use the normal sysvinit
6402 boot system instead of their old one.  This follow up on the
6403 <a href="https://teythoon.cryptobitch.de//categories/gsoc.html">great
6404 Google Summer of Code work</a> done last summer by Justus Winter to
6405 get Debian on Hurd working more like Debian on Linux.  To get started,
6406 I downloaded a prebuilt hard disk image from
6407 <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>,
6408 and started it using virt-manager.</p>
6409
6410 <p>The first think I had to do after logging in (root without any
6411 password) was to get the network operational.  I followed
6412 <a href="https://www.debian.org/ports/hurd/hurd-install">the
6413 instructions on the Debian GNU/Hurd ports page</a> and ran these
6414 commands as root to get the machine to accept a IP address from the
6415 kvm internal DHCP server:</p>
6416
6417 <p><blockquote><pre>
6418 settrans -fgap /dev/netdde /hurd/netdde
6419 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[p]finet/ { print $2}')
6420 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[d]evnode/ { print $2}')
6421 dhclient /dev/eth0
6422 </pre></blockquote></p>
6423
6424 <p>After this, the machine had internet connectivity, and I could
6425 upgrade it and install the sysvinit packages from experimental and
6426 enable it as the default boot system in Hurd.</p>
6427
6428 <p>But before I did that, I set a password on the root user, as ssh is
6429 running on the machine it for ssh login to work a password need to be
6430 set.  Also, note that a bug somewhere in openssh on Hurd block
6431 compression from working.  Remember to turn that off on the client
6432 side.</p>
6433
6434 <p>Run these commands as root to upgrade and test the new sysvinit
6435 stuff:</p>
6436
6437 <p><blockquote><pre>
6438 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/experimental.list &lt;&lt;EOF
6439 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ experimental main
6440 EOF
6441 apt-get update
6442 apt-get dist-upgrade
6443 apt-get install -t experimental initscripts sysv-rc sysvinit \
6444     sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils
6445 update-alternatives --config runsystem
6446 </pre></blockquote></p>
6447
6448 <p>To reboot after switching boot system, you have to use
6449 <tt>reboot-hurd</tt> instead of just <tt>reboot</tt>, as there is not
6450 yet a sysvinit process able to receive the signals from the normal
6451 'reboot' command.  After switching to sysvinit as the boot system,
6452 upgrading every package and rebooting, the network come up with DHCP
6453 after boot as it should, and the settrans/pkill hack mentioned at the
6454 start is no longer needed.  But for some strange reason, there are no
6455 longer any login prompt in the virtual console, so I logged in using
6456 ssh instead.
6457
6458 <p>Note that there are some race conditions in Hurd making the boot
6459 fail some times.  No idea what the cause is, but hope the Hurd porters
6460 figure it out.  At least Justus said on IRC (#debian-hurd on
6461 irc.debian.org) that they are aware of the problem.  A way to reduce
6462 the impact is to upgrade to the Hurd packages built by Justus by
6463 adding this repository to the machine:</p>
6464
6465 <p><blockquote><pre>
6466 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/hurd-ci.list &lt;&lt;EOF
6467 deb http://darnassus.sceen.net/~teythoon/hurd-ci/ sid main
6468 EOF
6469 </pre></blockquote></p>
6470
6471 <p>At the moment the prebuilt virtual machine get some packages from
6472 http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian, because some of the packages in
6473 unstable do not yet include the required patches that are lingering in
6474 BTS.  This is the completely list of "unofficial" packages installed:</p>
6475
6476 <p><blockquote><pre>
6477 # aptitude search '?narrow(?version(CURRENT),?origin(Debian Ports))'
6478 i   emacs                   - GNU Emacs editor (metapackage)
6479 i   gdb                     - GNU Debugger
6480 i   hurd-recommended        - Miscellaneous translators
6481 i   isc-dhcp-client         - ISC DHCP client
6482 i   isc-dhcp-common         - common files used by all the isc-dhcp* packages
6483 i   libc-bin                - Embedded GNU C Library: Binaries
6484 i   libc-dev-bin            - Embedded GNU C Library: Development binaries
6485 i   libc0.3                 - Embedded GNU C Library: Shared libraries
6486 i A libc0.3-dbg             - Embedded GNU C Library: detached debugging symbols
6487 i   libc0.3-dev             - Embedded GNU C Library: Development Libraries and Hea
6488 i   multiarch-support       - Transitional package to ensure multiarch compatibilit
6489 i A x11-common              - X Window System (X.Org) infrastructure
6490 i   xorg                    - X.Org X Window System
6491 i A xserver-xorg            - X.Org X server
6492 i A xserver-xorg-input-all  - X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
6493 #
6494 </pre></blockquote></p>
6495
6496 <p>All in all, testing hurd has been an interesting experience. :)
6497 X.org did not work out of the box and I never took the time to follow
6498 the porters instructions to fix it.  This time I was interested in the
6499 command line stuff.<p>
6500
6501       </div>
6502       <div class="tags">
6503
6504
6505         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>.
6506
6507
6508       </div>
6509     </div>
6510     <div class="padding"></div>
6511
6512     <div class="entry">
6513       <div class="title">
6514         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html">New chrpath release 0.16</a>
6515       </div>
6516       <div class="date">
6517         14th January 2014
6518       </div>
6519       <div class="body">
6520         <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to
6521 find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code
6522 analysis.  It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very
6523 useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of
6524 the source.  The company behind it provide
6525 <a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as
6526 a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are
6527 already checked.  A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at
6528 the Coverity system, and discovered that the
6529 <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and
6530 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a>
6531 projects I am involved with was already registered.  But these are
6532 fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to
6533 check, and decided to <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request
6534 checking of the chrpath project</a>.  It was
6535 added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects.  Six of
6536 these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an
6537 error.  Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction
6538 of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it
6539 is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in
6540 the future end up in a library.  Having fixed all defects and added
6541 <a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a
6542 mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to
6543 publish a new release.  These are the release notes:</p>
6544
6545 <p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p>
6546
6547 <ul>
6548
6549   <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li>
6550   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li>
6551   <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li>
6552
6553 </ul>
6554
6555 <p>You can
6556 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
6557 new version 0.16 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
6558 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
6559 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
6560 include a test suite check.</p>
6561
6562       </div>
6563       <div class="tags">
6564
6565
6566         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>.
6567
6568
6569       </div>
6570     </div>
6571     <div class="padding"></div>
6572
6573     <div class="entry">
6574       <div class="title">
6575         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html">New chrpath release 0.15</a>
6576       </div>
6577       <div class="date">
6578         24th November 2013
6579       </div>
6580       <div class="body">
6581         <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that
6582 development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my
6583 acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath,
6584 the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already
6585 compiled ELF programs.  The update was triggered by the persistence of
6586 Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get
6587 support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he
6588 is working on.  I checked the
6589 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>,
6590 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and
6591 <a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a>
6592 packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from
6593 OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes.
6594 These are the release notes:</p>
6595
6596 <p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p>
6597
6598 <ul>
6599
6600   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work
6601    with newer architectures.  Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads
6602    up.</li>
6603
6604   <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li>
6605
6606   <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and
6607    Matthias Klose.</li>
6608
6609   <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by
6610    Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li>
6611
6612   <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in
6613    .dynamic is a NULL terminated string.  Based on patch found in
6614    Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li>
6615
6616 </ul>
6617
6618 <p>You can
6619 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
6620 new version 0.15 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
6621 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
6622 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
6623 include a testsuite check.</p>
6624
6625       </div>
6626       <div class="tags">
6627
6628
6629         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>.
6630
6631
6632       </div>
6633     </div>
6634     <div class="padding"></div>
6635
6636     <div class="entry">
6637       <div class="title">
6638         <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>
6639       </div>
6640       <div class="date">
6641          2nd November 2013
6642       </div>
6643       <div class="body">
6644         <p>If one of the points of switching to a new init system in Debian is
6645 <a href="http://thomas.goirand.fr/blog/?p=147">to get rid of huge
6646 init.d scripts</a>, I doubt we need to switch away from sysvinit and
6647 init.d scripts at all.  Here is an example init.d script, ie a rewrite
6648 of /etc/init.d/rsyslog:</p>
6649
6650 <p><pre>
6651 #!/lib/init/init-d-script
6652 ### BEGIN INIT INFO
6653 # Provides:          rsyslog
6654 # Required-Start:    $remote_fs $time
6655 # Required-Stop:     umountnfs $time
6656 # X-Stop-After:      sendsigs
6657 # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
6658 # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
6659 # Short-Description: enhanced syslogd
6660 # Description:       Rsyslog is an enhanced multi-threaded syslogd.
6661 #                    It is quite compatible to stock sysklogd and can be
6662 #                    used as a drop-in replacement.
6663 ### END INIT INFO
6664 DESC="enhanced syslogd"
6665 DAEMON=/usr/sbin/rsyslogd
6666 </pre></p>
6667
6668 <p>Pretty minimalistic to me... For the record, the original sysv-rc
6669 script was 137 lines, and the above is just 15 lines, most of it meta
6670 info/comments.</p>
6671
6672 <p>How to do this, you ask?  Well, one create a new script
6673 /lib/init/init-d-script looking something like this:
6674
6675 <p><pre>
6676 #!/bin/sh
6677
6678 # Define LSB log_* functions.
6679 # Depend on lsb-base (>= 3.2-14) to ensure that this file is present
6680 # and status_of_proc is working.
6681 . /lib/lsb/init-functions
6682
6683 #
6684 # Function that starts the daemon/service
6685
6686 #
6687 do_start()
6688 {
6689         # Return
6690         #   0 if daemon has been started
6691         #   1 if daemon was already running
6692         #   2 if daemon could not be started
6693         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON --test > /dev/null \
6694                 || return 1
6695         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON -- \
6696                 $DAEMON_ARGS \
6697                 || return 2
6698         # Add code here, if necessary, that waits for the process to be ready
6699         # to handle requests from services started subsequently which depend
6700         # on this one.  As a last resort, sleep for some time.
6701 }
6702
6703 #
6704 # Function that stops the daemon/service
6705 #
6706 do_stop()
6707 {
6708         # Return
6709         #   0 if daemon has been stopped
6710         #   1 if daemon was already stopped
6711         #   2 if daemon could not be stopped
6712         #   other if a failure occurred
6713         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --retry=TERM/30/KILL/5 --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
6714         RETVAL="$?"
6715         [ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2
6716         # Wait for children to finish too if this is a daemon that forks
6717         # and if the daemon is only ever run from this initscript.
6718         # If the above conditions are not satisfied then add some other code
6719         # that waits for the process to drop all resources that could be
6720         # needed by services started subsequently.  A last resort is to
6721         # sleep for some time.
6722         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --retry=0/30/KILL/5 --exec $DAEMON
6723         [ "$?" = 2 ] && return 2
6724         # Many daemons don't delete their pidfiles when they exit.
6725         rm -f $PIDFILE
6726         return "$RETVAL"
6727 }
6728
6729 #
6730 # Function that sends a SIGHUP to the daemon/service
6731 #
6732 do_reload() {
6733         #
6734         # If the daemon can reload its configuration without
6735         # restarting (for example, when it is sent a SIGHUP),
6736         # then implement that here.
6737         #
6738         start-stop-daemon --stop --signal 1 --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
6739         return 0
6740 }
6741
6742 SCRIPTNAME=$1
6743 scriptbasename="$(basename $1)"
6744 echo "SN: $scriptbasename"
6745 if [ "$scriptbasename" != "init-d-library" ] ; then
6746     script="$1"
6747     shift
6748     . $script
6749 else
6750     exit 0
6751 fi
6752
6753 NAME=$(basename $DAEMON)
6754 PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
6755
6756 # Exit if the package is not installed
6757 #[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0
6758
6759 # Read configuration variable file if it is present
6760 [ -r /etc/default/$NAME ] && . /etc/default/$NAME
6761
6762 # Load the VERBOSE setting and other rcS variables
6763 . /lib/init/vars.sh
6764
6765 case "$1" in
6766   start)
6767         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
6768         do_start
6769         case "$?" in
6770                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
6771                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
6772         esac
6773         ;;
6774   stop)
6775         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
6776         do_stop
6777         case "$?" in
6778                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
6779                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
6780         esac
6781         ;;
6782   status)
6783         status_of_proc "$DAEMON" "$NAME" && exit 0 || exit $?
6784         ;;
6785   #reload|force-reload)
6786         #
6787         # If do_reload() is not implemented then leave this commented out
6788         # and leave 'force-reload' as an alias for 'restart'.
6789         #
6790         #log_daemon_msg "Reloading $DESC" "$NAME"
6791         #do_reload
6792         #log_end_msg $?
6793         #;;
6794   restart|force-reload)
6795         #
6796         # If the "reload" option is implemented then remove the
6797         # 'force-reload' alias
6798         #
6799         log_daemon_msg "Restarting $DESC" "$NAME"
6800         do_stop
6801         case "$?" in
6802           0|1)
6803                 do_start
6804                 case "$?" in
6805                         0) log_end_msg 0 ;;
6806                         1) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Old process is still running
6807                         *) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Failed to start
6808                 esac
6809                 ;;
6810           *)
6811                 # Failed to stop
6812                 log_end_msg 1
6813                 ;;
6814         esac
6815         ;;
6816   *)
6817         echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|status|restart|force-reload}" >&2
6818         exit 3
6819         ;;
6820 esac
6821
6822 :
6823 </pre></p>
6824
6825 <p>It is based on /etc/init.d/skeleton, and could be improved quite a
6826 lot.  I did not really polish the approach, so it might not always
6827 work out of the box, but you get the idea.  I did not try very hard to
6828 optimize it nor make it more robust either.</p>
6829
6830 <p>A better argument for switching init system in Debian than reducing
6831 the size of init scripts (which is a good thing to do anyway), is to
6832 get boot system that is able to handle the kernel events sensibly and
6833 robustly, and do not depend on the boot to run sequentially.  The boot
6834 and the kernel have not behaved sequentially in years.</p>
6835
6836       </div>
6837       <div class="tags">
6838
6839
6840         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>.
6841
6842
6843       </div>
6844     </div>
6845     <div class="padding"></div>
6846
6847     <div class="entry">
6848       <div class="title">
6849         <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>
6850       </div>
6851       <div class="date">
6852          1st November 2013
6853       </div>
6854       <div class="body">
6855         <p><a href="http://www.spice-space.org/">The SPICE protocol</a> for
6856 remote display access is the preferred solution with oVirt and RedHat
6857 Enterprise Virtualization, and I was sad to discover the other day
6858 that the browser plugin needed to use these systems seamlessly was
6859 missing in Debian.  The <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/668284">request
6860 for a package</a> was from 2012-04-10 with no progress since
6861 2013-04-01, so I decided to wrap up a package based on the great work
6862 from Cajus Pollmeier and put it in a collab-maint maintained git
6863 repository to get a package I could use.  I would very much like
6864 others to help me maintain the package (or just take over, I do not
6865 mind), but as no-one had volunteered so far, I just uploaded it to
6866 NEW.  I hope it will be available in Debian in a few days.</p>
6867
6868 <p>The source is now available from
6869 <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>
6870
6871       </div>
6872       <div class="tags">
6873
6874
6875         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>.
6876
6877
6878       </div>
6879     </div>
6880     <div class="padding"></div>
6881
6882     <div class="entry">
6883       <div class="title">
6884         <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>
6885       </div>
6886       <div class="date">
6887         27th October 2013
6888       </div>
6889       <div class="body">
6890         <p>The
6891 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/v/vmdebootstrap.html">vmdebootstrap</a>
6892 program is a a very nice system to create virtual machine images.  It
6893 create a image file, add a partition table, mount it and run
6894 debootstrap in the mounted directory to create a Debian system on a
6895 stick.  Yesterday, I decided to try to teach it how to make images for
6896 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi</a>, as part
6897 of a plan to simplify the build system for
6898 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the FreedomBox
6899 project</a>.  The FreedomBox project already uses vmdebootstrap for
6900 the virtualbox images, but its current build system made multistrap
6901 based system for Dreamplug images, and it is lacking support for
6902 Raspberry Pi.</p>
6903
6904 <p>Armed with the knowledge on how to build "foreign" (aka non-native
6905 architecture) chroots for Raspberry Pi, I dived into the vmdebootstrap
6906 code and adjusted it to be able to build armel images on my amd64
6907 Debian laptop.  I ended up giving vmdebootstrap five new options,
6908 allowing me to replicate the image creation process I use to make
6909 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">Debian
6910 Jessie based mesh node images for the Raspberry Pi</a>.  First, the
6911 <tt>--foreign /path/to/binfm_handler</tt> option tell vmdebootstrap to
6912 call debootstrap with --foreign and to copy the handler into the
6913 generated chroot before running the second stage.  This allow
6914 vmdebootstrap to create armel images on an amd64 host.  Next I added
6915 two new options <tt>--bootsize size</tt> and <tt>--boottype
6916 fstype</tt> to teach it to create a separate /boot/ partition with the
6917 given file system type, allowing me to create an image with a vfat
6918 partition for the /boot/ stuff.  I also added a <tt>--variant
6919 variant</tt> option to allow me to create smaller images without the
6920 Debian base system packages installed.  Finally, I added an option
6921 <tt>--no-extlinux</tt> to tell vmdebootstrap to not install extlinux
6922 as a boot loader.  It is not needed on the Raspberry Pi and probably
6923 most other non-x86 architectures.  The changes were accepted by the
6924 upstream author of vmdebootstrap yesterday and today, and is now
6925 available from
6926 <a href="http://git.liw.fi/cgi-bin/cgit/cgit.cgi/vmdebootstrap/">the
6927 upstream project page</a>.</p>
6928
6929 <p>To use it to build a Raspberry Pi image using Debian Jessie, first
6930 create a small script (the customize script) to add the non-free
6931 binary blob needed to boot the Raspberry Pi and the APT source
6932 list:</p>
6933
6934 <p><pre>
6935 #!/bin/sh
6936 set -e # Exit on first error
6937 rootdir="$1"
6938 cd "$rootdir"
6939 cat &lt;&lt;EOF > etc/apt/sources.list
6940 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
6941 EOF
6942 # Install non-free binary blob needed to boot Raspberry Pi.  This
6943 # install a kernel somewhere too.
6944 wget https://raw.github.com/Hexxeh/rpi-update/master/rpi-update \
6945     -O $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
6946 chmod a+x $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
6947 mkdir -p $rootdir/lib/modules
6948 touch $rootdir/boot/start.elf
6949 chroot $rootdir rpi-update
6950 </pre></p>
6951
6952 <p>Next, fetch the latest vmdebootstrap script and call it like this
6953 to build the image:</p>
6954
6955 <pre>
6956 sudo ./vmdebootstrap \
6957     --variant minbase \
6958     --arch armel \
6959     --distribution jessie \
6960     --mirror http://http.debian.net/debian \
6961     --image test.img \
6962     --size 600M \
6963     --bootsize 64M \
6964     --boottype vfat \
6965     --log-level debug \
6966     --verbose \
6967     --no-kernel \
6968     --no-extlinux \
6969     --root-password raspberry \
6970     --hostname raspberrypi \
6971     --foreign /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static \
6972     --customize `pwd`/customize \
6973     --package netbase \
6974     --package git-core \
6975     --package binutils \
6976     --package ca-certificates \
6977     --package wget \
6978     --package kmod
6979 </pre></p>
6980
6981 <p>The list of packages being installed are the ones needed by
6982 rpi-update to make the image bootable on the Raspberry Pi, with the
6983 exception of netbase, which is needed by debootstrap to find
6984 /etc/hosts with the minbase variant.  I really wish there was a way to
6985 set up an Raspberry Pi using only packages in the Debian archive, but
6986 that is not possible as far as I know, because it boots from the GPU
6987 using a non-free binary blob.</p>
6988
6989 <p>The build host need debootstrap, kpartx and qemu-user-static and
6990 probably a few others installed.  I have not checked the complete
6991 build dependency list.</p>
6992
6993 <p>The resulting image will not use the hardware floating point unit
6994 on the Raspberry PI, because the armel architecture in Debian is not
6995 optimized for that use.  So the images created will be a bit slower
6996 than <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/">Raspbian</a> based images.</p>
6997
6998       </div>
6999       <div class="tags">
7000
7001
7002         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>.
7003
7004
7005       </div>
7006     </div>
7007     <div class="padding"></div>
7008
7009     <div class="entry">
7010       <div class="title">
7011         <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>
7012       </div>
7013       <div class="date">
7014         15th October 2013
7015       </div>
7016       <div class="body">
7017         <p>The last few days I came across a few good causes that should get
7018 wider attention.  I recommend signing and donating to each one of
7019 these. :)</p>
7020
7021 <p>Via <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2013/18/">Debian
7022 Project News for 2013-10-14</a> I came across the Outreach Program for
7023 Women program which is a Google Summer of Code like initiative to get
7024 more women involved in free software.  One debian sponsor has offered
7025 to match <a href="http://debian.ch/opw2013">any donation done to Debian
7026 earmarked</a> for this initiative.  I donated a few minutes ago, and
7027 hope you will to. :)</p>
7028
7029 <p>And the Electronic Frontier Foundation just announced plans to
7030 create <a href="https://supporters.eff.org/donate/nsa-videos">video
7031 documentaries about the excessive spying</a> on every Internet user that
7032 take place these days, and their need to fund the work.  I've already
7033 donated.  Are you next?</p>
7034
7035 <p>For my Norwegian audience, the organisation Studentenes og
7036 Akademikernes Internasjonale Hjelpefond is collecting signatures for a
7037 statement under the heading
7038 <a href="http://saih.no/Bloggers_United/">Bloggers United for Open
7039 Access</a> for those of us asking for more focus on open access in the
7040 Norwegian government.  So far 499 signatures.  I hope you will sign it
7041 too.</p>
7042
7043       </div>
7044       <div class="tags">
7045
7046
7047         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>.
7048
7049
7050       </div>
7051     </div>
7052     <div class="padding"></div>
7053
7054     <div class="entry">
7055       <div class="title">
7056         <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>
7057       </div>
7058       <div class="date">
7059         27th September 2013
7060       </div>
7061       <div class="body">
7062         <p>The <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox
7063 project</a> have been going on for a while, and have presented the
7064 vision, ideas and solution several places.  Here is a little
7065 collection of videos of talks and presentation of the project.</p>
7066
7067 <ul>
7068
7069 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukvUz5taxvA">FreedomBox -
7070 2,5 minute marketing film</a> (Youtube)</li>
7071
7072 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzW25QTVWsE">Eben Moglen
7073 discusses the Freedombox on CBS news 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
7074
7075 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae8SZbxfE0g">Eben Moglen -
7076 Freedom in the Cloud - Software Freedom, Privacy and and Security for
7077 Web 2.0 and Cloud computing at ISOC-NY Public Meeting 2010</a>
7078 (Youtube)</li>
7079
7080 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNaIji_3xBE">Fosdem 2011
7081 Keynote by Eben Moglen presenting the Freedombox</a> (Youtube)</li>
7082
7083 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bDDUyJSQ9s">Presentation of
7084 the Freedombox by James Vasile at Elevate in Gratz 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
7085
7086 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQTmnk27g9s"> Freedombox -
7087 Discovery, Identity, and Trust by Nick Daly at Freedombox Hackfest New
7088 York City in 2012</a> (Youtube)</li>
7089
7090 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbSB4Ba7Ck">Introduction
7091 to the Freedombox at Freedombox Hackfest New York City in 2012</a>
7092 (Youtube)</li>
7093
7094 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-P2Jaeg0aQ">Freedom, Out
7095 of the Box! by Bdale Garbee at linux.conf.au Ballarat, 2012</a> (Youtube) </li>
7096
7097 <li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/freedombox/">Freedombox
7098 1.0 by Eben Moglen and Bdale Garbee at Fosdem 2013</a> (FOSDEM) </li>
7099
7100 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LpYX2zVYg">What is the
7101 FreedomBox today by Bdale Garbee at Debconf13 in Vaumarcus
7102 2013</a> (Youtube)</li>
7103
7104 </ul>
7105
7106 <p>A larger list is available from
7107 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/TalksAndPresentations">the
7108 Freedombox Wiki</a>.</p>
7109
7110 <p>On other news, I am happy to report that Freedombox based on Debian
7111 Jessie is coming along quite well, and soon both Owncloud and using
7112 Tor should be available for testers of the Freedombox solution. :) In
7113 a few weeks I hope everything needed to test it is included in Debian.
7114 The withsqlite package is already in Debian, and the plinth package is
7115 pending in NEW.  The third and vital part of that puzzle is the
7116 metapackage/setup framework, which is still pending an upload.  Join
7117 us on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC
7118 (#freedombox on irc.debian.org)</a> and
7119 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
7120 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
7121
7122       </div>
7123       <div class="tags">
7124
7125
7126         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>.
7127
7128
7129       </div>
7130     </div>
7131     <div class="padding"></div>
7132
7133     <div class="entry">
7134       <div class="title">
7135         <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>
7136       </div>
7137       <div class="date">
7138         10th September 2013
7139       </div>
7140       <div class="body">
7141         <p>I was introduced to the
7142 <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox project</a>
7143 in 2010, when Eben Moglen presented his vision about serving the need
7144 of non-technical people to keep their personal information private and
7145 within the legal protection of their own homes.  The idea is to give
7146 people back the power over their network and machines, and return
7147 Internet back to its intended peer-to-peer architecture.  Instead of
7148 depending on a central service, the Freedombox will give everyone
7149 control over their own basic infrastructure.</p>
7150
7151 <p>I've intended to join the effort since then, but other tasks have
7152 taken priority.  But this summers nasty news about the misuse of trust
7153 and privilege exercised by the "western" intelligence gathering
7154 communities increased my eagerness to contribute to a point where I
7155 actually started working on the project a while back.</p>
7156
7157 <p>The <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/freedombox/">initial
7158 Debian initiative</a> based on the vision from Eben Moglen, is to
7159 create a simple and cheap Debian based appliance that anyone can hook
7160 up in their home and get access to secure and private services and
7161 communication.  The initial deployment platform have been the
7162 <a href="http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-dreamplugdetails.aspx">Dreamplug</a>,
7163 which is a piece of hardware I do not own.  So to be able to test what
7164 the current Freedombox setup look like, I had to come up with a way to install
7165 it on some hardware I do have access to.  I have rewritten the
7166 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedom-maker">freedom-maker</a>
7167 image build framework to use .deb packages instead of only copying
7168 setup into the boot images, and thanks to this rewrite I am able to
7169 set up any machine supported by Debian Wheezy as a Freedombox, using
7170 the previously mentioned deb (and a few support debs for packages
7171 missing in Debian).</p>
7172
7173 <p>The current Freedombox setup consist of a set of bootstrapping
7174 scripts
7175 (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>),
7176 and a administrative web interface
7177 (<a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/Plinth">plinth</a> + exmachina +
7178 withsqlite), as well as a privacy enhancing proxy based on
7179 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>
7180 (freedombox-privoxy).  There is also a web/javascript based XMPP
7181 client (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/jwchat">jwchat</a>)
7182 trying (unsuccessfully so far) to talk to the XMPP server
7183 (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/ejabberd">ejabberd</a>).  The
7184 web interface is pluggable, and the goal is to use it to enable OpenID
7185 services, mesh network connectivity, use of TOR, etc, etc.  Not much of
7186 this is really working yet, see
7187 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedombox-todos/blob/master/TODO">the
7188 project TODO</a> for links to GIT repositories.  Most of the code is
7189 on github at the moment.  The HTTP proxy is operational out of the
7190 box, and the admin web interface can be used to add/remove plinth
7191 users.  I've not been able to do anything else with it so far, but
7192 know there are several branches spread around github and other places
7193 with lots of half baked features.</p>
7194
7195 <p>Anyway, if you want to have a look at the current state, the
7196 following recipes should work to give you a test machine to poke
7197 at.</p>
7198
7199 <p><strong>Debian Wheezy amd64</strong></p>
7200
7201 <ol>
7202
7203 <li>Fetch normal Debian Wheezy installation ISO.</li>
7204 <li>Boot from it, either as CD or USB stick.</li>
7205 <li><p>Press [tab] on the boot prompt and add this as a boot argument
7206 to the Debian installer:<p>
7207 <pre>url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat</a></pre></li>
7208
7209 <li>Answer the few language/region/password questions and pick disk to
7210 install on.</li>
7211
7212 <li>When the installation is finished and the machine have rebooted a
7213 few times, your Freedombox is ready for testing.</li>
7214
7215 </ol>
7216
7217 <p><strong>Raspberry Pi Raspbian</strong></p>
7218
7219 <ol>
7220
7221 <li>Fetch a Raspbian SD card image, create SD card.</li>
7222 <li>Boot from SD card, extend file system to fill the card completely.</li>
7223 <li><p>Log in and add this to /etc/sources.list:</p>
7224 <pre>
7225 deb <a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox</a> wheezy main
7226 </pre></li>
7227 <li><p>Run this as root:</p>
7228 <pre>
7229 wget -O - http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/BE1A583D.asc | \
7230    apt-key add -
7231 apt-get update
7232 apt-get install freedombox-setup
7233 /usr/lib/freedombox/setup
7234 </pre></li>
7235 <li>Reboot into your freshly created Freedombox.</li>
7236
7237 </ol>
7238
7239 <p>You can test it on other architectures too, but because the
7240 freedombox-privoxy package is binary, it will only work as intended on
7241 the architectures where I have had time to build the binary and put it
7242 in my APT repository.  But do not let this stop you.  It is only a
7243 short "<tt>apt-get source -b freedombox-privoxy</tt>" away. :)</p>
7244
7245 <p>Note that by default Freedombox is a DHCP server on the
7246 192.168.1.0/24 subnet, so if this is your subnet be careful and turn
7247 off the DHCP server by running "<tt>update-rc.d isc-dhcp-server
7248 disable</tt>" as root.</p>
7249
7250 <p>Please let me know if this works for you, or if you have any
7251 problems.  We gather on the IRC channel
7252 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">#freedombox</a> on
7253 irc.debian.org and the
7254 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">project
7255 mailing list</a>.</p>
7256
7257 <p>Once you get your freedombox operational, you can visit
7258 <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/</tt> to see the state of the plint
7259 welcome screen (dead end - do not be surprised if you are unable to
7260 get past it), and next visit <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/help/</tt>
7261 to look at the rest of plinth.  The default user is 'admin' and the
7262 default password is 'secret'.</p>
7263
7264       </div>
7265       <div class="tags">
7266
7267
7268         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>.
7269
7270
7271       </div>
7272     </div>
7273     <div class="padding"></div>
7274
7275     <div class="entry">
7276       <div class="title">
7277         <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>
7278       </div>
7279       <div class="date">
7280         18th August 2013
7281       </div>
7282       <div class="body">
7283         <p>Earlier, I reported about
7284 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">my
7285 problems using an Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB disk</a>.  Friday I was
7286 told by IBM that the original disk should be thrown away.  And as
7287 there no longer was a problem if I bricked the firmware, I decided
7288 today to try to install Intel firmware to replace the Lenovo firmware
7289 currently on the disk.</p>
7290
7291 <p>I searched the Intel site for firmware, and found
7292 <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>
7293 (aka Intel SATA Solid-State Drive Firmware Update Tool) which
7294 according to the site should contain the latest firmware for SSD
7295 disks.  I inserted the broken disk in one of my spare laptops and
7296 booted the ISO from a USB stick.  The disk was recognized, but the
7297 program claimed the newest firmware already were installed and refused
7298 to insert any Intel firmware.  So no change, and the disk is still
7299 unable to handle write load. :( I guess the only way to get them
7300 working would be if Lenovo releases new firmware.  No idea how likely
7301 that is.  Anyway, just blogging about this test for completeness.  I
7302 got a working Samsung disk, and see no point in spending more time on
7303 the broken disks.</p>
7304
7305       </div>
7306       <div class="tags">
7307
7308
7309         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>.
7310
7311
7312       </div>
7313     </div>
7314     <div class="padding"></div>
7315
7316     <div class="entry">
7317       <div class="title">
7318         <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>
7319       </div>
7320       <div class="date">
7321         17th July 2013
7322       </div>
7323       <div class="body">
7324         <p>Today I switched to
7325 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
7326 new laptop</a>.  I've previously written about the problems I had with
7327 my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
7328 <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
7329 GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
7330 sustained writes.  My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
7331 trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
7332 identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
7333 disk instead to fix it once and for all.  The Samsung disk survived
7334 the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
7335 random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
7336 decided to trust it with my data.  I have installed it as a Debian Edu
7337 Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
7338 server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
7339 station from now on.</p>
7340
7341 <p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
7342 Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
7343 performance and increase life time of the disk.  The Linux kernel and
7344 user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
7345 environment.  To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
7346 package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning.  The
7347 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
7348 for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
7349 is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
7350 package.  If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
7351 will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
7352 file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
7353
7354 <p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
7355 set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD.  It is adjusted to my use case,
7356 where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
7357 addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
7358 top of this again.  See the README file in the package source for the
7359 references I used to pick the settings.  At the moment these
7360 parameters are tuned:</p>
7361
7362 <ul>
7363
7364 <li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
7365     (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
7366
7367 <li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
7368     this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
7369     0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
7370
7371 <li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
7372     systems.</li>
7373
7374 <li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
7375     /etc/fstab.</li>
7376
7377 <li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
7378
7379 <li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
7380     cron.daily).</li>
7381
7382 <li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
7383     to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
7384
7385 </ul>
7386
7387 <p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
7388 the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
7389 little gain.  My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
7390 those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
7391 computer.  I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
7392 from getting the data on the disk (see
7393 <a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
7394 Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
7395 right thing to do.</p>
7396
7397 <p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
7398 it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
7399 indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
7400
7401 <p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
7402 and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
7403 file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
7404 instead of during my work.</p>
7405
7406 <p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
7407 this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
7408
7409 <p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning.  I expect
7410 iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
7411 have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
7412
7413 <p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
7414 there.</p>
7415
7416 <p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
7417 as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
7418 disk.  It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
7419 the Lenovo firmware.  But I have not tried and did not want to do so
7420 without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
7421 disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
7422 back.</p>
7423
7424       </div>
7425       <div class="tags">
7426
7427
7428         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>.
7429
7430
7431       </div>
7432     </div>
7433     <div class="padding"></div>
7434
7435     <div class="entry">
7436       <div class="title">
7437         <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>
7438       </div>
7439       <div class="date">
7440         10th July 2013
7441       </div>
7442       <div class="body">
7443         <p>A few days ago, I wrote about
7444 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
7445 problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
7446 was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
7447 sustained write.  My supplier is in contact with
7448 <a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
7449 replacement disk to try to fix the problem.  They decided to send an
7450 identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
7451
7452 <p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
7453 Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it.  The new disk have the
7454 same firmware version as the original.  This time my hope raised
7455 slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
7456 die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
7457 going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%.  But around 60%, the disk
7458 died again and I was back on square one.  I still do not have a new
7459 laptop with a disk I can trust.  I can not live with a disk that might
7460 lock up when I download a new
7461 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
7462 other large files.  I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
7463 the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
7464
7465 <p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
7466 11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
7467 LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
7468 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
7469 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
7470 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
7471
7472 <p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
7473 11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
7474 LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
7475 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
7476 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
7477 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
7478
7479 <p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
7480 SA, date and WNPP values.  Mentioning all the details here in case
7481 someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
7482 failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
7483 exist).</p>
7484
7485       </div>
7486       <div class="tags">
7487
7488
7489         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>.
7490
7491
7492       </div>
7493     </div>
7494     <div class="padding"></div>
7495
7496     <div class="entry">
7497       <div class="title">
7498         <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>
7499       </div>
7500       <div class="date">
7501          9th July 2013
7502       </div>
7503       <div class="body">
7504         <p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
7505 Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
7506 party in Oslo.  It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
7507 member assosiation NUUG</a> and
7508 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
7509 project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
7510 Bitraf</a>.</p>
7511
7512 <p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening.  Everyone is
7513 welcome, and there is no fee to participate.  There is on the other
7514 hand limited space, and only room for 30 people.  Please put your name
7515 on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
7516 wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
7517
7518       </div>
7519       <div class="tags">
7520
7521
7522         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>.
7523
7524
7525       </div>
7526     </div>
7527     <div class="padding"></div>
7528
7529     <div class="entry">
7530       <div class="title">
7531         <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>
7532       </div>
7533       <div class="date">
7534          5th July 2013
7535       </div>
7536       <div class="body">
7537         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
7538 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
7539 for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>.  Unfortunately I did not have much
7540 time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
7541 will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived.  I
7542 ended up picking a
7543 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
7544 with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
7545 a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly.  But my
7546 second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful.  More
7547 on that below.</p>
7548
7549 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
7550 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
7551 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
7552 feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
7553 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
7554 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
7555 to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
7556 disks from my search parameters.  I also asked around among friends to
7557 get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
7558
7559 <p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
7560 X41.  I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
7561 significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
7562 hand a lot more to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly
7563 good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
7564 I will get used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
7565 needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
7566
7567 <p>Turning off the touch pad was simple.  All it took was a quick
7568 visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
7569
7570 <p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop.  The 180 GB SSD disk
7571 lock up during load.  And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
7572 with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
7573 I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
7574 reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
7575 default in Ubuntu).  And the bug with is already known.  It was
7576 reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
7577 report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
7578 Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD).  It is also reported to the Linux
7579 kernel developers as
7580 <a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
7581 report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
7582 (SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
7583 Lenovo forums, both for
7584 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
7585 2012-11-10</a> and for
7586 <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
7587 03-20-2013</a>.  The problem do not only affect installation.  The
7588 reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
7589 on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
7590 problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
7591 There is even a
7592 <a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
7593 available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
7594 minutes by writing to a file.</p>
7595
7596 <p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
7597 contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
7598 requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
7599 firmware.  Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
7600 Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i).  I
7601 hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
7602 fixed. :)</p>
7603
7604       </div>
7605       <div class="tags">
7606
7607
7608         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>.
7609
7610
7611       </div>
7612     </div>
7613     <div class="padding"></div>
7614
7615     <div class="entry">
7616       <div class="title">
7617         <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>
7618       </div>
7619       <div class="date">
7620          4th July 2013
7621       </div>
7622       <div class="body">
7623         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
7624 trusty old Thinkpad X41.  Unfortunately I did not have much time to
7625 spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived.  I ended up
7626 picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
7627 X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu
7628 Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly.  As I write
7629 this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
7630 with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
7631 with an expencive door stop.</p>
7632
7633 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
7634 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
7635 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
7636 feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
7637 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
7638 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
7639 to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
7640
7641 <p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
7642 wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
7643 to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly good and the
7644 individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
7645 used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
7646 new laptop now. :)</p>
7647
7648 <p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
7649
7650       </div>
7651       <div class="tags">
7652
7653
7654         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>.
7655
7656
7657       </div>
7658     </div>
7659     <div class="padding"></div>
7660
7661     <div class="entry">
7662       <div class="title">
7663         <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>
7664       </div>
7665       <div class="date">
7666         25th June 2013
7667       </div>
7668       <div class="body">
7669         <p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
7670 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
7671 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
7672 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
7673 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
7674 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
7675 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
7676 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
7677 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
7678 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
7679 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
7680
7681 <p><pre>
7682 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
7683 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
7684 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
7685 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
7686 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
7687 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
7688 firmware-ipw2x00
7689 firmware-ipw2x00
7690 Preconfiguring packages ...
7691 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
7692 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
7693 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
7694 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
7695 #
7696 </pre></p>
7697
7698 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
7699 printed instead:</p>
7700
7701 <p><pre>
7702 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
7703 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
7704 #
7705 </pre></p>
7706
7707 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
7708 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
7709
7710 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
7711 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
7712 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
7713 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
7714 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
7715 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
7716 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
7717 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
7718 machine.</p>
7719
7720 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
7721 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
7722 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
7723 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
7724 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
7725 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
7726
7727       </div>
7728       <div class="tags">
7729
7730
7731         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>.
7732
7733
7734       </div>
7735     </div>
7736     <div class="padding"></div>
7737
7738     <div class="entry">
7739       <div class="title">
7740         <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>
7741       </div>
7742       <div class="date">
7743         11th June 2013
7744       </div>
7745       <div class="body">
7746         <p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
7747 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
7748 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
7749 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
7750 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
7751 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
7752 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
7753 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
7754 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
7755 i915 driver used by the
7756 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
7757 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
7758
7759 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
7760 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
7761 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
7762 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
7763 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
7764
7765 <pre>
7766 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
7767 update-initramfs -u -k all
7768 </pre>
7769
7770 <p>Since March 2012 there is
7771 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
7772 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
7773 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
7774 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
7775 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
7776 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
7777 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
7778 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
7779 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
7780 number.</p>
7781
7782 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
7783 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
7784
7785 <p><pre>
7786 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
7787     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
7788     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
7789  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
7790  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
7791     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
7792  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
7793     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
7794  Latency: 0
7795  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
7796  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
7797  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
7798  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
7799  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
7800  Capabilities: <access denied>
7801  Kernel driver in use: i915
7802 </pre></p>
7803
7804 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
7805
7806 <p><pre>
7807 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
7808        ...
7809         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
7810         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
7811        ...
7812 }
7813 </pre></p>
7814
7815 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
7816 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
7817 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
7818 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
7819 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
7820 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
7821 yet shown up in
7822 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
7823 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
7824 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
7825 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
7826 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
7827 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
7828
7829 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
7830 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
7831 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
7832 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
7833 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
7834 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
7835 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
7836 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
7837 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
7838 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
7839 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
7840 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
7841
7842 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
7843 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
7844 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
7845 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
7846 backlight.</p>
7847
7848       </div>
7849       <div class="tags">
7850
7851
7852         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>.
7853
7854
7855       </div>
7856     </div>
7857     <div class="padding"></div>
7858
7859     <div class="entry">
7860       <div class="title">
7861         <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>
7862       </div>
7863       <div class="date">
7864         27th May 2013
7865       </div>
7866       <div class="body">
7867         <p>Two days ago, I asked
7868 <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
7869 I could install Linux on a Packard Bell EasyNote LV computer
7870 preinstalled with Windows 8</a>.  I found a solution, but am horrified
7871 with the obstacles put in the way of Linux users on a laptop with UEFI
7872 and Windows 8.</p>
7873
7874 <p>I never found out if the cause of my problems were the use of UEFI
7875 secure booting or fast boot.  I suspect fast boot was the problem,
7876 causing the firmware to boot directly from HD without considering any
7877 key presses and alternative devices, but do not know UEFI settings
7878 enough to tell.</p>
7879
7880 <p>There is no way to install Linux on the machine in question without
7881 opening the box and disconnecting the hard drive!  This is as far as I
7882 can tell, the only way to get access to the firmware setup menu
7883 without accepting the Windows 8 license agreement.  I am told (and
7884 found description on how to) that it is possible to configure the
7885 firmware setup once booted into Windows 8.  But as I believe the terms
7886 of that agreement are completely unacceptable, accepting the license
7887 was never an alternative.  I do not enter agreements I do not intend
7888 to follow.</p>
7889
7890 <p>I feared I had to return the laptops and ask for a refund, and
7891 waste many hours on this, but luckily there was a way to get it to
7892 work.  But I would not recommend it to anyone planning to run Linux on
7893 it, and I have become sceptical to Windows 8 certified laptops.  Is
7894 this the way Linux will be forced out of the market place, by making
7895 it close to impossible for "normal" users to install Linux without
7896 accepting the Microsoft Windows license terms?  Or at least not
7897 without risking to loose the warranty?</p>
7898
7899 <p>I've updated the
7900 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Linux Laptop
7901 wiki page for Packard Bell EasyNote LV</a>, to ensure the next person
7902 do not have to struggle as much as I did to get Linux into the
7903 machine.</p>
7904
7905 <p>Thanks to Bob Rosbag, Florian Weimer, Philipp Kern, Ben Hutching,
7906 Michael Tokarev and others for feedback and ideas.</p>
7907
7908       </div>
7909       <div class="tags">
7910
7911
7912         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>.
7913
7914
7915       </div>
7916     </div>
7917     <div class="padding"></div>
7918
7919     <div class="entry">
7920       <div class="title">
7921         <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>
7922       </div>
7923       <div class="date">
7924         25th May 2013
7925       </div>
7926       <div class="body">
7927         <p>I've run into quite a problem the last few days.  I bought three
7928 new laptops for my parents and a few others.  I bought Packard Bell
7929 Easynote LV to run Kubuntu on and use as their home computer.  But I
7930 am completely unable to figure out how to install Linux on it.  The
7931 computer is preinstalled with Windows 8, and I suspect it uses UEFI
7932 instead of a BIOS to boot.</p>
7933
7934 <p>The problem is that I am unable to get it to PXE boot, and unable
7935 to get it to boot the Linux installer from my USB stick.  I have yet
7936 to try the DVD install, and still hope it will work.  when I turn on
7937 the computer, there is no information on what buttons to press to get
7938 the normal boot menu.  I expect to get some boot menu to select PXE or
7939 USB stick booting.  When booting, it first ask for the language to
7940 use, then for some regional settings, and finally if I will accept the
7941 Windows 8 terms of use.  As these terms are completely unacceptable to
7942 me, I have no other choice but to turn off the computer and try again
7943 to get it to boot the Linux installer.</p>
7944
7945 <p>I have gathered my findings so far on a Linlap page about the
7946 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
7947 EasyNote LV</a> model.  If you have any idea how to get Linux
7948 installed on this machine, please get in touch or update that wiki
7949 page.  If I can't find a way to install Linux, I will have to return
7950 the laptop to the seller and find another machine for my parents.</p>
7951
7952 <p>I wonder, is this the way Linux will be forced out of the market
7953 using UEFI and "secure boot" by making it impossible to install Linux
7954 on new Laptops?</p>
7955
7956       </div>
7957       <div class="tags">
7958
7959
7960         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>.
7961
7962
7963       </div>
7964     </div>
7965     <div class="padding"></div>
7966
7967     <div class="entry">
7968       <div class="title">
7969         <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>
7970       </div>
7971       <div class="date">
7972         17th May 2013
7973       </div>
7974       <div class="body">
7975         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is
7976 an operating system based on Debian intended for use in schools.  It
7977 contain a turn-key solution for the computer network provided to
7978 pupils in the primary schools.  It provide both the central server,
7979 network boot servers and desktop environments with heaps of
7980 educational software.  The project was founded almost 12 years ago,
7981 2001-07-02.  If you want to support the project, which is in need for
7982 cash to fund developer gatherings and other project related activity,
7983 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">please
7984 donate some money</a>.
7985
7986 <p>A topic that come up again and again on the Debian Edu mailing
7987 lists and elsewhere, is the question on how to transform a Debian or
7988 Ubuntu installation into a Debian Edu installation.  It isn't very
7989 hard, and last week I wrote a script to replicate the steps done by
7990 the Debian Edu installer.</p>
7991
7992 <p>The script,
7993 <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/>
7994 in the debian-edu-config package, will go through these six steps and
7995 transform an existing Debian Wheezy or Ubuntu (untested) installation
7996 into a Debian Edu Workstation:</p>
7997
7998 <ol>
7999
8000 <li>Add skolelinux related APT sources.</li>
8001 <li>Create /etc/debian-edu/config with the wanted configuration.</li>
8002 <li>Install debian-edu-install to load preseeding values and pull in
8003     our configuration.</li>
8004 <li>Preseed debconf database with profile setup in
8005     /etc/debian-edu/config, and run tasksel to install packages
8006     according to the profile specified in the config above,
8007     overriding some of the Debian automation machinery.</li>
8008 <li>Run debian-edu-cfengine-D installation to configure everything
8009     that could not be done using preseeding.</li>
8010 <li>Ask for a reboot to enable all the configuration changes.</li>
8011
8012 </ol>
8013
8014 <p>There are some steps in the Debian Edu installation that can not be
8015 replicated like this.  Disk partitioning and LVM setup, for example.
8016 So this script just assume there is enough disk space to install all
8017 the needed packages.</p>
8018
8019 <p>The script was created to help a Debian Edu student working on
8020 setting up <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org">Raspberry Pi</a> as a
8021 Debian Edu client, and using it he can take the existing
8022 <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/FrontPage‎">Raspbian</a> installation and
8023 transform it into a fully functioning Debian Edu Workstation (or
8024 Roaming Workstation, or whatever :).</p>
8025
8026 <p>The default setting in the script is to create a KDE Workstation.
8027 If a LXDE based Roaming workstation is wanted instead, modify the
8028 PROFILE and DESKTOP values at the top to look like this instead:</p>
8029
8030 <p><pre>
8031 PROFILE="Roaming-Workstation"
8032 DESKTOP="lxde"
8033 </pre></p>
8034
8035 <p>The script could even become useful to set up Debian Edu servers in
8036 the cloud, by starting with a virtual Debian installation at some
8037 virtual hosting service and setting up all the services on first
8038 boot.</p>
8039
8040       </div>
8041       <div class="tags">
8042
8043
8044         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>.
8045
8046
8047       </div>
8048     </div>
8049     <div class="padding"></div>
8050
8051     <div class="entry">
8052       <div class="title">
8053         <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>
8054       </div>
8055       <div class="date">
8056         11th May 2013
8057       </div>
8058       <div class="body">
8059         <P>In January,
8060 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
8061 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
8062 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
8063 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
8064 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
8065 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
8066 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
8067 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
8068 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
8069 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
8070 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
8071 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
8072
8073 <p><table>
8074 <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>
8075 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
8076 <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>
8077 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
8078 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
8079 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
8080 <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>
8081 <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>
8082 <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>
8083 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
8084 </table></p>
8085
8086 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
8087 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
8088 available in experimental.</p>
8089
8090 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
8091 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
8092 for LEGO designers.</p>
8093
8094       </div>
8095       <div class="tags">
8096
8097
8098         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>.
8099
8100
8101       </div>
8102     </div>
8103     <div class="padding"></div>
8104
8105     <div class="entry">
8106       <div class="title">
8107         <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>
8108       </div>
8109       <div class="date">
8110          5th May 2013
8111       </div>
8112       <div class="body">
8113         <p>When I woke up this morning, I was very happy to see that the
8114 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130504">release announcement
8115 for Debian Wheezy</a> was waiting in my mail box.  This is a great
8116 Debian release, and I expect to move my machines at home over to it fairly
8117 soon.</p>
8118
8119 <p>The new debian release contain heaps of new stuff, and one program
8120 in particular make me very happy to see included.  The
8121 <a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">Scratch</a> program, made famous by
8122 the <a href="http://www.code.org/">Teach kids code</a> movement, is
8123 included for the first time.  Alongside similar programs like
8124 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/kturtle/">kturtle</a> and
8125 <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/Turtle_Art">turtleart</a>,
8126 it allow for visual programming where syntax errors can not happen,
8127 and a friendly programming environment for learning to control the
8128 computer.  Scratch will also be included in the next release of Debian
8129 Edu.</a>
8130
8131 <p>And now that Wheezy is wrapped up, we can wrap up the next Debian
8132 Edu/Skolelinux release too.  The
8133 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/04/msg00132.html">first
8134 alpha release</a> went out last week, and the next should soon
8135 follow.<p>
8136
8137       </div>
8138       <div class="tags">
8139
8140
8141         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>.
8142
8143
8144       </div>
8145     </div>
8146     <div class="padding"></div>
8147
8148     <div class="entry">
8149       <div class="title">
8150         <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>
8151       </div>
8152       <div class="date">
8153          3rd April 2013
8154       </div>
8155       <div class="body">
8156         <p>Today the <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram
8157 package</a> finally made it into the archive, after lingering in NEW
8158 for many months.  I uploaded it to the Debian experimental suite
8159 2013-01-27, and today it was accepted into the archive.</p>
8160
8161 <p>Isenkram is a system for suggesting to users what packages to
8162 install to work with a pluggable hardware device.  The suggestion pop
8163 up when the device is plugged in.  For example if a Lego Mindstorm NXT
8164 is inserted, it will suggest to install the program needed to program
8165 the NXT controller.  Give it a go, and report bugs and suggestions to
8166 BTS. :)</p>
8167
8168       </div>
8169       <div class="tags">
8170
8171
8172         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>.
8173
8174
8175       </div>
8176     </div>
8177     <div class="padding"></div>
8178
8179     <div class="entry">
8180       <div class="title">
8181         <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>
8182       </div>
8183       <div class="date">
8184          2nd February 2013
8185       </div>
8186       <div class="body">
8187         <p>My
8188 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
8189 bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
8190 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
8191 Debian was waiting in NEW.  It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
8192 2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then.  It was
8193 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
8194 version too.</p>
8195
8196 <p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
8197 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
8198 architectures.  For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
8199 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
8200 architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
8201 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
8202 no-one have been able to propose a fix.  If you got an idea what is
8203 failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
8204
8205 <p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
8206 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
8207 if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
8208 #696715</a>).  So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
8209 it. :)</p>
8210
8211 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
8212 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
8213 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8214
8215       </div>
8216       <div class="tags">
8217
8218
8219         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>.
8220
8221
8222       </div>
8223     </div>
8224     <div class="padding"></div>
8225
8226     <div class="entry">
8227       <div class="title">
8228         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a>
8229       </div>
8230       <div class="date">
8231         22nd January 2013
8232       </div>
8233       <div class="body">
8234         <p>Yesterday, I
8235 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
8236 for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
8237 pluggable hardware devices, which I
8238 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
8239 out to create</a> earlier this month.  Several valuable testers showed
8240 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
8241 people.  But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
8242 for this project.  Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
8243 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name.  In the
8244 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
8245 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
8246 repository in Debian.  The new name?  It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
8247 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
8248
8249 <pre>
8250 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
8251 cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
8252 </pre>
8253
8254 <p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet.  If you
8255 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
8256 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
8257 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
8258
8259 <p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
8260 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc.  Typical hardware
8261 stuff, in other words.  I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
8262 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
8263 word.</p>
8264
8265 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
8266 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
8267 process.</p>
8268
8269 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
8270 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
8271
8272       </div>
8273       <div class="tags">
8274
8275
8276         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>.
8277
8278
8279       </div>
8280     </div>
8281     <div class="padding"></div>
8282
8283     <div class="entry">
8284       <div class="title">
8285         <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>
8286       </div>
8287       <div class="date">
8288         21st January 2013
8289       </div>
8290       <div class="body">
8291         <p>Early this month I set out to try to
8292 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
8293 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>.  Now my
8294 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience.  To test
8295 it, fetch the
8296 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
8297 from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
8298 package.  You might have to log out and in again activate the
8299 autostart script.</p>
8300
8301 <p>The design is simple:</p>
8302
8303 <ul>
8304
8305 <li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
8306 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
8307
8308 <li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
8309 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
8310 initially did.</li>
8311
8312 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
8313 the APT database, a database
8314 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
8315 via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
8316
8317 <li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
8318 isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
8319 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
8320 package or packages.</li>
8321
8322 <li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
8323 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
8324
8325 <li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
8326 package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
8327
8328 </ul>
8329
8330 <p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system.  Here
8331 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action.  First the
8332 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
8333 approve all the dependencies.  Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
8334
8335 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
8336 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
8337 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
8338 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
8339 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
8340
8341 <p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
8342 is already useful.  The database of hardware to package mappings also
8343 need more work.  It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
8344 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
8345 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
8346 method.  I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
8347 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
8348 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
8349
8350 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
8351 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
8352 '<tt>svn checkout
8353 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
8354 hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'.  If you lack debuild, install the
8355 devscripts package.</p>
8356
8357 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
8358 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
8359 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository.  See
8360 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
8361 instructions</a> for details.</p>
8362
8363       </div>
8364       <div class="tags">
8365
8366
8367         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>.
8368
8369
8370       </div>
8371     </div>
8372     <div class="padding"></div>
8373
8374     <div class="entry">
8375       <div class="title">
8376         <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>
8377       </div>
8378       <div class="date">
8379         19th January 2013
8380       </div>
8381       <div class="body">
8382         <p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died.  It died quietly and
8383 suddenly in bed.  With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
8384 black.  The power button was no longer able to turn it on.  It was a
8385 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had.  Better than both
8386 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S.  Far better than the
8387 Compaq I had before that.  Now I need to find a replacement.  To keep
8388 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
8389 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
8390 not a durable solution.
8391
8392 <p>My laptop needs are fairly modest.  This is my wishlist from when I
8393 got a new one more than 10 years ago.  It still holds true.:)</p>
8394
8395 <ul>
8396
8397 <li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
8398   than A4).</li>
8399 <li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
8400 <li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
8401 <li>Long battery life time.  Preferable a week.</li>
8402 <li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
8403 <li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
8404 <li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
8405 <li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
8406 <li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
8407 size).</li>
8408 <li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
8409   X.org packages.</li>
8410 <li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
8411   the time).
8412
8413 </ul>
8414
8415 <p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
8416 list.  The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
8417 last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
8418 at other features to choose my laptop.  But are there still made as
8419 robust laptops as my X41?  The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
8420 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
8421 Lenovo took over.  But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
8422 still be useful.</p>
8423
8424 <p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
8425 external keyboard?  I'll have to check the
8426 <a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
8427 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
8428 of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
8429 Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
8430
8431       </div>
8432       <div class="tags">
8433
8434
8435         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>.
8436
8437
8438       </div>
8439     </div>
8440     <div class="padding"></div>
8441
8442     <div class="entry">
8443       <div class="title">
8444         <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>
8445       </div>
8446       <div class="date">
8447         18th January 2013
8448       </div>
8449       <div class="body">
8450         <p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
8451 install to get support for a given MIME type.  Thanks to
8452 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
8453 done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
8454 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
8455 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
8456 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
8457
8458 <pre>
8459 #!/usr/bin/python
8460 import sys
8461 import apt
8462 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
8463     cache = apt.Cache()
8464     cache.open(None)
8465     thepkgs = []
8466     for pkg in cache:
8467         version = pkg.candidate
8468         if version is None:
8469             version = pkg.installed
8470         if version is None:
8471             continue
8472         record = version.record
8473         if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
8474             continue
8475         mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
8476         for t in mime_types:
8477             t = t.rstrip().strip()
8478             if t == mimetype:
8479                 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
8480     return thepkgs
8481 mimetype = "audio/ogg"
8482 if 1 < len(sys.argv):
8483     mimetype = sys.argv[1]
8484 print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
8485 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
8486     print "  %s" %pkg
8487 </pre>
8488
8489 <p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
8490
8491 <pre>
8492 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
8493 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
8494   gecko-mediaplayer
8495 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
8496 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
8497   browser-plugin-gnash
8498 %
8499 </pre>
8500
8501 <p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
8502 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
8503 packages.  It would be great if Debian supported such feature too.  Is
8504 anyone working on adding it?</p>
8505
8506 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
8507 request for icweasel support for this feature is
8508 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
8509 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today).  Lack
8510 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
8511 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
8512
8513       </div>
8514       <div class="tags">
8515
8516
8517         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>.
8518
8519
8520       </div>
8521     </div>
8522     <div class="padding"></div>
8523
8524     <div class="entry">
8525       <div class="title">
8526         <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>
8527       </div>
8528       <div class="date">
8529         16th January 2013
8530       </div>
8531       <div class="body">
8532         <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
8533 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
8534 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
8535 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
8536 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing.  With such
8537 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
8538 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
8539 downloaded by the browser.</p>
8540
8541 <p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
8542 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
8543 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there.  The result
8544 can be found on the
8545 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
8546 site</a>.  Using the collected information, it become possible to
8547 answer the question in the title.  Here are the 20 most supported MIME
8548 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
8549 The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
8550
8551 <p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
8552
8553 <pre>
8554   count MIME type
8555   ----- -----------------------
8556      32 text/plain
8557      30 audio/mpeg
8558      29 image/png
8559      28 image/jpeg
8560      27 application/ogg
8561      26 audio/x-mp3
8562      25 image/tiff
8563      25 image/gif
8564      22 image/bmp
8565      22 audio/x-wav
8566      20 audio/x-flac
8567      19 audio/x-mpegurl
8568      18 video/x-ms-asf
8569      18 audio/x-musepack
8570      18 audio/x-mpeg
8571      18 application/x-ogg
8572      17 video/mpeg
8573      17 audio/x-scpls
8574      17 audio/ogg
8575      16 video/x-ms-wmv
8576 </pre>
8577
8578 <p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
8579
8580 <pre>
8581   count MIME type
8582   ----- -----------------------
8583      33 text/plain
8584      32 image/png
8585      32 image/jpeg
8586      29 audio/mpeg
8587      27 image/gif
8588      26 image/tiff
8589      26 application/ogg
8590      25 audio/x-mp3
8591      22 image/bmp
8592      21 audio/x-wav
8593      19 audio/x-mpegurl
8594      19 audio/x-mpeg
8595      18 video/mpeg
8596      18 audio/x-scpls
8597      18 audio/x-flac
8598      18 application/x-ogg
8599      17 video/x-ms-asf
8600      17 text/html
8601      17 audio/x-musepack
8602      16 image/x-xbitmap
8603 </pre>
8604
8605 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
8606
8607 <pre>
8608   count MIME type
8609   ----- -----------------------
8610      31 text/plain
8611      31 image/png
8612      31 image/jpeg
8613      29 audio/mpeg
8614      28 application/ogg
8615      27 image/gif
8616      26 image/tiff
8617      26 audio/x-mp3
8618      23 audio/x-wav
8619      22 image/bmp
8620      21 audio/x-flac
8621      20 audio/x-mpegurl
8622      19 audio/x-mpeg
8623      18 video/x-ms-asf
8624      18 video/mpeg
8625      18 audio/x-scpls
8626      18 application/x-ogg
8627      17 audio/x-musepack
8628      16 video/x-ms-wmv
8629      16 video/x-msvideo
8630 </pre>
8631
8632 <p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
8633 information mentioned in DEP-11.  I have not yet had time to look at
8634 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
8635 issues.</p>
8636
8637 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
8638 discovering a typo in my script.</p>
8639
8640       </div>
8641       <div class="tags">
8642
8643
8644         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>.
8645
8646
8647       </div>
8648     </div>
8649     <div class="padding"></div>
8650
8651     <div class="entry">
8652       <div class="title">
8653         <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>
8654       </div>
8655       <div class="date">
8656         15th January 2013
8657       </div>
8658       <div class="body">
8659         <p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
8660 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
8661 values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
8662 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
8663 dongle support in Debian</a>.  Using this knowledge, I have tested how
8664 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
8665 to hardware.  This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
8666 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
8667 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
8668 packages.</p>
8669
8670 <p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
8671 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
8672 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
8673 modalias.</p>
8674
8675 <p><blockquote>
8676 Package: package-name
8677 <br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
8678 </blockquote></p>
8679
8680 <p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
8681 for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
8682
8683 <p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
8684 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
8685
8686 <p><blockquote>
8687 Package: cheese
8688 <br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
8689 </blockquote></p>
8690
8691 <p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
8692 CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
8693
8694 <p><blockquote>
8695 Package: pcmciautils
8696 <br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
8697 </blockquote></p>
8698
8699 <p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
8700 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
8701
8702 <p><blockquote>
8703 Package: colorhug-client
8704 <br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
8705 </blockquote></p>
8706
8707 <p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
8708 file in the Debian archive.  Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
8709 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
8710
8711 <p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
8712 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
8713 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
8714 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
8715 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information.  I've
8716 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
8717 is working as it should with my prototype.  It even made it to Ubuntu
8718 Raring.</p>
8719
8720 <p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
8721 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
8722 implementation of the lookup code.  The idea is to create files for
8723 each modalias and let the shell do the matching.  Please check out and
8724 try the
8725 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
8726 shell script.  It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
8727 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
8728 repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
8729
8730 <p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
8731 install yubikey-personalization:</p>
8732
8733 <p><blockquote>
8734 % ./hw-support-lookup
8735 <br>yubikey-personalization
8736 <br>%
8737 </blockquote></p>
8738
8739 <p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
8740 propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
8741
8742 <p><blockquote>
8743 % ./hw-support-lookup
8744 <br>pcmciautils
8745 <br>%
8746 </blockquote></p>
8747
8748 <p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
8749 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
8750 database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
8751
8752 <p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
8753 packages and hardware.  One source would be to look at packages with
8754 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
8755 extract their modalias information.  Another would be to look at
8756 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
8757 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
8758 generate a modalias matching rule.  I have not tested any of these to
8759 see if it work.</p>
8760
8761 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
8762 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
8763 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
8764 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
8765
8766       </div>
8767       <div class="tags">
8768
8769
8770         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>.
8771
8772
8773       </div>
8774     </div>
8775     <div class="padding"></div>
8776
8777     <div class="entry">
8778       <div class="title">
8779         <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>
8780       </div>
8781       <div class="date">
8782         14th January 2013
8783       </div>
8784       <div class="body">
8785         <p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
8786 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
8787 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
8788 to document the details.  Here are my findings so far, also available
8789 in
8790 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
8791 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
8792
8793 <p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
8794
8795 <p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
8796 values stands for.  It is in part based on information from
8797 &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> &gt;,
8798 &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;,
8799 &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
8800 &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;.
8801
8802 <p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
8803 this shell script:</p>
8804
8805 <pre>
8806 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
8807 </pre>
8808
8809 <p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
8810 using modinfo:</p>
8811
8812 <pre>
8813 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
8814 alias:          serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
8815 alias:          serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
8816 %
8817 </pre>
8818
8819 <p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
8820
8821 <p>A typical PCI entry can look like this.  This is an Intel Host
8822 Bridge memory controller:</p>
8823
8824 <p><blockquote>
8825 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
8826 </blockquote></p>
8827
8828 <p>This represent these values:</p>
8829
8830 <pre>
8831  v   00008086  (vendor)
8832  d   00002770  (device)
8833  sv  00001028  (subvendor)
8834  sd  000001AD  (subdevice)
8835  bc  06        (bus class)
8836  sc  00        (bus subclass)
8837  i   00        (interface)
8838 </pre>
8839
8840 <p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
8841 -n' as 8086:2770.  The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
8842 0600.  The 0600 class is a host bridge.  Other useful bus values are
8843 0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
8844
8845 <p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
8846 means.</p>
8847
8848 <p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
8849
8850 <p>Some typical USB entries can look like this.  This is an internal
8851 USB hub in a laptop:</p>
8852
8853 <p><blockquote>
8854 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
8855 </blockquote></p>
8856
8857 <p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
8858
8859 <pre>
8860  v    1D6B  (device vendor)
8861  p    0001  (device product)
8862  d    0206  (bcddevice)
8863  dc     09  (device class)
8864  dsc    00  (device subclass)
8865  dp     00  (device protocol)
8866  ic     09  (interface class)
8867  isc    00  (interface subclass)
8868  ip     00  (interface protocol)
8869 </pre>
8870
8871 <p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub.  Some times the relevant
8872 class is in the interface class section.  For a simple USB web camera,
8873 these alias entries show up:</p>
8874
8875 <p><blockquote>
8876 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
8877 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
8878 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
8879 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
8880 </blockquote></p>
8881
8882 <p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
8883 camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
8884 microphone).  Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
8885
8886 <p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
8887
8888 <p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff.  This is an IR
8889 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
8890
8891 <p><blockquote>
8892 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
8893 </blockquote></p>
8894
8895 <p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
8896
8897 <p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
8898
8899 <p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
8900 and model.  This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
8901 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
8902
8903 <p><blockquote>
8904 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
8905 </blockquote></p>
8906
8907 <p>The values present are</p>
8908
8909 <pre>
8910  bvn  IBM            (BIOS vendor)
8911  bvr  1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
8912  bd   06/15/2005     (BIOS date)
8913  svn  IBM            (system vendor)
8914  pn   2371H4G        (product name)
8915  pvr  ThinkPadX40    (product version)
8916  rvn  IBM            (board vendor)
8917  rn   2371H4G        (board name)
8918  rvr  NotAvailable   (board version)
8919  cvn  IBM            (chassis vendor)
8920  ct   10             (chassis type)
8921  cvr  NotAvailable   (chassis version)
8922 </pre>
8923
8924 <p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook.  Other interesting values can be
8925 found in the dmidecode source:</p>
8926
8927 <pre>
8928   3 Desktop
8929   4 Low Profile Desktop
8930   5 Pizza Box
8931   6 Mini Tower
8932   7 Tower
8933   8 Portable
8934   9 Laptop
8935  10 Notebook
8936  11 Hand Held
8937  12 Docking Station
8938  13 All In One
8939  14 Sub Notebook
8940  15 Space-saving
8941  16 Lunch Box
8942  17 Main Server Chassis
8943  18 Expansion Chassis
8944  19 Sub Chassis
8945  20 Bus Expansion Chassis
8946  21 Peripheral Chassis
8947  22 RAID Chassis
8948  23 Rack Mount Chassis
8949  24 Sealed-case PC
8950  25 Multi-system
8951  26 CompactPCI
8952  27 AdvancedTCA
8953  28 Blade
8954  29 Blade Enclosing
8955 </pre>
8956
8957 <p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
8958 table.  For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
8959 claim it is a desktop.</p>
8960
8961 <p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
8962
8963 <p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs.  One example is from my
8964 test machine:</p>
8965
8966 <p><blockquote>
8967 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
8968 </blockquote></p>
8969
8970 <p>The values present are</p>
8971
8972 <pre>
8973   ty  01  (type)
8974   pr  00  (prototype)
8975   id  00  (id)
8976   ex  00  (extra)
8977 </pre>
8978
8979 <p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver.  I am not sure what
8980 the valid values are.</p>
8981
8982 <p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
8983
8984 <p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
8985 file2alias.c.  There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
8986 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
8987 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
8988 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro.  I did not spend time documenting all of
8989 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
8990 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
8991
8992 <p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
8993
8994 <p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
8995 one can use the following shell script:</p>
8996
8997 <pre>
8998   for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
8999     echo "$id" ; \
9000     /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/  /' ; \
9001   done
9002 </pre>
9003
9004 <p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
9005 list is very long on my test machine):</p>
9006
9007 <pre>
9008   acpi:ACPI0003:
9009     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
9010   acpi:device:
9011   FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
9012   acpi:IBM0068:
9013     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
9014     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
9015     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
9016     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
9017   acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
9018     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
9019     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
9020     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
9021   [...]
9022 </pre>
9023
9024 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
9025 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
9026 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
9027 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
9028
9029 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
9030 "find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
9031 in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
9032
9033       </div>
9034       <div class="tags">
9035
9036
9037         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>.
9038
9039
9040       </div>
9041     </div>
9042     <div class="padding"></div>
9043
9044     <div class="entry">
9045       <div class="title">
9046         <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>
9047       </div>
9048       <div class="date">
9049         10th January 2013
9050       </div>
9051       <div class="body">
9052         <p>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
9053 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
9054 Launcher and updated the Debian package
9055 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">pymissile</a> to make
9056 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in.  I
9057 also added a "Modaliases" header to test it in the Debian archive and
9058 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
9059 plug in his rocket launcher.  In the process I moved the source to a
9060 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
9061 contribute.  <a href="http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/">Upstream</a>
9062 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
9063 years of relative silence.  The new git repository is not listed in
9064 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
9065 bit more before I upload the new version.  If you want to check out
9066 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
9067 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git">gitweb
9068 view</a> or use "<tt>git clone
9069 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git</tt>".</p>
9070
9071       </div>
9072       <div class="tags">
9073
9074
9075         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>.
9076
9077
9078       </div>
9079     </div>
9080     <div class="padding"></div>
9081
9082     <div class="entry">
9083       <div class="title">
9084         <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>
9085       </div>
9086       <div class="date">
9087          9th January 2013
9088       </div>
9089       <div class="body">
9090         <p>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
9091 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
9092 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
9093 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
9094 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
9095 machine.  Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
9096 Linux distribution.  When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
9097 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
9098 I need to talk to it.  When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
9099 yubikey-personalization package.  The information required to do this
9100 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.</p>
9101
9102 <p>Some years ago, I proposed to
9103 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg01206.html">use
9104 the discover subsystem to implement this</a>.  The idea is fairly
9105 simple:
9106
9107 <ul>
9108
9109 <li>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
9110   starting when a user log in.</li>
9111
9112 <li>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
9113   hardware is inserted into the computer.</li>
9114
9115 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
9116   database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
9117   packages.</li>
9118
9119 <li>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
9120   package, and make it easy to install it.</li>
9121
9122 </ul>
9123
9124 <p>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
9125 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
9126 discover database to find packages and
9127 <a href="http://www.packagekit.org/">PackageKit</a> to install
9128 packages.</p>
9129
9130 <p>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
9131 draft package is now checked into
9132 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
9133 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>.  In the process, I updated the
9134 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html">discover-data</a>
9135 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
9136 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
9137 2.2013.01.09 to unstable.  I also discovered that the current
9138 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html">discover</a>
9139 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
9140 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present.  I ported it to use
9141 libusb as a fall back option to get it working.  The fixed package
9142 version 2.1.2-6 is now in experimental (didn't upload it to unstable
9143 because of the freeze).</p>
9144
9145 <p>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
9146 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
9147 inserted):</p>
9148
9149 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-09-hw-autoinstall.png"></p>
9150
9151 <p>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
9152 install the proposed packages by pressing the "Please install
9153 program(s)" button should to be implemented.</p>
9154
9155 <p>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
9156 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
9157 from hardware to Debian packages.  Check if 'discover-pkginstall -l'
9158 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
9159 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
9160 reportbug if it isn't.  Or, if you know of a better way to provide
9161 such mapping, please let me know.</p>
9162
9163 <p>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
9164 should be considered before it is ready for production use.  Is dbus
9165 the correct way to detect new hardware?  At the moment I look for HAL
9166 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
9167 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop.  Are there better events to use?
9168 How should the user be notified?  Is the desktop notification
9169 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
9170 popup instead?  How should packages be installed?  When should they
9171 not be installed?</p>
9172
9173 <p>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
9174 please send me an email. :)</p>
9175
9176       </div>
9177       <div class="tags">
9178
9179
9180         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>.
9181
9182
9183       </div>
9184     </div>
9185     <div class="padding"></div>
9186
9187     <div class="entry">
9188       <div class="title">
9189         <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>
9190       </div>
9191       <div class="date">
9192          2nd January 2013
9193       </div>
9194       <div class="body">
9195         <p>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
9196 <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx">LEGO Mindstorm
9197 NXT</a>.  My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
9198 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
9199 already in Debian Squeeze.  If Debian support for LEGO is something
9200 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
9201 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> (server
9202 irc.debian.org).  There is a lot that could be done to improve the
9203 Debian support for LEGO designers.  For example both CAD software
9204 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)</p>
9205
9206 <p>Update 2012-01-03: A
9207 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">project page</a>
9208 including links to Lego related packages is now available.</p>
9209
9210       </div>
9211       <div class="tags">
9212
9213
9214         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>.
9215
9216
9217       </div>
9218     </div>
9219     <div class="padding"></div>
9220
9221     <div class="entry">
9222       <div class="title">
9223         <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>
9224       </div>
9225       <div class="date">
9226         25th December 2012
9227       </div>
9228       <div class="body">
9229         <p>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
9230 year!  I hope next year will prove to be a good year.</p>
9231
9232 <p><a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">Bitcoin</a>, the digital
9233 decentralised "currency" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
9234 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
9235 experiment.  And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
9236 <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> is about to improve a bit.
9237 The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">new debian source
9238 package</a> (version 0.7.2-2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
9239 in <a href="http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW queue</A>
9240 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
9241 name.</p>
9242
9243 <p>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
9244 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
9245 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:</p>
9246
9247 <blockquote><pre>
9248 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
9249 cd bitcoin
9250 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
9251 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
9252 </pre></blockquote>
9253
9254 <p>You might have to install some build dependencies as well.  The
9255 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
9256 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment.  Note that the
9257 client will download the complete set of bitcoin "blocks", which need
9258 around 5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment.  Make sure your
9259 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
9260 all the blocks.  The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
9261 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
9262 not be able to get all the features out of the client.</p>
9263
9264 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
9265 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
9266 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
9267
9268       </div>
9269       <div class="tags">
9270
9271
9272         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>.
9273
9274
9275       </div>
9276     </div>
9277     <div class="padding"></div>
9278
9279     <div class="entry">
9280       <div class="title">
9281         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html">A word on bitcoin support in Debian</a>
9282       </div>
9283       <div class="date">
9284         21st December 2012
9285       </div>
9286       <div class="body">
9287         <p>It has been a while since I wrote about
9288 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>, the decentralised
9289 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
9290 have been busy elsewhere.  But two days ago, I started looking at the
9291 state of <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin in
9292 Debian</a> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet.  The package
9293 is now maintained by a
9294 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/">team of
9295 people</a>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team.  We
9296 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
9297 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
9298 Wheezy.  It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
9299 backports).  The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
9300 it from entering testing.  To try to help the team and improve the
9301 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
9302 reports.  I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
9303 Corallo in a
9304 <a href="https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin">PPA for
9305 Ubuntu</a>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
9306 Debian package.</p>
9307
9308 <p>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
9309 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
9310 improve the package.  It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
9311 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
9312 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
9313 setup.  As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
9314 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-20121217/000041.html">a
9315 patch to backport</a> the latest version.  Jonas is going to look at
9316 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
9317 new version to unstable.
9318
9319 <p>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
9320 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system.  I
9321 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
9322 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
9323 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
9324 transactions to Wikileaks.  But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
9325 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
9326 they sell products and services.  Improving the bitcoin support in
9327 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
9328 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
9329 pay with bitcoin is still not very good.  The bitcoin: URI is a step
9330 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
9331 use.  Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
9332 quick transaction.  I believe there are other clients available, but
9333 have not tested them.</p>
9334
9335 <p>My
9336 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">experiment
9337 with bitcoins</a> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
9338 I received 20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
9339 years ago, as can be
9340 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">seen
9341 on the blockexplorer service</a>.  Thank you everyone for your
9342 donation.  The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
9343 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
9344 number of users have gone up since then.  If you use bitcoin and want
9345 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
9346 the same address as last time,
9347 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
9348
9349       </div>
9350       <div class="tags">
9351
9352
9353         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>.
9354
9355
9356       </div>
9357     </div>
9358     <div class="padding"></div>
9359
9360     <div class="entry">
9361       <div class="title">
9362         <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>
9363       </div>
9364       <div class="date">
9365          7th September 2012
9366       </div>
9367       <div class="body">
9368         <p>As I
9369 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">mentioned
9370 this summer</a>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
9371 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
9372 <a href="https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook">Gitorious
9373 repository for the project</a>.</p>
9374
9375 <p>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
9376 to the HTML version.  To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
9377 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
9378 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.</p>
9379
9380 <p>Want to sing?  You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
9381 PostScript formats at
9382 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's Computer
9383 Science Songbook</a>.</p>
9384
9385       </div>
9386       <div class="tags">
9387
9388
9389         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>.
9390
9391
9392       </div>
9393     </div>
9394     <div class="padding"></div>
9395
9396     <div class="entry">
9397       <div class="title">
9398         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gratulerer_med_19__rsdagen__Debian_.html">Gratulerer med 19-årsdagen, Debian!</a>
9399       </div>
9400       <div class="date">
9401         16th August 2012
9402       </div>
9403       <div class="body">
9404         <p>I dag fyller
9405 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120813">Debian-prosjektet 19
9406 år</a>.  Jeg har fulgt det de siste 12 årene, og er veldig glad for å kunne
9407 si gratulerer med dagen, Debian!</p>
9408
9409       </div>
9410       <div class="tags">
9411
9412
9413         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>.
9414
9415
9416       </div>
9417     </div>
9418     <div class="padding"></div>
9419
9420     <div class="entry">
9421       <div class="title">
9422         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Song book for Computer Scientists</a>
9423       </div>
9424       <div class="date">
9425         24th June 2012
9426       </div>
9427       <div class="body">
9428         <p>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
9429 <a href="http://www.uit.no/">University of Tromsø</a>, I started
9430 collecting computer related songs for use at parties.  The original
9431 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
9432 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
9433 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format.  I have
9434 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
9435 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
9436 help me extend and update the book.  If anyone is volunteering to help
9437 me with this, send me an email.  Also let me know if there are songs
9438 missing in my book.</p>
9439
9440 <p>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
9441 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
9442 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
9443 Especially now that <a href="http://debconf12.debconf.org/">Debconf
9444 12</a> is about to start (and I am not going).  Want to sing?  Check
9445 out <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's
9446 Computer Science Songbook</a>.
9447
9448       </div>
9449       <div class="tags">
9450
9451
9452         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>.
9453
9454
9455       </div>
9456     </div>
9457     <div class="padding"></div>
9458
9459     <div class="entry">
9460       <div class="title">
9461         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html">Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge</a>
9462       </div>
9463       <div class="date">
9464         21st November 2011
9465       </div>
9466       <div class="body">
9467         <p>At work we have heaps of servers.  I believe the total count is
9468 around 1000 at the moment.  To be able to get help from the vendors
9469 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
9470 up to date.  If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the
9471 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
9472 firmware is upgraded.  So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
9473 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
9474 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
9475 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
9476 the tools to do so.</p>
9477
9478 <p>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
9479 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got.  Most of
9480 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
9481 so far.  This blog post is about the Dell part.</P>
9482
9483 <p>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
9484 <a href="ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz">an XML file</a>
9485 with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing
9486 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
9487 site I can find it.  Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
9488 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
9489 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
9490 be activated on the first reboot.</p>
9491
9492 <p>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
9493 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
9494 servers at a site?  Please get in touch and lets share resources.</p>
9495
9496 <p><pre>
9497 #!/usr/bin/perl
9498 use strict;
9499 use warnings;
9500 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
9501 BEGIN {
9502     # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
9503     my %rhelmodules = (
9504         'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
9505         );
9506     for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
9507         eval "use $module;";
9508         if ($@) {
9509             my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
9510             system("yum install -y $pkg");
9511             eval "use $module;";
9512         }
9513     }
9514 }
9515 my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
9516
9517 upgrade_dell();
9518
9519 exit 0;
9520
9521 sub run_firmware_script {
9522     my ($opts, $script) = @_;
9523     unless ($script) {
9524         print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
9525         exit 1
9526     }
9527     print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
9528
9529     if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
9530         print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
9531     } else {
9532         print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
9533     }
9534 }
9535
9536 sub run_firmware_scripts {
9537     my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
9538     # Run firmware packages
9539     for my $dir (@dirs) {
9540         print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
9541         opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
9542         while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
9543             next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
9544             run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
9545         }
9546         closedir $dh;
9547     }
9548 }
9549
9550 sub download {
9551     my $url = shift;
9552     print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
9553     system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
9554 }
9555
9556 sub upgrade_dell {
9557     my @dirs;
9558     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
9559     chomp $product;
9560
9561     if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
9562
9563         # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
9564         system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
9565
9566         my $tmpdir = tempdir(
9567             CLEANUP => 1
9568             );
9569         chdir($tmpdir);
9570         fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
9571         system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
9572         my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
9573         # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
9574         my $fwopts = "-q";
9575         if (@paths) {
9576             for my $url (@paths) {
9577                 fetch_dell_fw($url);
9578             }
9579             run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
9580         } else {
9581             print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
9582             print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
9583         }
9584         chdir('/');
9585     } else {
9586         print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
9587         print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
9588     }
9589 }
9590
9591 sub fetch_dell_fw {
9592     my $path = shift;
9593     my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
9594     download($url);
9595 }
9596
9597 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
9598 # firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
9599 # machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
9600 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
9601     my $filename = shift;
9602
9603     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
9604     chomp $product;
9605     my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
9606
9607     print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
9608
9609     my $xml = XMLin($filename);
9610     my @paths;
9611     for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
9612         my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
9613         my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
9614         my $oscode;
9615         if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
9616             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
9617         } else {
9618             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
9619         }
9620         if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
9621         {
9622             @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
9623         }
9624     }
9625     for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
9626         my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
9627
9628         # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
9629         next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
9630
9631         my $cpath = $component->{path};
9632         for my $path (@paths) {
9633             if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
9634                 push(@paths, $cpath);
9635             }
9636         }
9637     }
9638     return @paths;
9639 }
9640 </pre>
9641
9642 <p>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
9643 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking.  Anyone know a
9644 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers?  At the
9645 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
9646 outdated.</p>
9647
9648       </div>
9649       <div class="tags">
9650
9651
9652         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>.
9653
9654
9655       </div>
9656     </div>
9657     <div class="padding"></div>
9658
9659     <div class="entry">
9660       <div class="title">
9661         <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>
9662       </div>
9663       <div class="date">
9664          4th August 2011
9665       </div>
9666       <div class="body">
9667         <p>Wouter Verhelst have some
9668 <a href="http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot">interesting
9669 comments and opinions</a> on my blog post on
9670 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">the
9671 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian</a> and my blog post about
9672 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">the
9673 default KDE desktop in Debian</a>.  I only have time to address one
9674 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
9675 misunderstanding he bring forward:</p>
9676
9677 <p><blockquote>
9678 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
9679 single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line;
9680 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
9681 </blockquote></p>
9682
9683 <p>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
9684 and booting into runlevel 1 is the same.  I am not surprised he
9685 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
9686 thing to believe.  But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
9687 runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user
9688 mode.  I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
9689 hard to explain.</p>
9690
9691 <p>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
9692 "<tt>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin</tt>".  This means the only thing that is
9693 executed in single user mode is sulogin.  Single user mode is a boot
9694 state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
9695 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
9696 enters the single user state.  When switching to runlevel 1, the state
9697 is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1
9698 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
9699 runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
9700 1.  It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the
9701 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
9702 mode).</p>
9703
9704 <p>This summary might make it clearer.  When booting for the first
9705 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
9706 "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  When booting into
9707 runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc
9708 S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  A problem show up when
9709 trying to continue after visiting single user mode.  Not all services
9710 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
9711 unpredicatble state.  This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
9712 after visiting single user mode.</p>
9713
9714 <p>A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of
9715 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/.  When switching from say runlevel 2
9716 to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
9717 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
9718 started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels
9719 2-5.  I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
9720 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not <strong>required</strong> to get a
9721 functioning single user mode during boot.</p>
9722
9723 <p>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
9724 and discovered this problem a few years ago.  I suspect it originates
9725 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.</p>
9726
9727       </div>
9728       <div class="tags">
9729
9730
9731         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>.
9732
9733
9734       </div>
9735     </div>
9736     <div class="padding"></div>
9737
9738     <div class="entry">
9739       <div class="title">
9740         <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>
9741       </div>
9742       <div class="date">
9743         30th July 2011
9744       </div>
9745       <div class="body">
9746         <p>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
9747 are started from /etc/rcS.d/.  In fact, there is a bite more of them
9748 than make sense, and this causes a few problems.  What kind of
9749 problems, you might ask.  There are at least two problems.  The first
9750 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
9751 runlevel 1.  One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
9752 the expected state.  The other is that single user boot will sometimes
9753 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
9754 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
9755 machine from a problem in that subsystem.  A minor additional point is
9756 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
9757 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
9758 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.</p>
9759
9760 <p>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/.  In short, only the
9761 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
9762 presented during a single user boot should go there.  Everything else
9763 should go into the numeric runlevels.  This means things like
9764 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
9765 the numeric runlevels.  Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d
9766 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
9767 out.  Do your package have one of them?  Please help us make single
9768 user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.</p>
9769
9770 <p>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
9771 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
9772 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
9773 is presented.</p>
9774
9775 <p>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound.  To keep
9776 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
9777 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
9778 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
9779 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
9780 moved first.  This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
9781 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
9782 the system state correct.  This will require some coordination when it
9783 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
9784 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
9785 on them.  Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
9786 package, while others are still left to do.  I wish I had time to work
9787 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
9788 find time to push this forward.</p>
9789
9790       </div>
9791       <div class="tags">
9792
9793
9794         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>.
9795
9796
9797       </div>
9798     </div>
9799     <div class="padding"></div>
9800
9801     <div class="entry">
9802       <div class="title">
9803         <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>
9804       </div>
9805       <div class="date">
9806         29th July 2011
9807       </div>
9808       <div class="body">
9809         <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
9810 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
9811 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
9812 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
9813 issues.</p>
9814
9815 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
9816 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
9817 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
9818
9819 <ol>
9820
9821 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
9822 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
9823 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
9824 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
9825 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
9826 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
9827 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
9828 Debian.</li>
9829
9830 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
9831 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
9832 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
9833 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
9834 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
9835 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
9836 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
9837 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
9838 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
9839 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
9840 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
9841 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
9842 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
9843
9844 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
9845 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
9846 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
9847 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
9848 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
9849 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
9850 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
9851 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
9852 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
9853 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
9854
9855 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
9856 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
9857 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
9858 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
9859 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
9860 latter behaviour.</li>
9861
9862 </ol>
9863
9864 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
9865 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
9866 it do not matter much.</p>
9867
9868 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
9869 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
9870 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>
9871
9872       </div>
9873       <div class="tags">
9874
9875
9876         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>.
9877
9878
9879       </div>
9880     </div>
9881     <div class="padding"></div>
9882
9883     <div class="entry">
9884       <div class="title">
9885         <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>
9886       </div>
9887       <div class="date">
9888         26th July 2011
9889       </div>
9890       <div class="body">
9891         <p>The Norwegian <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</A>
9892 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
9893 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10
9894 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
9895 security support for a few years.</p>
9896
9897 <p>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
9898 that are missing in Debian at the moment.  It would be great if these
9899 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
9900 their own <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com">FixMyStreet</a> clone
9901 in their own country using only Debian packages.  The list of modules
9902 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group
9903 will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
9904 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
9905 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
9906 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
9907 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
9908 easier in the future.</p>
9909
9910 <p>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
9911 installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name'
9912 and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package.  But this leave me
9913 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
9914 do not have time for.</p>
9915
9916       </div>
9917       <div class="tags">
9918
9919
9920         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>.
9921
9922
9923       </div>
9924     </div>
9925     <div class="padding"></div>
9926
9927     <div class="entry">
9928       <div class="title">
9929         <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>
9930       </div>
9931       <div class="date">
9932          3rd April 2011
9933       </div>
9934       <div class="body">
9935         <p>Here is a small update for my English readers.  Most of my blog
9936 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
9937 update in English.</p>
9938
9939 <p>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
9940 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
9941 of the British service
9942 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> up and running,
9943 and it has been running for a month now.  The entire project has been
9944 organised by me and two others.  Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
9945 to fund the development work.  In January I drafted a contract with
9946 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> on what to develop,
9947 and in February the development took place.  Most of it involved
9948 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
9949 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
9950 running in any country by now.  The Norwegian
9951 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is using
9952 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> as the map
9953 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
9954 support for this had to be added/fixed.</p>
9955
9956 <p>The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend
9957 polishing the system before we announced it March 7th.  The system is
9958 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000
9959 problem reports in a few weeks.  Soon we hope to announce the Android
9960 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
9961 public infrastructure.</p>
9962
9963 <p>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
9964 such service?</p>
9965
9966       </div>
9967       <div class="tags">
9968
9969
9970         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>.
9971
9972
9973       </div>
9974     </div>
9975     <div class="padding"></div>
9976
9977     <div class="entry">
9978       <div class="title">
9979         <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>
9980       </div>
9981       <div class="date">
9982         28th January 2011
9983       </div>
9984       <div class="body">
9985         <p>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
9986 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo.  My idea is that
9987 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
9988 available on the Internet, and check our locally
9989 maintained/distributed software against this information.  It should
9990 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten.  The
9991 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
9992 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
9993 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
9994 out which security holes were present in our free software
9995 collection.</p>
9996
9997 <p>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
9998 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
9999 consistent way across data sources.  I considered several ways to do
10000 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
10001 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
10002 existing naming scheme.  And it seem like I am not the first one to
10003 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
10004 solution.  Enter the <a href="http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html">Common
10005 Platform Enumeration</a> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
10006 software, hardware and other platform components.  The CPE ids are
10007 mapped to CVEs in the <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/">National
10008 Vulnerability Database</a>, allowing me to look up know security
10009 issues for any CPE name.  With this in place, all I need to do is to
10010 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
10011 This is fairly trivial (I google for 'cve cpe $package' and check the
10012 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).</p>
10013
10014 <p>To give you an example.  The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
10015 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip.  If the old version 1.3.3 was the package to
10016 check out, one could look up
10017 <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
10018 in NVD</a> and get a list of 6 security holes with public CVE entries.
10019 The most recent one is
10020 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-0001">CVE-2010-0001</a>,
10021 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
10022 list of affected versions is provided.</p>
10023
10024 <p>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
10025 for offline processing of issues.  Using this dump, I've written a
10026 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
10027 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs.  One give it CPEs
10028 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
10029 security issues out.</p>
10030
10031 <p>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
10032 information need to be high.  For that to happen, I believe as many as
10033 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database.  I notice
10034 RHEL is providing
10035 <a href="https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt">a
10036 map from CVE to CPE</a>, indicating that they are using the CPE
10037 information.  I'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.</p>
10038
10039 <p>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
10040 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
10041 the CVE database in NVD.  The result look fairly good, but there are
10042 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
10043 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
10044 Debian believe are affected by a CVE).  Hope to find time to improve
10045 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
10046 someone maintaining it.  So far my three emails with questions and
10047 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
10048 established soon.</p>
10049
10050 <p>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
10051 mapping.  It would be useful to know which packages in for example
10052 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
10053 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
10054 for their packages.</p>
10055
10056       </div>
10057       <div class="tags">
10058
10059
10060         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>.
10061
10062
10063       </div>
10064     </div>
10065     <div class="padding"></div>
10066
10067     <div class="entry">
10068       <div class="title">
10069         <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>
10070       </div>
10071       <div class="date">
10072         23rd January 2011
10073       </div>
10074       <div class="body">
10075         <p>In the
10076 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data">discover-data</a>
10077 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
10078 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
10079 information.  One part of this script that I find very useful when
10080 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
10081 to the PCI device it claims.  It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
10082 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with.  To see
10083 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
10084 <tt>/usr/share/bug/discover-data 3>&1</tt>.  The relevant output on
10085 one of my machines like this:</p>
10086
10087 <pre>
10088 loaded modules:
10089 10de:03eb i2c_nforce2
10090 10de:03f1 ohci_hcd
10091 10de:03f2 ehci_hcd
10092 10de:03f0 snd_hda_intel
10093 10de:03ec pata_amd
10094 10de:03f6 sata_nv
10095 1022:1103 k8temp
10096 109e:036e bttv
10097 109e:0878 snd_bt87x
10098 11ab:4364 sky2
10099 </pre>
10100
10101 <p>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
10102 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor 3:</p>
10103
10104 <pre>
10105 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
10106     echo loaded pci modules:
10107     (
10108         cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
10109         for address in * ; do
10110             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
10111                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
10112                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
10113                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
10114                     id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $3}'`
10115                     echo "$id $module"
10116                 fi
10117             fi
10118         done
10119     )
10120     echo
10121 fi
10122 </pre>
10123
10124 <p>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
10125 mappings:</p>
10126
10127 <pre>
10128 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
10129     echo loaded usb modules:
10130     (
10131         cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
10132         for address in * ; do
10133             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
10134                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
10135                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
10136                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
10137                     id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $6}')
10138                     if [ "$id" ] ; then
10139                         echo "$id $module"
10140                     fi
10141                 fi
10142             fi
10143         done
10144     )
10145     echo
10146 fi
10147 </pre>
10148
10149 <p>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
10150 well.</p>
10151
10152       </div>
10153       <div class="tags">
10154
10155
10156         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>.
10157
10158
10159       </div>
10160     </div>
10161     <div class="padding"></div>
10162
10163     <div class="entry">
10164       <div class="title">
10165         <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>
10166       </div>
10167       <div class="date">
10168         22nd December 2010
10169       </div>
10170       <div class="body">
10171         <p>The last few days I have spent at work here at the <a
10172 href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> testing if the new
10173 batch of computers will work with Linux.  Every year for the last few
10174 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
10175 computers, and this year HP won the bid.  Two different desktops and
10176 five different laptops are on the list this year.  We in the UNIX
10177 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
10178 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
10179 university.</p>
10180
10181 <p>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
10182 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well.  To test, I PXE
10183 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
10184 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware.  When
10185 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
10186 on.  If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
10187 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
10188 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.</p>
10189
10190 <p>Anyway, to get to the point of this post.  Here is the simple tests
10191 I perform on a new model.</p>
10192
10193 <ul>
10194
10195 <li>Is PXE installation working?  I'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
10196 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment.  If I feel like it, I also test with
10197 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.</li>
10198
10199 <li>Is X.org working?  If the graphical login screen show up after
10200 installation, X.org is working.</li>
10201
10202 <li>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working?  Running glxgears (in
10203 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
10204 reported by the program.</li>
10205
10206 <li>Is sound working?  With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
10207 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful.  If there
10208 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
10209 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound.  I
10210 normally test this by playing
10211 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20101012-chef/ ">a HTML5
10212 video</a> in Firefox/Iceweasel.</li>
10213
10214 <li>Is the USB subsystem working?  I test this by plugging in a USB
10215 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
10216
10217 <li>Is the CD/DVD player working?  I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
10218 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
10219
10220 <li>Is any built in camera working?  Test using cheese, and see if a
10221 picture from the v4l device show up.</li>
10222
10223 <li>Is bluetooth working?  Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
10224 any bluetooth devices are discovered.  In my office, I normally see a
10225 few.</li>
10226
10227 <li>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working.  I have
10228 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
10229 notice this.</li>
10230
10231 <li>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working?  I'm testing if the
10232 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
10233 resume.</li>
10234
10235 <li>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
10236 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
10237 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc?  The set of buttons differ from
10238 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
10239 not.</li>
10240
10241 <li>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
10242 acceleration sensors etc.  I rarely test these, as I do not know how
10243 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
10244 existence.</li>
10245
10246 </ul>
10247
10248 <p>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
10249 for the HP machines I am testing.  I'm not done yet, so I will report
10250 the test results later.  For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work
10251 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
10252 and audio fail on RHEL6.  Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p.  As you
10253 can see, I have most machines left to test.  One interesting
10254 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
10255 RHEL6 with glxgears.  No idea why.</p>
10256
10257       </div>
10258       <div class="tags">
10259
10260
10261         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>.
10262
10263
10264       </div>
10265     </div>
10266     <div class="padding"></div>
10267
10268     <div class="entry">
10269       <div class="title">
10270         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html">Some thoughts on BitCoins</a>
10271       </div>
10272       <div class="date">
10273         11th December 2010
10274       </div>
10275       <div class="body">
10276         <p>As I continue to explore
10277 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>, I've starting to wonder
10278 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
10279 and regulations here in Norway.  Here are some random notes.</p>
10280
10281 <p>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
10282 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
10283 is known to everyone.  This means that if a BitCoin address has been
10284 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
10285 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
10286 that address.  There is even a web service to look at the details for
10287 all transactions.  There I can see that my address
10288 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a>
10289 have received 16.06 Bitcoin, the
10290 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3</a>
10291 address of Simon Phipps have received 181.97 BitCoin and the address
10292 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt</A>
10293 of EFF have received 2447.38 BitCoins so far.  Thank you to each and
10294 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
10295 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
10296 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
10297 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction.  I'm told
10298 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
10299 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
10300 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.</p>
10301
10302 <p>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
10303 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
10304 without declaring it.  There are money laundering, tax and accounting
10305 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
10306 If the Skolelinux foundation
10307 (<a href="http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">SLX
10308 Debian Labs</a>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
10309 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
10310 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
10311 not, should everything or nothing be declared?  What exchange rate
10312 should be used when calculating taxes?  Would receivers have to pay
10313 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
10314 BitCoin?  I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.</p>
10315
10316 <p>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
10317 accepted by a lot of users.  It must be possible to get easy access to
10318 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
10319 easy to spend it.  At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
10320 access to, but there are very few places to spend it.  I am not really
10321 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
10322 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins.  I
10323 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
10324 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
10325 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
10326 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular.  I'm sure they
10327 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
10328 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
10329 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
10330 currencies.</p>
10331
10332 <p>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
10333 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
10334 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
10335 to see which one get the next lump of cash).  The "winner" get 50
10336 BitCoin when this happen.  Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
10337 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
10338 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
10339 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the 50
10340 BitCoins.  Check out
10341 <a href="http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/">BitCoin Pool</a>
10342 if this sounds interesting.  I have not had time to try to set up a
10343 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
10344 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
10345 yet.</p>
10346
10347 <p>Update 2010-12-15: Found an <a
10348 href="http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi">interesting
10349 criticism</a> of bitcoin.  Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
10350 it was interesting to read.  The arguments presented seem to be
10351 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.</p>
10352
10353       </div>
10354       <div class="tags">
10355
10356
10357         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>.
10358
10359
10360       </div>
10361     </div>
10362     <div class="padding"></div>
10363
10364     <div class="entry">
10365       <div class="title">
10366         <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>
10367       </div>
10368       <div class="date">
10369         10th December 2010
10370       </div>
10371       <div class="body">
10372         <p>With this weeks lawless
10373 <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/06/wikileaks/index.html">governmental
10374 attacks</a> on Wikileak and
10375 <a href="http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/2010/12/06/war_on_speech">free
10376 speech</a>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
10377 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
10378 A blog post from
10379 <a href="http://webmink.com/2010/12/06/now-accepting-bitcoin/">Simon
10380 Phipps on bitcoin</a> reminded me about a project that a friend of
10381 mine mentioned earlier.  I decided to follow Simon's example, and get
10382 involved with <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>.  I got
10383 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
10384 some bitcoins to get started.  I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
10385 for helping me remember BitCoin.</p>
10386
10387 <p>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder?  It is a digital
10388 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
10389 networks.  It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
10390 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
10391 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions.  The
10392 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets 2.9
10393 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
10394 line client builds just fine.  Hopefully Jonas
10395 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/578157">will get the package into
10396 Debian</a> soon.</p>
10397
10398 <p>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
10399 There are <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/trade">companies accepting
10400 bitcoins</a> when selling services and goods, and there are even
10401 currency "stock" markets where the exchange rate is decided.  There
10402 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising.  If you
10403 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
10404 you can even get
10405 <a href="https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/">some for free</a> (0.05
10406 bitcoin at the time of writing).  Use
10407 <a href="http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/">BitcoinWatch</a> to keep an eye
10408 on the current exchange rates.</p>
10409
10410 <p>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
10411 machines.  If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
10412 donations to the address
10413 <b>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</b>.  Thank you!</p>
10414
10415       </div>
10416       <div class="tags">
10417
10418
10419         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>.
10420
10421
10422       </div>
10423     </div>
10424     <div class="padding"></div>
10425
10426     <div class="entry">
10427       <div class="title">
10428         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html">Why isn't Debian Edu using VLC?</a>
10429       </div>
10430       <div class="date">
10431         27th November 2010
10432       </div>
10433       <div class="body">
10434         <p>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
10435 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
10436 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
10437 to play a video file or stream.  Only if VLC fail will I drag out
10438 gmplayer to see if it can do better.  The reason is mostly the failure
10439 model and trust.  When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
10440 reporting the problem.  When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
10441 just hangs.  The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.<p>
10442
10443 <p>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
10444 mplayer in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
10445 Edu/Skolelinux</a>.  The reason is simple.  We need a good browser
10446 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
10447 not very good.  For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
10448 is no way for the user to pause the video.  Also, when I
10449 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">last
10450 tested the browser plugins</a> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
10451 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked.  If
10452 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
10453 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.</P>
10454
10455 <p>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
10456 annoying.  The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
10457 keyboard shortcuts.  When the player is in full screen mode, its
10458 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
10459 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode.  I
10460 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
10461 window mode.  Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
10462 the current video.  It is very nice when playing short videos from the
10463 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
10464 what is going on.</p>
10465
10466       </div>
10467       <div class="tags">
10468
10469
10470         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>.
10471
10472
10473       </div>
10474     </div>
10475     <div class="padding"></div>
10476
10477     <div class="entry">
10478       <div class="title">
10479         <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>
10480       </div>
10481       <div class="date">
10482         22nd November 2010
10483       </div>
10484       <div class="body">
10485         <p>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
10486 upgrade testing of the
10487 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
10488 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a> to do <tt>apt-get autoremove</tt> when using apt-get.
10489 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
10490 can now present the updated result from today:</p>
10491
10492 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
10493
10494 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10495
10496 <blockquote><p>
10497   apache2.2-bin
10498   aptdaemon
10499   baobab
10500   binfmt-support
10501   browser-plugin-gnash
10502   cheese-common
10503   cli-common
10504   cups-pk-helper
10505   dmz-cursor-theme
10506   empathy
10507   empathy-common
10508   freedesktop-sound-theme
10509   freeglut3
10510   gconf-defaults-service
10511   gdm-themes
10512   gedit-plugins
10513   geoclue
10514   geoclue-hostip
10515   geoclue-localnet
10516   geoclue-manual
10517   geoclue-yahoo
10518   gnash
10519   gnash-common
10520   gnome
10521   gnome-backgrounds
10522   gnome-cards-data
10523   gnome-codec-install
10524   gnome-core
10525   gnome-desktop-environment
10526   gnome-disk-utility
10527   gnome-screenshot
10528   gnome-search-tool
10529   gnome-session-canberra
10530   gnome-system-log
10531   gnome-themes-extras
10532   gnome-themes-more
10533   gnome-user-share
10534   gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
10535   gstreamer0.10-tools
10536   gtk2-engines
10537   gtk2-engines-pixbuf
10538   gtk2-engines-smooth
10539   hamster-applet
10540   libapache2-mod-dnssd
10541   libapr1
10542   libaprutil1
10543   libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
10544   libaprutil1-ldap
10545   libart2.0-cil
10546   libboost-date-time1.42.0
10547   libboost-python1.42.0
10548   libboost-thread1.42.0
10549   libchamplain-0.4-0
10550   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0
10551   libcheese-gtk18
10552   libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
10553   libcryptui0
10554   libdiscid0
10555   libelf1
10556   libepc-1.0-2
10557   libepc-common
10558   libepc-ui-1.0-2
10559   libfreerdp-plugins-standard
10560   libfreerdp0
10561   libgconf2.0-cil
10562   libgdata-common
10563   libgdata7
10564   libgdu-gtk0
10565   libgee2
10566   libgeoclue0
10567   libgexiv2-0
10568   libgif4
10569   libglade2.0-cil
10570   libglib2.0-cil
10571   libgmime2.4-cil
10572   libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
10573   libgnome2.24-cil
10574   libgnomepanel2.24-cil
10575   libgpod-common
10576   libgpod4
10577   libgtk2.0-cil
10578   libgtkglext1
10579   libgtksourceview2.0-common
10580   libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
10581   libmono-addins0.2-cil
10582   libmono-cairo2.0-cil
10583   libmono-corlib2.0-cil
10584   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
10585   libmono-posix2.0-cil
10586   libmono-security2.0-cil
10587   libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
10588   libmono-system2.0-cil
10589   libmtp8
10590   libmusicbrainz3-6
10591   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
10592   libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
10593   libopal3.6.8
10594   libpolkit-gtk-1-0
10595   libpt2.6.7
10596   libpython2.6
10597   librpm1
10598   librpmio1
10599   libsdl1.2debian
10600   libsrtp0
10601   libssh-4
10602   libtelepathy-farsight0
10603   libtelepathy-glib0
10604   libtidy-0.99-0
10605   media-player-info
10606   mesa-utils
10607   mono-2.0-gac
10608   mono-gac
10609   mono-runtime
10610   nautilus-sendto
10611   nautilus-sendto-empathy
10612   p7zip-full
10613   pkg-config
10614   python-aptdaemon
10615   python-aptdaemon-gtk
10616   python-axiom
10617   python-beautifulsoup
10618   python-bugbuddy
10619   python-clientform
10620   python-coherence
10621   python-configobj
10622   python-crypto
10623   python-cupshelpers
10624   python-elementtree
10625   python-epsilon
10626   python-evolution
10627   python-feedparser
10628   python-gdata
10629   python-gdbm
10630   python-gst0.10
10631   python-gtkglext1
10632   python-gtksourceview2
10633   python-httplib2
10634   python-louie
10635   python-mako
10636   python-markupsafe
10637   python-mechanize
10638   python-nevow
10639   python-notify
10640   python-opengl
10641   python-openssl
10642   python-pam
10643   python-pkg-resources
10644   python-pyasn1
10645   python-pysqlite2
10646   python-rdflib
10647   python-serial
10648   python-tagpy
10649   python-twisted-bin
10650   python-twisted-conch
10651   python-twisted-core
10652   python-twisted-web
10653   python-utidylib
10654   python-webkit
10655   python-xdg
10656   python-zope.interface
10657   remmina
10658   remmina-plugin-data
10659   remmina-plugin-rdp
10660   remmina-plugin-vnc
10661   rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
10662   rhythmbox-plugins
10663   rpm-common
10664   rpm2cpio
10665   seahorse-plugins
10666   shotwell
10667   software-center
10668   system-config-printer-udev
10669   telepathy-gabble
10670   telepathy-mission-control-5
10671   telepathy-salut
10672   tomboy
10673   totem
10674   totem-coherence
10675   totem-mozilla
10676   totem-plugins
10677   transmission-common
10678   xdg-user-dirs
10679   xdg-user-dirs-gtk
10680   xserver-xephyr
10681 </p></blockquote>
10682
10683 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10684
10685 <blockquote><p>
10686   cheese
10687   ekiga
10688   eog
10689   epiphany-extensions
10690   evolution-exchange
10691   fast-user-switch-applet
10692   file-roller
10693   gcalctool
10694   gconf-editor
10695   gdm
10696   gedit
10697   gedit-common
10698   gnome-games
10699   gnome-games-data
10700   gnome-nettool
10701   gnome-system-tools
10702   gnome-themes
10703   gnuchess
10704   gucharmap
10705   guile-1.8-libs
10706   libavahi-ui0
10707   libdmx1
10708   libgalago3
10709   libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
10710   libgtksourceview2.0-0
10711   liblircclient0
10712   libsdl1.2debian-alsa
10713   libspeexdsp1
10714   libsvga1
10715   rhythmbox
10716   seahorse
10717   sound-juicer
10718   system-config-printer
10719   totem-common
10720   transmission-gtk
10721   vinagre
10722   vino
10723 </p></blockquote>
10724
10725 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10726
10727 <blockquote><p>
10728   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
10729 </p></blockquote>
10730
10731 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10732
10733 <blockquote><p>
10734 [nothing]
10735 </p></blockquote>
10736
10737 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
10738
10739 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10740
10741 <blockquote><p>
10742   ksmserver
10743 </p></blockquote>
10744
10745 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10746
10747 <blockquote><p>
10748   kwin
10749   network-manager-kde
10750 </p></blockquote>
10751
10752 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10753
10754 <blockquote><p>
10755   arts
10756   dolphin
10757   freespacenotifier
10758   google-gadgets-gst
10759   google-gadgets-xul
10760   kappfinder
10761   kcalc
10762   kcharselect
10763   kde-core
10764   kde-plasma-desktop
10765   kde-standard
10766   kde-window-manager
10767   kdeartwork
10768   kdeartwork-emoticons
10769   kdeartwork-style
10770   kdeartwork-theme-icon
10771   kdebase
10772   kdebase-apps
10773   kdebase-workspace
10774   kdebase-workspace-bin
10775   kdebase-workspace-data
10776   kdeeject
10777   kdelibs
10778   kdeplasma-addons
10779   kdeutils
10780   kdewallpapers
10781   kdf
10782   kfloppy
10783   kgpg
10784   khelpcenter4
10785   kinfocenter
10786   konq-plugins-l10n
10787   konqueror-nsplugins
10788   kscreensaver
10789   kscreensaver-xsavers
10790   ktimer
10791   kwrite
10792   libgle3
10793   libkde4-ruby1.8
10794   libkonq5
10795   libkonq5-templates
10796   libnetpbm10
10797   libplasma-ruby
10798   libplasma-ruby1.8
10799   libqt4-ruby1.8
10800   marble-data
10801   marble-plugins
10802   netpbm
10803   nuvola-icon-theme
10804   plasma-dataengines-workspace
10805   plasma-desktop
10806   plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
10807   plasma-runners-addons
10808   plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
10809   plasma-scriptengine-python
10810   plasma-scriptengine-qedje
10811   plasma-scriptengine-ruby
10812   plasma-scriptengine-webkit
10813   plasma-scriptengines
10814   plasma-wallpapers-addons
10815   plasma-widget-folderview
10816   plasma-widget-networkmanagement
10817   ruby
10818   sweeper
10819   update-notifier-kde
10820   xscreensaver-data-extra
10821   xscreensaver-gl
10822   xscreensaver-gl-extra
10823   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
10824 </p></blockquote>
10825
10826 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10827
10828 <blockquote><p>
10829   ark
10830   google-gadgets-common
10831   google-gadgets-qt
10832   htdig
10833   kate
10834   kdebase-bin
10835   kdebase-data
10836   kdepasswd
10837   kfind
10838   klipper
10839   konq-plugins
10840   konqueror
10841   ksysguard
10842   ksysguardd
10843   libarchive1
10844   libcln6
10845   libeet1
10846   libeina-svn-06
10847   libggadget-1.0-0b
10848   libggadget-qt-1.0-0b
10849   libgps19
10850   libkdecorations4
10851   libkephal4
10852   libkonq4
10853   libkonqsidebarplugin4a
10854   libkscreensaver5
10855   libksgrd4
10856   libksignalplotter4
10857   libkunitconversion4
10858   libkwineffects1a
10859   libmarblewidget4
10860   libntrack-qt4-1
10861   libntrack0
10862   libplasma-geolocation-interface4
10863   libplasmaclock4a
10864   libplasmagenericshell4
10865   libprocesscore4a
10866   libprocessui4a
10867   libqalculate5
10868   libqedje0a
10869   libqtruby4shared2
10870   libqzion0a
10871   libruby1.8
10872   libscim8c2a
10873   libsmokekdecore4-3
10874   libsmokekdeui4-3
10875   libsmokekfile3
10876   libsmokekhtml3
10877   libsmokekio3
10878   libsmokeknewstuff2-3
10879   libsmokeknewstuff3-3
10880   libsmokekparts3
10881   libsmokektexteditor3
10882   libsmokekutils3
10883   libsmokenepomuk3
10884   libsmokephonon3
10885   libsmokeplasma3
10886   libsmokeqtcore4-3
10887   libsmokeqtdbus4-3
10888   libsmokeqtgui4-3
10889   libsmokeqtnetwork4-3
10890   libsmokeqtopengl4-3
10891   libsmokeqtscript4-3
10892   libsmokeqtsql4-3
10893   libsmokeqtsvg4-3
10894   libsmokeqttest4-3
10895   libsmokeqtuitools4-3
10896   libsmokeqtwebkit4-3
10897   libsmokeqtxml4-3
10898   libsmokesolid3
10899   libsmokesoprano3
10900   libtaskmanager4a
10901   libtidy-0.99-0
10902   libweather-ion4a
10903   libxklavier16
10904   libxxf86misc1
10905   okteta
10906   oxygencursors
10907   plasma-dataengines-addons
10908   plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
10909   plasma-widget-lancelot
10910   plasma-widgets-addons
10911   plasma-widgets-workspace
10912   polkit-kde-1
10913   ruby1.8
10914   systemsettings
10915   update-notifier-common
10916 </p></blockquote>
10917
10918 <p>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
10919 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
10920 differences.  I have no idea what packages should be installed after
10921 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.</p>
10922
10923       </div>
10924       <div class="tags">
10925
10926
10927         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>.
10928
10929
10930       </div>
10931     </div>
10932     <div class="padding"></div>
10933
10934     <div class="entry">
10935       <div class="title">
10936         <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>
10937       </div>
10938       <div class="date">
10939         22nd November 2010
10940       </div>
10941       <div class="body">
10942         <p>Most of the computers in use by the
10943 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project</a>
10944 are virtual machines.  And they have been Xen machines running on a
10945 fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
10946 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge 2950 host machine.  This was a
10947 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
10948 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
10949 know is not supported by KVM.  So to migrate, we had to convert
10950 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.</p>
10951
10952 <p>I found
10953 <a href="http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM">a
10954 nice recipe</a> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
10955 migration.  It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
10956 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
10957 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data.  I NFS mounted the
10958 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.</p>
10959
10960 <pre>
10961 #!/bin/sh
10962
10963 # Based on
10964 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
10965
10966 set -e
10967 set -x
10968
10969 if [ -z "$1" ] ; then
10970     echo "Usage: $0 &lt;hostname&gt;"
10971     exit 1
10972 else
10973     host="$1"
10974 fi
10975
10976 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
10977     echo "error: unable to find LVM volume for $host"
10978     exit 1
10979 fi
10980
10981 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs.  not sure why.
10982 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
10983 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
10984 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
10985
10986 img=$host.img
10987 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
10988 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
10989
10990 parted $img mklabel msdos
10991 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap 0 $disksize
10992 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
10993 parted $img set 1 boot on
10994
10995 modprobe dm-mod
10996 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
10997 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
10998
10999 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=1M
11000 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
11001 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
11002
11003 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
11004 losetup -d /dev/loop0
11005 </pre>
11006
11007 <p>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
11008 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.</p>
11009
11010 <p>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
11011 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and
11012 set up grub to boot from the disk image.  After this, the KVM machines
11013 seem to work just fine.</p>
11014
11015       </div>
11016       <div class="tags">
11017
11018
11019         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>.
11020
11021
11022       </div>
11023     </div>
11024     <div class="padding"></div>
11025
11026     <div class="entry">
11027       <div class="title">
11028         <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>
11029       </div>
11030       <div class="date">
11031         20th November 2010
11032       </div>
11033       <div class="body">
11034         <p>I'm still running upgrade testing of the
11035 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
11036 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
11037 status.  Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.</p>
11038
11039 <p>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
11040 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
11041 can see if anything should be changed.</p>
11042
11043 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
11044
11045 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
11046
11047 <blockquote><p>
11048   apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
11049   browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-4.3 cups-pk-helper
11050   dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
11051   freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
11052   gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
11053   geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
11054   gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
11055   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
11056   gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
11057   gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
11058   gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
11059   gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
11060   gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
11061   libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
11062   libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-0 libboost-date-time1.42.0
11063   libboost-python1.42.0 libboost-thread1.42.0 libchamplain-0.4-0
11064   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
11065   libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-1.0-2
11066   libepc-common libepc-ui-1.0-2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
11067   libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
11068   libgdl-1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-0 libgif4
11069   libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
11070   libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
11071   libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
11072   libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
11073   libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
11074   libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
11075   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
11076   libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
11077   libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-6
11078   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6.8
11079   libpolkit-gtk-1-0 libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
11080   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
11081   libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-4
11082   libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-0.99-0
11083   libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
11084   mono-2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
11085   nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
11086   openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-4suite-xml
11087   python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
11088   python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
11089   python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
11090   python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
11091   python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
11092   python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
11093   python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
11094   python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
11095   python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
11096   python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
11097   python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
11098   python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
11099   python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
11100   remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
11101   rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
11102   software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
11103   telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-5 telepathy-salut tomboy
11104   totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
11105   transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
11106   zip
11107 </p></blockquote>
11108
11109 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
11110
11111 <blockquote><p>
11112   arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
11113   epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
11114   fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
11115   gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
11116   gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
11117   gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
11118   guile-1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
11119   libavahi-ui0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7
11120   libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
11121   libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1
11122   libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3 libfaad0 libgadu3
11123   libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
11124   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
11125   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11126   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
11127   libgtkhtml2-0 libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgtksourceview2.0-0
11128   libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
11129   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
11130   libmagick++10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
11131   libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
11132   libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpisock9
11133   libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8
11134   libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
11135   libspeexdsp1 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libsvga1
11136   libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
11137   libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
11138   libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
11139   sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
11140   totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
11141 </p></blockquote>
11142
11143 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
11144
11145 <blockquote><p>
11146   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
11147 </p></blockquote>
11148
11149 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
11150
11151 <blockquote><p>
11152 [nothing]
11153 </p></blockquote>
11154
11155 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
11156
11157 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
11158
11159 <blockquote><p>
11160   autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-4.3 dcoprss
11161   edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
11162   ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
11163   gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
11164   kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
11165   kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
11166   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
11167   kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
11168   kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
11169   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
11170   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
11171   kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
11172   killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
11173   kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
11174   ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42.0
11175   libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
11176   libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
11177   libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
11178   libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
11179   libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
11180   libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
11181   libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
11182   libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
11183   libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
11184   lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
11185   openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
11186   parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
11187   pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
11188   speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
11189   ttf-sazanami-gothic
11190 </p></blockquote>
11191
11192 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
11193
11194 <blockquote><p>
11195   amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
11196   dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
11197   kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
11198   kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
11199   keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
11200   kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
11201   kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
11202   klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
11203   kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
11204   kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
11205   kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
11206   ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
11207   ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
11208   kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
11209   kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
11210   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
11211   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2
11212   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
11213   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
11214   libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0 libicu38
11215   libiec61883-0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
11216   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
11217   libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
11218   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
11219   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
11220   libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
11221   libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
11222   libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 librss1 libsensors3
11223   libsmbios2 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90
11224   libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
11225   mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
11226   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
11227   ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
11228 </p></blockquote>
11229
11230 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
11231
11232 <blockquote><p>
11233   dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
11234   kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
11235   kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
11236   kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
11237   netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
11238   xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra
11239   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
11240 </p></blockquote>
11241
11242 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
11243
11244 <blockquote><p>
11245   kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
11246 </p></blockquote>
11247
11248       </div>
11249       <div class="tags">
11250
11251
11252         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>.
11253
11254
11255       </div>
11256     </div>
11257     <div class="padding"></div>
11258
11259     <div class="entry">
11260       <div class="title">
11261         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html">Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd</a>
11262       </div>
11263       <div class="date">
11264         20th November 2010
11265       </div>
11266       <div class="body">
11267         <p>Answering
11268 <a href="http://www.listware.net/201011/gnash-dev/67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html">the
11269 call from the Gnash project</a> for
11270 <a href="http://www.gnashdev.org:8010">buildbot</a> slaves to test the
11271 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
11272 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
11273 Debian/Squeeze.  I hope this can help the developers in getting new
11274 releases out more often.</p>
11275
11276 <p>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
11277 I have considered setting up a <a
11278 href="http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/">Debian/kfreebsd</a>
11279 machine as well.  I have also considered using the kfreebsd
11280 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the 5
11281 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video.  Because of this, I
11282 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
11283 kfreebsd.  Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
11284 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
11285 screen at random locations).  Have not gotten very far with the
11286 testing.  Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
11287 fatal problem.  Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
11288 useful as a file server for NUUG.  Will try to find time to set up a
11289 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.</p>
11290
11291       </div>
11292       <div class="tags">
11293
11294
11295         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>.
11296
11297
11298       </div>
11299     </div>
11300     <div class="padding"></div>
11301
11302     <div class="entry">
11303       <div class="title">
11304         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html">Debian in 3D</a>
11305       </div>
11306       <div class="date">
11307          9th November 2010
11308       </div>
11309       <div class="body">
11310         <p><img src="http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/23/e0/c4/f9/2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg"></p>
11311
11312 <p>3D printing is just great.  I just came across this Debian logo in
11313 3D linked in from
11314 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2010/11/09/participatory-branding/">the
11315 thingiverse blog</a>.</p>
11316
11317       </div>
11318       <div class="tags">
11319
11320
11321         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>.
11322
11323
11324       </div>
11325     </div>
11326     <div class="padding"></div>
11327
11328     <div class="entry">
11329       <div class="title">
11330         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html">Software updates 2010-10-24</a>
11331       </div>
11332       <div class="date">
11333         24th October 2010
11334       </div>
11335       <div class="body">
11336         <p>Some updates.</p>
11337
11338 <p>My <a href="http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">gnash pledge</a> to
11339 raise money for the project is going well.  The lower limit of 10
11340 signers was reached in 24 hours, and so far 13 people have signed it.
11341 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
11342 how far we can get before the time limit of December 24 is reached.
11343 :)</p>
11344
11345 <p>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
11346 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
11347 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
11348 It is called
11349 <a href="http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html">kcov</a>,
11350 and can be used using <tt>kcov &lt;directory&gt; &lt;binary&gt;</tt>.
11351 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
11352 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
11353 libglib2.0-dev.  Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
11354 solvable.  I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.</p>
11355
11356 <p>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for <a
11357 href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2010/10/msg00002.html">a
11358 new alpha release of Debian Edu</a>, and just published the second
11359 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
11360 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>
11361 release.  Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
11362 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
11363 client servers and diskless workstations.  A nice touch added
11364 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
11365 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.</p>
11366
11367       </div>
11368       <div class="tags">
11369
11370
11371         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>.
11372
11373
11374       </div>
11375     </div>
11376     <div class="padding"></div>
11377
11378     <div class="entry">
11379       <div class="title">
11380         <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>
11381       </div>
11382       <div class="date">
11383          4th September 2010
11384       </div>
11385       <div class="body">
11386         <p>In the <a href="http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote">Debian
11387 popularity-contest numbers</a>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
11388 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian.  The sixth
11389 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla.  This is a clear indication that
11390 working flash is important for Debian users.  Around 10 percent of the
11391 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
11392 installed.</p>
11393
11394 <p>In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008
11395 («<a href="http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile&do=view&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf">Skolelinux
11396 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
11397 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs</a>»), one of the most important problems
11398 schools experienced with <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
11399 Edu/Skolelinux</a> was the lack of working Flash.  A lot of educational
11400 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
11401 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
11402 good reason to stay with Windows.</p>
11403
11404 <p>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
11405 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
11406 everything you told him but could work fairly well.  This was a
11407 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
11408 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
11409 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
11410 example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
11411 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
11412 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
11413 pages they want to visit.</p>
11414
11415 <p>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
11416 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
11417 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
11418 Video to working out of the box.  For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
11419 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
11420 the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
11421 unstable.  The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7.
11422 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
11423 release team have not had time to reply to it yet.  I hope they agree
11424 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
11425 accept the new package into Squeeze.</p>
11426
11427       </div>
11428       <div class="tags">
11429
11430
11431         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>.
11432
11433
11434       </div>
11435     </div>
11436     <div class="padding"></div>
11437
11438     <div class="entry">
11439       <div class="title">
11440         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html">Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery</a>
11441       </div>
11442       <div class="date">
11443         27th July 2010
11444       </div>
11445       <div class="body">
11446         <p>I discovered this while doing
11447 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">automated
11448 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze</a>.  A few packages
11449 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
11450 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
11451 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.</p>
11452
11453 <p>An example is from todays
11454 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt">upgrade
11455 of KDE using aptitude</a>.  In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
11456 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade.  The cause is simple.  If a
11457 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
11458 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
11459 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
11460 because its dependencies are unavailable.</p>
11461
11462 <p>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:</p>
11463
11464 <blockquote><pre>
11465 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
11466  perl-modules depends on perl (>= 5.10.1-1); however:
11467   Version of perl on system is 5.10.0-19lenny2.
11468 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
11469  dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
11470 </pre></blockquote>
11471
11472 <p>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
11473 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/527917">reported as a bug</a>, and will
11474 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
11475 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
11476 failures.  Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
11477 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
11478 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
11479 of dependency loops.</p>
11480
11481 <p>Thanks to
11482 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/06/msg00116.html">the
11483 tireless effort by Bill Allombert</a>, the number of circular
11484 dependencies
11485 <a href="http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html">left in Debian
11486 is dropping</a>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)</p>
11487
11488 <p>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
11489 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590605">update-notifier</a> and
11490 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590604">different behaviour</a> between
11491 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
11492 dependency.  Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
11493 it.</p>
11494
11495       </div>
11496       <div class="tags">
11497
11498
11499         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>.
11500
11501
11502       </div>
11503     </div>
11504     <div class="padding"></div>
11505
11506     <div class="entry">
11507       <div class="title">
11508         <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>
11509       </div>
11510       <div class="date">
11511         17th July 2010
11512       </div>
11513       <div class="body">
11514         <p>This is a
11515 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">followup</a>
11516 on my
11517 <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
11518 work</a> on
11519 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">merging
11520 all</a> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.</p>
11521
11522 <p>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
11523 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
11524 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server.  The two
11525 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.</p>
11526
11527 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
11528 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
11529 on a Debian Edu main-server.  Here is a summary.
11530
11531 <p><strong>powerdns</strong></p>
11532
11533 <a href="http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend">Clues
11534 on how to</a> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
11535 the web.
11536
11537 <p>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
11538 One "strict" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
11539 using the same LDAP objects, and a "tree" mode where the forward and
11540 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
11541 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
11542 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.</p>
11543
11544 <p>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
11545 base, and uses a "base" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
11546 "dc=tjener,dc=intern," to the base with a filter for
11547 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" for the forward entry and
11548 "dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa," with a filter for
11549 "(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)" for the reverse entry.  For
11550 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
11551 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
11552 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
11553 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
11554 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
11555 spfrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entries it is looking for
11556 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
11557 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
11558 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  The equivalent
11559 ldapsearch commands could look like this:</p>
11560
11561 <blockquote><pre>
11562 ldapsearch -h ldap \
11563   -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
11564   -s base -x '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
11565   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
11566   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
11567   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
11568   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
11569
11570 ldapsearch -h ldap \
11571   -b dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
11572   -s base -x '(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)'
11573   dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
11574   hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
11575   srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
11576 </pre></blockquote>
11577
11578 <p>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
11579 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
11580 example LDAP objects used there.  In addition to these objects, the
11581 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11582 also exist.</p>
11583
11584 <blockquote><pre>
11585 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11586 objectclass: top
11587 objectclass: dnsdomain
11588 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11589 dc: tjener
11590 arecord: 10.0.2.2
11591 associateddomain: tjener.intern
11592
11593 dn: dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11594 objectclass: top
11595 objectclass: dnsdomain2
11596 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11597 dc: 2
11598 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
11599 associateddomain: 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
11600 </pre></blockquote>
11601
11602 <p>In strict mode, the server behaves differently.  When looking for
11603 forward DNS entries, it is doing a "subtree" scoped search with the
11604 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
11605 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
11606 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
11607 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
11608 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entires it also do a
11609 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is "(arecord=10.0.2.2)"
11610 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
11611 modifytimestamp.  In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
11612 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
11613 instead.</p>
11614
11615 <p>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
11616 like this:</p>
11617
11618 <blockquote><pre>
11619 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
11620   '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
11621   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
11622   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
11623   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
11624   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
11625
11626 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
11627   '(arecord=10.0.2.2)' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
11628 </pre></blockquote>
11629
11630 <p>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
11631 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
11632 reverse lookups.</p>
11633
11634 <p>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
11635 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
11636 need to generate a DNS reply.  This make it able to work with any
11637 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.</p>
11638
11639 <p>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC 1274) and
11640 dnsdomain2 schemas.  The latter is used for reverse entries like
11641 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.</p>
11642
11643 <p>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
11644 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
11645 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain).  The use
11646 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
11647 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.</p>
11648
11649 <p>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
11650 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
11651 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
11652 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
11653 (zonename and relativedomainname).</p>
11654
11655 <p>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
11656 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
11657 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
11658 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
11659 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
11660 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):</p>
11661
11662 <blockquote><pre>
11663 objectclass ( some-oid NAME 'dnsDomainAux'
11664     SUP top
11665     AUXILIARY
11666     MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
11667           DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
11668           TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
11669           NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
11670           A6Record $ DNAMERecord
11671     ))
11672 </pre></blockquote>
11673
11674 <p>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
11675 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
11676 all the attributes PowerDNS wants.  I've sent an email to the PowerDNS
11677 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
11678 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
11679 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.</p>
11680
11681 <p><strong>ISC dhcp</strong></p>
11682
11683 <p>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
11684 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want.  This
11685 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
11686 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
11687 what is needed without having to read the source code.</p>
11688
11689 <p>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
11690 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
11691 stored.  These are the relevant entries from
11692 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:</p>
11693
11694 <blockquote><pre>
11695 ldap-base-dn "dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no";
11696 ldap-dhcp-server-cn "dhcp";
11697 </pre></blockquote>
11698
11699 <p>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
11700 configuration it need.  The cn "dhcp" is located using the given LDAP
11701 base and the filter "(&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))".  The
11702 search result is this entry:</p>
11703
11704 <blockquote><pre>
11705 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11706 cn: dhcp
11707 objectClass: top
11708 objectClass: dhcpServer
11709 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11710 </pre></blockquote>
11711
11712 <p>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
11713 subtree with DHCP configuration.  The DHCP configuration subtree base
11714 is located using a base scope search with base "cn=DHCP
11715 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" and filter
11716 "(&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))".
11717 The search result is this entry:</p>
11718
11719 <blockquote><pre>
11720 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11721 cn: DHCP Config
11722 objectClass: top
11723 objectClass: dhcpService
11724 objectClass: dhcpOptions
11725 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11726 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
11727 dhcpStatements: authoritative
11728 dhcpOption: smtp-server code 69 = array of ip-address
11729 dhcpOption: www-server code 72 = array of ip-address
11730 dhcpOption: wpad-url code 252 = text
11731 </pre></blockquote>
11732
11733 <p>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time.  When
11734 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
11735 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
11736 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
11737 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost.  These provide options
11738 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc.  Leaving out the
11739 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
11740 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
11741 related computer objects.</p>
11742
11743 <p>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
11744 of the client (00:00:00:00:00:00 in this example), using a subtree
11745 scoped search with "cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" as
11746 the base and "(&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
11747 00:00:00:00:00:00))" as the filter.  This is what a host object look
11748 like:</p>
11749
11750 <blockquote><pre>
11751 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11752 cn: hostname
11753 objectClass: top
11754 objectClass: dhcpHost
11755 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11756 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
11757 </pre></blockquote>
11758
11759 <p>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
11760 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
11761 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure.  On the
11762 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
11763 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries.  The latter should make
11764 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
11765 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
11766 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
11767 structural object class.
11768
11769 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
11770
11771 <p>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
11772 to which LDAP schemas to use.  While its "tree" mode is rigid when it
11773 come to the the LDAP structure, the "strict" mode is very flexible,
11774 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
11775 in the configuration.</p>
11776
11777 <p>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
11778 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
11779 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
11780 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
11781 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
11782 structure.</p>
11783
11784 <p>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
11785 this might work for Debian Edu:</p>
11786
11787 <blockquote><pre>
11788 ou=services
11789   cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
11790     cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
11791     cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
11792       cn=10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
11793         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
11794     cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
11795       cn=192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
11796         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
11797     ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
11798       cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
11799 </pre></blockquote>
11800
11801 <P>This is not tested yet.  If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
11802 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
11803 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
11804 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.</p>
11805
11806 <p>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
11807 like this:</p>
11808
11809 <blockquote><pre>
11810 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11811 dc: hostname
11812 objectClass: top
11813 objectClass: dhcpHost
11814 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11815 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
11816 associateddomain: hostname.intern
11817 arecord: 10.11.12.13
11818 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11819 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
11820 </pre></blockquote>
11821
11822 </p>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
11823 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
11824 auxiliary object class.</p>
11825
11826       </div>
11827       <div class="tags">
11828
11829
11830         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>.
11831
11832
11833       </div>
11834     </div>
11835     <div class="padding"></div>
11836
11837     <div class="entry">
11838       <div class="title">
11839         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects</a>
11840       </div>
11841       <div class="date">
11842         14th July 2010
11843       </div>
11844       <div class="body">
11845         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
11846 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
11847 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
11848 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
11849 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.</p>
11850
11851 <p>I've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
11852 information finally found a solution that seem to work.</p>
11853
11854 <p>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
11855 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry.  If
11856 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
11857 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
11858 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
11859 to a slave DNS server.</p>
11860
11861 <p>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
11862 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
11863 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
11864 I've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
11865 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup.  It
11866 seem to work.</p>
11867
11868 <p>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
11869 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
11870 an earlier email.  The combined LDAP object will look something like
11871 this:</p>
11872
11873 <blockquote><pre>
11874   dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11875   cn: hostname
11876   objectClass: dhcphost
11877   objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11878   objectclass: dnsdomainaux
11879   associateddomain: hostname.intern
11880   arecord: 10.11.12.13
11881   dhcphwaddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11882   dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
11883   ldapconfigsound: Y
11884 </pre></blockquote>
11885
11886 <p>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
11887 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
11888 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress.  LTSP will use
11889 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.</p>
11890
11891 <p>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
11892 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
11893 outside the "DHCP Config" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
11894 that.  If I can't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
11895 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
11896 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
11897 content.  I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
11898 might be a good place to put it.</p>
11899
11900 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11901 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11902
11903       </div>
11904       <div class="tags">
11905
11906
11907         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>.
11908
11909
11910       </div>
11911     </div>
11912     <div class="padding"></div>
11913
11914     <div class="entry">
11915       <div class="title">
11916         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html">Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP</a>
11917       </div>
11918       <div class="date">
11919         11th July 2010
11920       </div>
11921       <div class="body">
11922         <p>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
11923 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
11924 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
11925 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.</p>
11926
11927 <p>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
11928 to get configuration from LDAP.  The idea is to look up the MAC
11929 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
11930 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
11931 LTSP clients.</p>
11932
11933 <p>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
11934 in a "computer" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
11935 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.</p>
11936
11937 <p>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
11938 this approach.  A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
11939 need to be written.  Comments, suggestions, etc?</p>
11940
11941 <blockquote><pre>
11942 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
11943 #
11944 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
11945 #
11946 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
11947 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
11948 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
11949 #
11950 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
11951 # existence of attribute names.
11952 #
11953 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
11954 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
11955 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
11956 #
11957 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
11958 # configuration settings.  Something like this should work:
11959 #
11960 # objectclass ( 1.1.2.2 NAME 'ltspClientAux'
11961 #     SUP top
11962 #     AUXILIARY
11963 #     MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
11964
11965 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
11966 if [ "$LDAPSERVER" ] ; then
11967     LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
11968     for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk '{print $5}'|sort -u) ; do
11969         filter="(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))"
11970         ldapsearch -h "$LDAPSERVER" -b "$LDAPBASE" -v -x "$filter" | \
11971             grep '^ltspConfig' | while read attr value ; do
11972             # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
11973             attr=$(echo $attr | sed 's/^ltspConfig//i' | tr a-z A-Z)
11974             # bass value on to clients
11975             eval "$attr=$value; export $attr"
11976         done
11977     done
11978 fi
11979 </pre></blockquote>
11980
11981 <p>I'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
11982 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
11983 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
11984 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
11985 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)</p>
11986
11987 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11988 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11989
11990 <p>Update 2010-07-17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
11991 configuration in LDAP that was created around year 2000 by
11992 <a href="http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html">PC
11993 Xperience, Inc., 2000</a>.  I found its
11994 <a href="http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/">files</a> on a
11995 personal home page over at redhat.com.</p>
11996
11997       </div>
11998       <div class="tags">
11999
12000
12001         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>.
12002
12003
12004       </div>
12005     </div>
12006     <div class="padding"></div>
12007
12008     <div class="entry">
12009       <div class="title">
12010         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
12011       </div>
12012       <div class="date">
12013          9th July 2010
12014       </div>
12015       <div class="body">
12016         <p>Since
12017 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">my
12018 last post</a> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
12019 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma.  The java application
12020 <a href="http://jxplorer.org/">jXplorer</a> is claimed to be capable of
12021 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
12022 authenticate using Kerberos.  I have only tested the Kerberos
12023 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
12024 LDAP with my test user yet.  It is
12025 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html">available in
12026 Debian</a> testing and unstable at the moment.  The only problem I
12027 have with it is how it handle errors.  If something go wrong, its
12028 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
12029 and remove the failing query.  Nothing big, but very annoying.</p>
12030
12031       </div>
12032       <div class="tags">
12033
12034
12035         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>.
12036
12037
12038       </div>
12039     </div>
12040     <div class="padding"></div>
12041
12042     <div class="entry">
12043       <div class="title">
12044         <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>
12045       </div>
12046       <div class="date">
12047          3rd July 2010
12048       </div>
12049       <div class="body">
12050         <p>Here is a short update on my <a
12051 href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">my
12052 Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing</a>.  Here is a summary of the
12053 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude.  I'm
12054 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
12055 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
12056 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> and
12057 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585716">#585716</a>).</p>
12058
12059 <p>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
12060 complete list of the installed packages.  Based on this I see these
12061 differences when I did a test run today.  As usual, I do not really
12062 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
12063 publish the difference.</p>
12064
12065 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
12066
12067 <blockquote><p>
12068   at-spi cpp-4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
12069   libatspi1.0-0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-1-common
12070   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
12071   libgtksourceview-common libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
12072   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
12073   libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
12074   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
12075   python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
12076 </p></blockquote>
12077
12078 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
12079
12080 <blockquote><p>
12081   bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
12082   gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
12083   libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-50
12084   libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
12085   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9
12086   libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3
12087   libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
12088   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
12089   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
12090   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
12091   libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
12092   libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++10
12093   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
12094   libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5
12095   libparted1.8-10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
12096   libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
12097   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1
12098   libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
12099   libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
12100   mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
12101 </p></blockquote>
12102
12103 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
12104
12105 <blockquote><p>
12106   gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
12107   python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
12108   xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
12109   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
12110   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
12111   xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
12112   xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
12113   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
12114   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
12115   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
12116   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
12117   xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
12118   xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
12119   xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
12120   xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
12121   xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
12122   xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
12123   xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
12124   xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
12125   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
12126   xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
12127 </p></blockquote>
12128
12129 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
12130
12131 <blockquote><p>
12132   deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
12133   xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
12134   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
12135 </p></blockquote>
12136
12137 <p>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
12138 <a href="http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120">changed
12139 in git</a> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
12140 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
12141 the difference somewhat.
12142
12143       </div>
12144       <div class="tags">
12145
12146
12147         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>.
12148
12149
12150       </div>
12151     </div>
12152     <div class="padding"></div>
12153
12154     <div class="entry">
12155       <div class="title">
12156         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
12157       </div>
12158       <div class="date">
12159         28th June 2010
12160       </div>
12161       <div class="body">
12162         <p>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
12163 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
12164 tool to browse the LDAP tree.  The only one I was able to find in
12165 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
12166 <a href="http://luma.sourceforge.net/">LUMA</a>, which has proved to
12167 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
12168 populated by default in Skolelinux.  Thanks to it, I have been able to
12169 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
12170 objects.  It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze.  If you
12171 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)</p>
12172
12173 <p>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
12174 the BTS yet.  There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
12175 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
12176 Debian submenu in KDE.  I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
12177 released.</p>
12178
12179 <p>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet.  I would
12180 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
12181 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet.  So in the mean time, I use
12182 <a href="http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/">ldapvi</a> for that.</p>
12183
12184 <p>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
12185 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
12186
12187 <p>Update 2010-06-29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
12188 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html">gq</a> package as a
12189 useful GUI alternative.  It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
12190 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze.  Unless that
12191 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.</p>
12192
12193       </div>
12194       <div class="tags">
12195
12196
12197         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>.
12198
12199
12200       </div>
12201     </div>
12202     <div class="padding"></div>
12203
12204     <div class="entry">
12205       <div class="title">
12206         <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>
12207       </div>
12208       <div class="date">
12209         24th June 2010
12210       </div>
12211       <div class="body">
12212         <p>A while back, I
12213 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
12214 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
12215 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
12216 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
12217
12218 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
12219 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
12220 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
12221 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
12222
12223 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
12224 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
12225 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
12226 Debian Edu.</p>
12227
12228 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
12229 the
12230 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
12231 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
12232 available today from IETF.</p>
12233
12234 <pre>
12235 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
12236 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
12237 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
12238  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
12239         NAME 'dhcpHost'
12240         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
12241 -       SUP top
12242 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
12243         MUST cn
12244         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
12245         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
12246 </pre>
12247
12248 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
12249 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
12250 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
12251
12252 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
12253 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
12254
12255       </div>
12256       <div class="tags">
12257
12258
12259         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>.
12260
12261
12262       </div>
12263     </div>
12264     <div class="padding"></div>
12265
12266     <div class="entry">
12267       <div class="title">
12268         <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>
12269       </div>
12270       <div class="date">
12271         16th June 2010
12272       </div>
12273       <div class="body">
12274         <p>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
12275 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run.  Until now,
12276 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
12277 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
12278 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
12279 this:
12280
12281 <blockquote><pre>
12282 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
12283 tasksel --new-install
12284 </pre></blockquote>
12285
12286 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
12287 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
12288 any output what so ever.
12289
12290 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
12291 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
12292 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
12293 happen.  Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
12294 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
12295 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run.  I ended up using
12296 code like this:
12297
12298 <blockquote><pre>
12299 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
12300 cmd="$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed 's/debconf-apt-progress -- //')"
12301 $cmd
12302 </pre></blockquote>
12303
12304 <p>The content of $cmd is typically something like "<tt>aptitude -q
12305 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
12306 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
12307 ~pimportant</tt>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
12308 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
12309 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
12310 installation.</p>
12311
12312 <p>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
12313 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
12314 like this.</p>
12315
12316       </div>
12317       <div class="tags">
12318
12319
12320         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>.
12321
12322
12323       </div>
12324     </div>
12325     <div class="padding"></div>
12326
12327     <div class="entry">
12328       <div class="title">
12329         <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>
12330       </div>
12331       <div class="date">
12332         13th June 2010
12333       </div>
12334       <div class="body">
12335         <p>My
12336 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">testing
12337 of Debian upgrades</a> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've
12338 finally made the upgrade logs available from
12339 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/</a>.
12340 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
12341 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting.  This time
12342 I will only focus on their removal plans.</p>
12343
12344 <p>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
12345 to remove 72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze.  The
12346 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
12347 xserver-xorg-video* drivers.  Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
12348 sure why.  When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove 129
12349 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
12350 longer needed.  Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
12351 I do not know.  Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?</p>
12352
12353 <p>For KDE, apt-get want to remove 82 packages, among them kdebase
12354 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
12355 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove 192 packages, none which are
12356 too surprising.</p>
12357
12358 <p>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
12359 and avoided, and perhaps others as well.  Here are the complete list
12360 of planned removals.  The complete logs is available from the URL
12361 above.  Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
12362 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
12363 conffile questions.  No idea why.  I worked around it by using
12364 '<tt>echo >> /proc/<em>pidofdpkg</em>/fd/0</tt>' to tell dpkg to
12365 continue.</p>
12366
12367 <p><b>apt-get gnome 72</b>
12368 <br>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
12369   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
12370   iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-1-0
12371   libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
12372   nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
12373   serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
12374   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
12375   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
12376   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
12377   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
12378   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
12379   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
12380   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
12381   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
12382   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12383   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
12384   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
12385   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
12386   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
12387   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
12388   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
12389   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
12390   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
12391   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
12392   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
12393   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
12394   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
12395   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9
12396   xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support</p>
12397
12398 <p><b>aptitude gnome 129</b>
12399
12400 <br>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
12401   djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
12402   gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
12403   gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
12404   libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
12405   libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
12406   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20
12407   libeel2-data libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libfaad0 libgail-common
12408   libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libgdl-1-0 libgdl-1-common
12409   libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0
12410   libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-0
12411   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
12412   libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
12413   libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6
12414   libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++10
12415   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
12416   libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2
12417   libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10
12418   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-8
12419   libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8 libssh2-1
12420   libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
12421   libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
12422   libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
12423   libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
12424   openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
12425   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
12426   python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
12427   python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
12428   swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
12429   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12430   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
12431   zip</p>
12432
12433 <p><b>apt-get kde 82</b>
12434
12435 <br>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
12436   kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
12437   kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
12438   kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
12439   kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
12440   libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
12441   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
12442   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
12443   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
12444   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
12445   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
12446   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
12447   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
12448   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
12449   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12450   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
12451   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
12452   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
12453   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
12454   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
12455   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
12456   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
12457   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
12458   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
12459   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
12460   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
12461   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
12462   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9</p>
12463
12464 <p><b>aptitude kde 192</b>
12465 <br>bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
12466   djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
12467   ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
12468   kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
12469   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
12470   kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
12471   kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
12472   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
12473   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
12474   kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
12475   kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
12476   klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
12477   kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
12478   krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
12479   ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
12480   kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
12481   kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
12482   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
12483   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
12484   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
12485   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
12486   libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0
12487   libicu38 libiec61883-0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
12488   libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
12489   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
12490   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
12491   libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
12492   libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 libsmbios2
12493   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
12494   libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
12495   libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
12496   openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
12497   superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
12498   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
12499   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12500   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
12501   xulrunner-1.9</p>
12502
12503
12504       </div>
12505       <div class="tags">
12506
12507
12508         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>.
12509
12510
12511       </div>
12512     </div>
12513     <div class="padding"></div>
12514
12515     <div class="entry">
12516       <div class="title">
12517         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze</a>
12518       </div>
12519       <div class="date">
12520         11th June 2010
12521       </div>
12522       <div class="body">
12523         <p>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
12524 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly.  A few bugs
12525 have been discovered and reported in the process
12526 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585410">#585410</a> in nagios3-cgi,
12527 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584879">#584879</a> already fixed in
12528 enscript and <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> in
12529 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
12530 am working on a script to automate the test.</p>
12531
12532 <p>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
12533 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
12534 it.  To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
12535 script is inserted.  To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
12536 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
12537 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).</p>
12538
12539 <p>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
12540 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
12541 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
12542 is created.  The bug report
12543 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566000">#566000</a> make me suspect
12544 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
12545 to make sure the upgrade go well.  Testing on virtual and real
12546 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
12547 do the trick in such settings anyway.  This is a
12548 <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-804130/">known
12549 issue</a> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
12550 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
12551 working with old kernels or something like that.  I really wish the
12552 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
12553 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
12554 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
12555 Debian Squeeze.</p>
12556
12557 <p>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades.  This test
12558 script, which I call <tt>upgrade-test</tt> for now, is doing the
12559 trick:</p>
12560
12561 <blockquote><pre>
12562 #!/bin/sh
12563 set -ex
12564
12565 if [ "$1" ] ; then
12566     desktop=$1
12567 else
12568     desktop=gnome
12569 fi
12570
12571 from=lenny
12572 to=squeeze
12573
12574 exec &lt; /dev/null
12575 unset LANG
12576 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
12577 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
12578 fuser -mv .
12579 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
12580 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
12581 cat > $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d &lt;&lt;EOF
12582 #!/bin/sh
12583 exit 101
12584 EOF
12585 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
12586 exit_cleanup() {
12587     umount $tmpdir/proc
12588 }
12589 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
12590 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
12591 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
12592
12593 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
12594
12595 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger.  It need the test scripts
12596 # to return the correct answers.
12597 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
12598     chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
12599
12600 # Include the desktop and laptop task
12601 for test in desktop laptop ; do
12602     echo > $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test &lt;&lt;EOF
12603 #!/bin/sh
12604 exit 2
12605 EOF
12606     chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
12607 done
12608
12609 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
12610 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
12611 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
12612 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
12613
12614 echo deb $mirror $to main > $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
12615 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
12616 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
12617 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
12618 fuser -mv
12619 </pre></blockquote>
12620
12621 <p>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
12622 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
12623 differently so far.  I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
12624 regularly and post the result on the web.  The Gnome upgrade currently
12625 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
12626 kdebase-workspace-data</p>
12627
12628 <p>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
12629 (KDE 167 KiB, Gnome 516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
12630 post, so I will refrain from trying.  I can report that for Gnome,
12631 aptitude report 760 packages upgraded, 448 newly installed, 129 to
12632 remove and 1 not upgraded and 1024MB need to be downloaded while for
12633 KDE the same numbers are 702 packages upgraded, 507 newly installed,
12634 193 to remove and 0 not upgraded and 1117MB need to be downloaded</p>
12635
12636 <p>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
12637 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
12638 booting without a hitch.  Was unsure if there were still bugs with
12639 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
12640 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
12641 packages.</p>
12642
12643       </div>
12644       <div class="tags">
12645
12646
12647         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>.
12648
12649
12650       </div>
12651     </div>
12652     <div class="padding"></div>
12653
12654     <div class="entry">
12655       <div class="title">
12656         <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>
12657       </div>
12658       <div class="date">
12659          6th June 2010
12660       </div>
12661       <div class="body">
12662         <p>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
12663 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
12664 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd.  The packages with such
12665 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
12666 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart.  Because of
12667 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
12668 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.</p>
12669
12670 <p>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
12671 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
12672 COLUMNS):</p>
12673
12674 <blockquote><pre>
12675 DEFAULT_RUNLEVEL=2
12676 previous=N
12677 PREVLEVEL=
12678 RUNLEVEL=
12679 runlevel=S
12680 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
12681 UPSTART_INSTANCE=
12682 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
12683 </pre></blockquote>
12684
12685 <p>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
12686 script.</p>
12687
12688 <blockquote><pre>
12689 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-2.88
12690 previous=N
12691 PREVLEVEL=N
12692 RUNLEVEL=S
12693 runlevel=S
12694 </pre></blockquote>
12695
12696 <p>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
12697 sysvinit are not set by upstart.  Not sure if it is intentional or not
12698 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.</p>
12699
12700 <p>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
12701 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
12702 choice.</p>
12703
12704       </div>
12705       <div class="tags">
12706
12707
12708         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>.
12709
12710
12711       </div>
12712     </div>
12713     <div class="padding"></div>
12714
12715     <div class="entry">
12716       <div class="title">
12717         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html">A manual for standards wars...</a>
12718       </div>
12719       <div class="date">
12720          6th June 2010
12721       </div>
12722       <div class="body">
12723         <p>Via the
12724 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html">blog
12725 of Rob Weir</a> I came across the very interesting essay named
12726 <a href="http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf">The Art of
12727 Standards Wars</a> (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
12728 following the standards wars of today.</p>
12729
12730       </div>
12731       <div class="tags">
12732
12733
12734         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>.
12735
12736
12737       </div>
12738     </div>
12739     <div class="padding"></div>
12740
12741     <div class="entry">
12742       <div class="title">
12743         <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>
12744       </div>
12745       <div class="date">
12746          3rd June 2010
12747       </div>
12748       <div class="body">
12749         <p>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
12750 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
12751 information extracted from each machine.  The script to do so is
12752 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
12753 the Skolelinux build servers:</p>
12754
12755 <blockquote><pre>
12756 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
12757   vendor                    count
12758   Dell Computer Corporation     1
12759     PowerEdge 1750              1
12760   IBM                           1
12761     eserver xSeries 345 -[8670M1X]-     1
12762   Intel                         2
12763   [no-dmi-info]                 3
12764 maintainer:~#
12765 </pre></blockquote>
12766
12767 <p>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
12768 provided in each machine.  Here there are Intel machines without model
12769 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
12770 machines listed as [no-dmi-info].  One can add -l as a command line
12771 option to list the individual machines.</p>
12772
12773 <p>A larger list is
12774 <a href="http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/">available from the the
12775 city of Narvik</a>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
12776 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly.  In their report there
12777 are ~1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
12778 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
12779 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
12780 collector.</p>
12781
12782       </div>
12783       <div class="tags">
12784
12785
12786         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>.
12787
12788
12789       </div>
12790     </div>
12791     <div class="padding"></div>
12792
12793     <div class="entry">
12794       <div class="title">
12795         <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>
12796       </div>
12797       <div class="date">
12798          1st June 2010
12799       </div>
12800       <div class="body">
12801         <p>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
12802 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled.  The
12803 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
12804 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
12805 wait.</p>
12806
12807 <p>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
12808 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">#583312</a> initially filed
12809 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
12810 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
12811 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/524751">#524751</a> initially filed against
12812 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.</p>
12813
12814 <p>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
12815 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
12816 distribution work out of the box for these users.  The nvidia driver
12817 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
12818 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
12819 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
12820 distribution that work for them.  I have no idea what the solution is,
12821 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.</p>
12822
12823 <p>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.</p>
12824
12825       </div>
12826       <div class="tags">
12827
12828
12829         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>.
12830
12831
12832       </div>
12833     </div>
12834     <div class="padding"></div>
12835
12836     <div class="entry">
12837       <div class="title">
12838         <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>
12839       </div>
12840       <div class="date">
12841         27th May 2010
12842       </div>
12843       <div class="body">
12844         <p>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
12845 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
12846 issues are known and should be solved:
12847
12848 <p><ul>
12849
12850 <li>The wicd package seen to
12851 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/508289">break NFS mounting</a> and
12852 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/581586">network setup</a> when
12853 parallel booting is enabled.  No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
12854 seem to be on the case.</li>
12855
12856 <li>The nvidia X driver seem to
12857 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">have a race condition</a>
12858 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect.  The
12859 maintainer is on the case.</li>
12860
12861 <li>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
12862 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
12863 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/575080">try to switch back</a> to
12864 sysv-rc.  One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
12865 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
12866 sysv-rc more robust.  Will investigate some more and probably upload a
12867 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
12868 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.</li>
12869
12870 </ul></p>
12871
12872 <p>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
12873 solvable before Squeeze is released.  In addition to these there are
12874 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
12875 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.</p>
12876
12877 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12878 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12879 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12880 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12881
12882 <p>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.</p>
12883
12884       </div>
12885       <div class="tags">
12886
12887
12888         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>.
12889
12890
12891       </div>
12892     </div>
12893     <div class="padding"></div>
12894
12895     <div class="entry">
12896       <div class="title">
12897         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html">More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer</a>
12898       </div>
12899       <div class="date">
12900         22nd May 2010
12901       </div>
12902       <div class="body">
12903         <p>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
12904 found time today to return to the project.  Having to spend less time
12905 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
12906 definitely helped freeing some time.</p>
12907
12908 <p>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu.  We
12909 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
12910 get disk and network controllers working.  Without having these
12911 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
12912 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
12913 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
12914 an external medium is a support pain.  Initially, I expected it to be
12915 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
12916 debian-installer to find and use them.  This proved to be wrong.
12917 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
12918 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
12919 /cdrom/firmware/).  This also proved to not work, and at this point I
12920 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
12921 going to work.</p>
12922
12923 <p>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
12924 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
12925 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
12926 packages.  It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
12927 "external" media devices.  Today I changed it to also look in the
12928 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
12929 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu.  I also changed it to
12930 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
12931 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
12932 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
12933 Edu.</p>
12934
12935 <p>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
12936 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
12937 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
12938 run these before activating the firmware during installation.  The
12939 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
12940 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.</p>
12941
12942 <p>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
12943 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.</p>
12944
12945       </div>
12946       <div class="tags">
12947
12948
12949         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>.
12950
12951
12952       </div>
12953     </div>
12954     <div class="padding"></div>
12955
12956     <div class="entry">
12957       <div class="title">
12958         <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>
12959       </div>
12960       <div class="date">
12961         14th May 2010
12962       </div>
12963       <div class="body">
12964         <p>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
12965 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
12966 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
12967 expected, if I am to believe the
12968 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
12969 on debian-devel@</a>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
12970 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
12971 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen.  If serious problems are
12972 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
12973 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
12974 version.</p>
12975
12976 More information about
12977 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12978 based boot sequencing</a> is available from the Debian wiki.  It is
12979 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
12980 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:</p>
12981
12982 <blockquote><pre>
12983 CONCURRENCY=none
12984 </pre></blockquote>
12985
12986 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12987 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12988 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12989 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12990
12991       </div>
12992       <div class="tags">
12993
12994
12995         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>.
12996
12997
12998       </div>
12999     </div>
13000     <div class="padding"></div>
13001
13002     <div class="entry">
13003       <div class="title">
13004         <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>
13005       </div>
13006       <div class="date">
13007         14th May 2010
13008       </div>
13009       <div class="body">
13010         <p>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
13011 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">sitesummary
13012 system</a> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
13013 network.  Each machine will automatically report its status to the
13014 central server after boot and once per night.  The network setup is
13015 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
13016 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines.  This is useful
13017 to update the DHCP configuration.</p>
13018
13019 <p>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
13020 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary.  Run
13021 this on the collector host:</p>
13022
13023 <blockquote><pre>
13024 perl -MSiteSummary -e 'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(" ", get_macaddresses(shift)), "\n"; });'
13025 </pre></blockquote>
13026
13027 <p>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
13028 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.</p>
13029
13030 <p>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
13031 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
13032 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
13033 tables in LDAP using this information.  Such tool is unfortunately not
13034 written yet.</p>
13035
13036       </div>
13037       <div class="tags">
13038
13039
13040         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>.
13041
13042
13043       </div>
13044     </div>
13045     <div class="padding"></div>
13046
13047     <div class="entry">
13048       <div class="title">
13049         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html">systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart</a>
13050       </div>
13051       <div class="date">
13052         13th May 2010
13053       </div>
13054       <div class="body">
13055         <p>The last few days a new boot system called
13056 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd">systemd</a>
13057 has been
13058 <a href="http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html">introduced</a>
13059
13060 to the free software world.  I have not yet had time to play around
13061 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
13062 <a href="http://upstart.ubuntu.com/">upstart</a>, and might prove to be
13063 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
13064 based boot system.  Tollef is
13065 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/580814">in the process</a> of getting
13066 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work.  I
13067 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
13068 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
13069 at the moment do not.</p>
13070
13071 <p>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
13072 platform support.  It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
13073 some new kernel features enabled to function properly.  This means
13074 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
13075 system.  Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
13076 way forward.</p>
13077
13078 <p>In the mean time, based on the
13079 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
13080 on debian-devel@</a> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
13081 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
13082 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
13083 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies.  A
13084 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
13085 already in experimental.  If all go well, Squeeze will be released
13086 with parallel booting enabled by default.</p>
13087
13088       </div>
13089       <div class="tags">
13090
13091
13092         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>.
13093
13094
13095       </div>
13096     </div>
13097     <div class="padding"></div>
13098
13099     <div class="entry">
13100       <div class="title">
13101         <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>
13102       </div>
13103       <div class="date">
13104          6th May 2010
13105       </div>
13106       <div class="body">
13107         <p>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
13108 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
13109 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies.  If you want
13110 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
13111 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
13112 based boot sequencing</a> is enabled, and add this line to
13113 /etc/default/rcS:</p>
13114
13115 <blockquote><pre>
13116 CONCURRENCY=makefile
13117 </pre></blockquote>
13118
13119 <p>That is it.  It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
13120 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
13121 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
13122 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts.  Startpar is configured
13123 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
13124 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
13125 make this happen.</p>
13126
13127 <p>Give it a try, and see if you like the result.  If some services
13128 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
13129 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
13130 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies).  Report bugs and get
13131 the package maintainers to fix it. :)</p>
13132
13133 <p>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
13134 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct.  I
13135 expect we will get there in Squeeze+1, if we get manage to test and
13136 fix the remaining issues.</p>
13137
13138 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
13139 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
13140 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
13141 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
13142
13143       </div>
13144       <div class="tags">
13145
13146
13147         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>.
13148
13149
13150       </div>
13151     </div>
13152     <div class="padding"></div>
13153
13154     <div class="entry">
13155       <div class="title">
13156         <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>
13157       </div>
13158       <div class="date">
13159         27th July 2009
13160       </div>
13161       <div class="body">
13162         <p>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2,
13163 and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable
13164 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing.  This
13165 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
13166 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
13167 installation.  Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
13168 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.</p>
13169
13170 <p>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
13171 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
13172 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.</p>
13173
13174       </div>
13175       <div class="tags">
13176
13177
13178         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>.
13179
13180
13181       </div>
13182     </div>
13183     <div class="padding"></div>
13184
13185     <div class="entry">
13186       <div class="title">
13187         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html">Taking over sysvinit development</a>
13188       </div>
13189       <div class="date">
13190         22nd July 2009
13191       </div>
13192       <div class="body">
13193         <p>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
13194 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
13195 take over the package and become the new upstream.  The number of
13196 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
13197 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
13198 the package up to date.</p>
13199
13200 <p>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
13201 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman.  About 10 days ago, I made
13202 a new upstream tarball with version number 2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
13203 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
13204 distributions.  We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
13205 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge.  Since the
13206 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
13207 upstream project at <a href="http://savannah.nongnu.org/">Savannah</a>, and continue
13208 development there.  The project is registered and currently waiting
13209 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
13210 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
13211 working on the future release.</p>
13212
13213 <p>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
13214 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.</p>
13215
13216       </div>
13217       <div class="tags">
13218
13219
13220         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>.
13221
13222
13223       </div>
13224     </div>
13225     <div class="padding"></div>
13226
13227     <div class="entry">
13228       <div class="title">
13229         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html">Debian boots quicker and quicker</a>
13230       </div>
13231       <div class="date">
13232         24th June 2009
13233       </div>
13234       <div class="body">
13235         <p>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
13236 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
13237 could find more ways to speed up the boot system.  This was an Ubuntu
13238 funded
13239 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint">developer
13240 gathering</a>. It was quite productive.  We also discussed the future
13241 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
13242 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
13243 asynchronous and event base.  The Ubuntu approach using udev and
13244 upstart might be a good way forward.  Time will show.</p>
13245
13246 <p>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
13247 process in Debian.  All of these should be applied to get a quick
13248 boot:</p>
13249
13250 <ul>
13251
13252 <li>Use dash as /bin/sh.</li>
13253
13254 <li>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
13255    clock is in UTC.</li>
13256
13257 <li>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
13258    <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
13259    based boot sequencing</a>, and enable concurrent booting.</li>
13260
13261 </ul>
13262
13263 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
13264 <a href="http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/">Carlos
13265 Villegas</a>.
13266
13267 <p>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
13268 unstable yesterday.  When we tested it, we were able to cut 6 seconds
13269 from the boot sequence.  It depend on very correct dependency
13270 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
13271 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
13272 using this.</p>
13273
13274 <p>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
13275 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
13276 startup speed as well.  Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
13277 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
13278 possible to run a of them in the same process.  A quick way to test
13279 this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
13280 insserv'.  Will need to test if that work. :)</p>
13281
13282       </div>
13283       <div class="tags">
13284
13285
13286         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>.
13287
13288
13289       </div>
13290     </div>
13291     <div class="padding"></div>
13292
13293     <div class="entry">
13294       <div class="title">
13295         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/BSAs_p_stander_om_piratkopiering_m_ter_motstand.html">BSAs påstander om piratkopiering møter motstand</a>
13296       </div>
13297       <div class="date">
13298         17th May 2009
13299       </div>
13300       <div class="body">
13301         <p>Hvert år de siste årene har BSA, lobbyfronten til de store
13302 programvareselskapene som Microsoft og Apple, publisert en rapport der
13303 de gjetter på hvor mye piratkopiering påfører i tapte inntekter i
13304 ulike land rundt om i verden.  Resultatene er tendensiøse.  For noen
13305 dager siden kom
13306 <a href="http://global.bsa.org/globalpiracy2008/studies/globalpiracy2008.pdf">siste
13307 rapport</a>, og det er flere kritiske kommentarer publisert de siste
13308 dagene.  Et spesielt interessant kommentar fra Sverige,
13309 <a href="http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.229795/bsa-hoftade-sverigesiffror">BSA
13310 höftade Sverigesiffror</a>, oppsummeres slik:</p>
13311
13312 <blockquote>
13313 I sin senaste rapport slår BSA fast att 25 procent av all mjukvara i
13314 Sverige är piratkopierad. Det utan att ha pratat med ett enda svenskt
13315 företag. "Man bör nog kanske inte se de här siffrorna som helt
13316 exakta", säger BSAs Sverigechef John Hugosson.
13317 </blockquote>
13318
13319 <p>Mon tro om de er like metodiske når de gjetter på andelen piratkopiering i Norge?  To andre kommentarer er <a
13320 href="http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/comment/2242134/bsa-piracy-figures-shot-reality">BSA
13321 piracy figures need a shot of reality</a> og <a
13322 href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3958/125/">Does The WIPO
13323 Copyright Treaty Work?</a></p>
13324
13325 <p>Fant lenkene via <a
13326 href="http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/17/1632242">oppslag
13327 på Slashdot</a>.</p>
13328
13329       </div>
13330       <div class="tags">
13331
13332
13333         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>.
13334
13335
13336       </div>
13337     </div>
13338     <div class="padding"></div>
13339
13340     <div class="entry">
13341       <div class="title">
13342         <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>
13343       </div>
13344       <div class="date">
13345          7th May 2009
13346       </div>
13347       <div class="body">
13348         <p>Kom over
13349 <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10216873-16.html">interessante
13350 tall</a> fra IDG om utviklingen av linuxservermarkedet.  Fikk meg til
13351 å tenke på antall tjenermaskiner ved Universitetet i Oslo der jeg
13352 jobber til daglig.  En rask opptelling forteller meg at vi har 490
13353 (61%) fysiske unix-tjener (mest linux men også noen solaris) og 196
13354 (25%) windowstjenere, samt 112 (14%) virtuelle unix-tjenere.  Med den
13355 bakgrunnskunnskapen kan jeg godt tro at IDG er inne på noe.</p>
13356
13357       </div>
13358       <div class="tags">
13359
13360
13361         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>.
13362
13363
13364       </div>
13365     </div>
13366     <div class="padding"></div>
13367
13368     <div class="entry">
13369       <div class="title">
13370         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kryptert_harddisk___naturligvis.html">Kryptert harddisk - naturligvis</a>
13371       </div>
13372       <div class="date">
13373          2nd May 2009
13374       </div>
13375       <div class="body">
13376         <p><a href="http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1658676.ece">Dagens
13377 IT melder</a> at Intel hevder at det er dyrt å miste en datamaskin,
13378 når en tar tap av arbeidstid, fortrolige dokumenter,
13379 personopplysninger og alt annet det innebærer.  Det er ingen tvil om
13380 at det er en kostbar affære å miste sin datamaskin, og det er årsaken
13381 til at jeg har kryptert harddisken på både kontormaskinen og min
13382 bærbare.  Begge inneholder personopplysninger jeg ikke ønsker skal
13383 komme på avveie, den første informasjon relatert til jobben min ved
13384 Universitetet i Oslo, og den andre relatert til blant annet
13385 foreningsarbeide.  Kryptering av diskene gjør at det er lite
13386 sannsynlig at dophoder som kan finne på å rappe maskinene får noe ut
13387 av dem.  Maskinene låses automatisk etter noen minutter uten bruk,
13388 og en reboot vil gjøre at de ber om passord før de vil starte opp.
13389 Jeg bruker Debian på begge maskinene, og installasjonssystemet der
13390 gjør det trivielt å sette opp krypterte disker.  Jeg har LVM på toppen
13391 av krypterte partisjoner, slik at alt av datapartisjoner er kryptert.
13392 Jeg anbefaler alle å kryptere diskene på sine bærbare.  Kostnaden når
13393 det er gjort slik jeg gjør det er minimale, og gevinstene er
13394 betydelige.  En bør dog passe på passordet.  Hvis det går tapt, må
13395 maskinen reinstalleres og alt er tapt.</p>
13396
13397 <p>Krypteringen vil ikke stoppe kompetente angripere som f.eks. kjøler
13398 ned minnebrikkene før maskinen rebootes med programvare for å hente ut
13399 krypteringsnøklene.  Kostnaden med å forsvare seg mot slike angripere
13400 er for min del høyere enn gevinsten.  Jeg tror oddsene for at
13401 f.eks. etteretningsorganisasjoner har glede av å titte på mine
13402 maskiner er minimale, og ulempene jeg ville oppnå ved å forsøke å
13403 gjøre det vanskeligere for angripere med kompetanse og ressurser er
13404 betydelige.</p>
13405
13406       </div>
13407       <div class="tags">
13408
13409
13410         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>.
13411
13412
13413       </div>
13414     </div>
13415     <div class="padding"></div>
13416
13417     <div class="entry">
13418       <div class="title">
13419         <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>
13420       </div>
13421       <div class="date">
13422          2nd May 2009
13423       </div>
13424       <div class="body">
13425         <p>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
13426 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
13427 do not yet know them.</p>
13428
13429 <p>The first one is <a href="http://valgrind.org/">valgrind</a>, a
13430 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
13431 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run 'valgrind program',
13432 and it will report any problems on stdout.  It is even better if the
13433 program include debug information.  With debug information, it is able
13434 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
13435 occurs.  It can report things like 'reading past memory block in file
13436 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M', and
13437 'using uninitialised value in control logic'.  This tool has made it
13438 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
13439 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
13440
13441 <p>The second one is
13442 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity">Coverity</a> which is
13443 a source code checker.  It is able to process the source of a program
13444 and find problems in the logic without running the program.  It
13445 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
13446 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel.  It is now a commercial tool
13447 and the company behind it is running
13448 <a href="http://www.scan.coverity.com/">a community service</a> for the
13449 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
13450 their source checked for free.  Several thousand defects have been
13451 found and fixed so far.  It can find errors like 'lock L taken in file
13452 X line N is never released if exiting in line M', or 'the code in file
13453 Y lines O to P can never be executed'.  The projects included in the
13454 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
13455 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.</p>
13456
13457 <p>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
13458 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
13459 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
13460 surrounded by today.</p>
13461
13462       </div>
13463       <div class="tags">
13464
13465
13466         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>.
13467
13468
13469       </div>
13470     </div>
13471     <div class="padding"></div>
13472
13473     <div class="entry">
13474       <div class="title">
13475         <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>
13476       </div>
13477       <div class="date">
13478         28th April 2009
13479       </div>
13480       <div class="body">
13481         <p>Julien Blache
13482 <a href="http://blog.technologeek.org/2009/04/12/214">claim that no
13483 patch is better than a useless patch</a>.  I completely disagree, as a
13484 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
13485 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
13486 time on fixing it.  No patch do not provide any of these positive
13487 properties.</p>
13488
13489       </div>
13490       <div class="tags">
13491
13492
13493         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>.
13494
13495
13496       </div>
13497     </div>
13498     <div class="padding"></div>
13499
13500     <div class="entry">
13501       <div class="title">
13502         <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>
13503       </div>
13504       <div class="date">
13505         30th March 2009
13506       </div>
13507       <div class="body">
13508         <p>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
13509 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
13510 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
13511 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
13512 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
13513 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
13514 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
13515 application.</p>
13516
13517 <p>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
13518 independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
13519 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
13520 protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
13521 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
13522 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
13523 blocked from doing so.</p>
13524
13525 <p>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
13526 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
13527 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
13528 requirements change.</p>
13529
13530 <p>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
13531 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
13532 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.</p>
13533
13534       </div>
13535       <div class="tags">
13536
13537
13538         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>.
13539
13540
13541       </div>
13542     </div>
13543     <div class="padding"></div>
13544
13545     <div class="entry">
13546       <div class="title">
13547         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html">Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering</a>
13548       </div>
13549       <div class="date">
13550         29th March 2009
13551       </div>
13552       <div class="body">
13553         <p>I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
13554 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering.  I got a bit done tuning the
13555 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
13556 implementation avahi.  It look like it could be useful for us.  Almost
13557 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
13558 get to know the Skolelinux system.  Walter Bender, involved in the
13559 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
13560 also helped me improve my OLPC installation.  He also showed me that
13561 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
13562 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian.  As a
13563 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu.  We also
13564 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
13565 proved to be too hard for us.  The application seem to need more work
13566 before it is ready for me.  I look forward to getting home and relax
13567 now. :)</p>
13568
13569       </div>
13570       <div class="tags">
13571
13572
13573         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>.
13574
13575
13576       </div>
13577     </div>
13578     <div class="padding"></div>
13579
13580     <div class="entry">
13581       <div class="title">
13582         <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>
13583       </div>
13584       <div class="date">
13585         29th March 2009
13586       </div>
13587       <div class="body">
13588         <p>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
13589 optimal.  There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
13590 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with
13591 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory.  The RFC
13592 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
13593 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.</p>
13594
13595 <p>In <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux</a>,
13596 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
13597 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
13598 and LTSP configuration in LDAP.  These objects have a lot in common,
13599 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
13600 object per entity.  For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
13601 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
13602 DNS information and another with DHCP information.  The schemas
13603 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
13604 object.  In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
13605 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
13606 It just do not scale.  I believe it is time for a few RFC
13607 specifications to cleam up this mess.</p>
13608
13609 <p>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
13610 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
13611 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
13612 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.</p>
13613
13614 <p>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
13615 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.</p>
13616
13617 <p>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
13618 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up.  Time to start a
13619 new IETF work group?</p>
13620
13621       </div>
13622       <div class="tags">
13623
13624
13625         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>.
13626
13627
13628       </div>
13629     </div>
13630     <div class="padding"></div>
13631
13632     <div class="entry">
13633       <div class="title">
13634         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Endelig_er_Debian_Lenny_gitt_ut.html">Endelig er Debian Lenny gitt ut</a>
13635       </div>
13636       <div class="date">
13637         15th February 2009
13638       </div>
13639       <div class="body">
13640         <p>Endelig er <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>
13641 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090214">Lenny</a> gitt ut.
13642 Et langt steg videre for Debian-prosjektet, og en rekke nye
13643 programpakker blir nå tilgjengelig for de av oss som bruker den
13644 stabile utgaven av Debian.  Neste steg er nå å få
13645 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> /
13646 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> ferdig
13647 oppdatert for den nye utgaven, slik at en oppdatert versjon kan
13648 slippes løs på skolene.  Takk til alle debian-utviklerne som har
13649 gjort dette mulig.  Endelig er f.eks. fungerende avhengighetsstyrt
13650 bootsekvens tilgjengelig i stabil utgave, vha pakken
13651 <tt>insserv</tt>.</p>
13652
13653       </div>
13654       <div class="tags">
13655
13656
13657         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>.
13658
13659
13660       </div>
13661     </div>
13662     <div class="padding"></div>
13663
13664     <div class="entry">
13665       <div class="title">
13666         <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>
13667       </div>
13668       <div class="date">
13669          7th December 2008
13670       </div>
13671       <div class="body">
13672         <p>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
13673 Oslo.  Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
13674 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
13675 LTSP installation.  LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network.
13676 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
13677 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box.  Was working on getting the
13678 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
13679 finish it before the weekend was up.</p>
13680
13681 <p>Did not find time to look at the 4 VGA cards in one box we got from
13682 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
13683 development gathering.  Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
13684 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
13685 of these cards.</p>
13686
13687       </div>
13688       <div class="tags">
13689
13690
13691         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>.
13692
13693
13694       </div>
13695     </div>
13696     <div class="padding"></div>
13697
13698     <div class="entry">
13699       <div class="title">
13700         <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>
13701       </div>
13702       <div class="date">
13703         25th November 2008
13704       </div>
13705       <div class="body">
13706         <p>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
13707 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
13708 default in Debian Edu.  We need an embedded video playing plugin with
13709 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
13710 all the multimedia content available on the web.  The test results and
13711 notes are available on
13712 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">the
13713 Debian wiki</a>.  I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
13714 fill this need.  My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
13715 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages.  A lot of the MIME
13716 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
13717 video/ogg), just do not work.  And simple formats like the
13718 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn't supported by the
13719 totem and vlc plugins.  I hope the situation will improve soon.  No
13720 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.</p>
13721
13722 <p>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin.  It seem to
13723 be the only one fitting our needs. :/</p>
13724
13725       </div>
13726       <div class="tags">
13727
13728
13729         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>.
13730
13731
13732       </div>
13733     </div>
13734     <div class="padding"></div>
13735
13736     <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>
13737     <div id="sidebar">
13738
13739
13740
13741 <h2>Archive</h2>
13742 <ul>
13743
13744 <li>2019
13745 <ul>
13746
13747 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/01/">January (4)</a></li>
13748
13749 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/02/">February (3)</a></li>
13750
13751 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13752
13753 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/05/">May (2)</a></li>
13754
13755 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/06/">June (3)</a></li>
13756
13757 </ul></li>
13758
13759 <li>2018
13760 <ul>
13761
13762 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/01/">January (1)</a></li>
13763
13764 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/02/">February (5)</a></li>
13765
13766 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/03/">March (5)</a></li>
13767
13768 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/04/">April (3)</a></li>
13769
13770 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13771
13772 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/07/">July (5)</a></li>
13773
13774 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/08/">August (3)</a></li>
13775
13776 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/09/">September (3)</a></li>
13777
13778 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/10/">October (5)</a></li>
13779
13780 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/11/">November (2)</a></li>
13781
13782 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/12/">December (4)</a></li>
13783
13784 </ul></li>
13785
13786 <li>2017
13787 <ul>
13788
13789 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/01/">January (4)</a></li>
13790
13791 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/02/">February (3)</a></li>
13792
13793 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/03/">March (5)</a></li>
13794
13795 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/04/">April (2)</a></li>
13796
13797 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/06/">June (5)</a></li>
13798
13799 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/07/">July (1)</a></li>
13800
13801 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/08/">August (1)</a></li>
13802
13803 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/09/">September (3)</a></li>
13804
13805 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/10/">October (5)</a></li>
13806
13807 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13808
13809 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/12/">December (4)</a></li>
13810
13811 </ul></li>
13812
13813 <li>2016
13814 <ul>
13815
13816 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
13817
13818 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
13819
13820 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13821
13822 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
13823
13824 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
13825
13826 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13827
13828 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/07/">July (2)</a></li>
13829
13830 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/08/">August (5)</a></li>
13831
13832 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/09/">September (2)</a></li>
13833
13834 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/10/">October (3)</a></li>
13835
13836 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/11/">November (8)</a></li>
13837
13838 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/12/">December (5)</a></li>
13839
13840 </ul></li>
13841
13842 <li>2015
13843 <ul>
13844
13845 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
13846
13847 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
13848
13849 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
13850
13851 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
13852
13853 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
13854
13855 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
13856
13857 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
13858
13859 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
13860
13861 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
13862
13863 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
13864
13865 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
13866
13867 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
13868
13869 </ul></li>
13870
13871 <li>2014
13872 <ul>
13873
13874 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
13875
13876 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
13877
13878 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
13879
13880 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
13881
13882 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
13883
13884 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13885
13886 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
13887
13888 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
13889
13890 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
13891
13892 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
13893
13894 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13895
13896 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
13897
13898 </ul></li>
13899
13900 <li>2013
13901 <ul>
13902
13903 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
13904
13905 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
13906
13907 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
13908
13909 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
13910
13911 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
13912
13913 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
13914
13915 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
13916
13917 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
13918
13919 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
13920
13921 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
13922
13923 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
13924
13925 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
13926
13927 </ul></li>
13928
13929 <li>2012
13930 <ul>
13931
13932 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
13933
13934 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
13935
13936 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
13937
13938 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
13939
13940 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
13941
13942 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
13943
13944 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
13945
13946 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
13947
13948 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
13949
13950 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
13951
13952 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
13953
13954 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
13955
13956 </ul></li>
13957
13958 <li>2011
13959 <ul>
13960
13961 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
13962
13963 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
13964
13965 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
13966
13967 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
13968
13969 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
13970
13971 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13972
13973 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
13974
13975 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
13976
13977 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
13978
13979 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
13980
13981 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13982
13983 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
13984
13985 </ul></li>
13986
13987 <li>2010
13988 <ul>
13989
13990 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
13991
13992 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
13993
13994 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13995
13996 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
13997
13998 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
13999
14000 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
14001
14002 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
14003
14004 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
14005
14006 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
14007
14008 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
14009
14010 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
14011
14012 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
14013
14014 </ul></li>
14015
14016 <li>2009
14017 <ul>
14018
14019 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
14020
14021 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
14022
14023 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
14024
14025 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
14026
14027 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
14028
14029 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
14030
14031 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
14032
14033 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
14034
14035 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
14036
14037 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
14038
14039 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
14040
14041 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
14042
14043 </ul></li>
14044
14045 <li>2008
14046 <ul>
14047
14048 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
14049
14050 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
14051
14052 </ul></li>
14053
14054 </ul>
14055
14056
14057
14058 <h2>Tags</h2>
14059 <ul>
14060
14061  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (16)</a></li>
14062
14063  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
14064
14065  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
14066
14067  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
14068
14069  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/betalkontant">betalkontant (8)</a></li>
14070
14071  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (11)</a></li>
14072
14073  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (17)</a></li>
14074
14075  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
14076
14077  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
14078
14079  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (167)</a></li>
14080
14081  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (158)</a></li>
14082
14083  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook (4)</a></li>
14084
14085  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (11)</a></li>
14086
14087  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (17)</a></li>
14088
14089  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (26)</a></li>
14090
14091  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
14092
14093  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (405)</a></li>
14094
14095  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
14096
14097  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (14)</a></li>
14098
14099  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (34)</a></li>
14100
14101  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
14102
14103  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (20)</a></li>
14104
14105  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
14106
14107  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
14108
14109  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (16)</a></li>
14110
14111  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (22)</a></li>
14112
14113  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kodi">kodi (4)</a></li>
14114
14115  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
14116
14117  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lego">lego (4)</a></li>
14118
14119  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
14120
14121  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
14122
14123  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
14124
14125  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
14126
14127  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (42)</a></li>
14128
14129  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (12)</a></li>
14130
14131  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/noark5">noark5 (15)</a></li>
14132
14133  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (305)</a></li>
14134
14135  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (195)</a></li>
14136
14137  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (37)</a></li>
14138
14139  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
14140
14141  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (73)</a></li>
14142
14143  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (108)</a></li>
14144
14145  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (2)</a></li>
14146
14147  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
14148
14149  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
14150
14151  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
14152
14153  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (12)</a></li>
14154
14155  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
14156
14157  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (7)</a></li>
14158
14159  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
14160
14161  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (55)</a></li>
14162
14163  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
14164
14165  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (5)</a></li>
14166
14167  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (64)</a></li>
14168
14169  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (6)</a></li>
14170
14171  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (12)</a></li>
14172
14173  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (55)</a></li>
14174
14175  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (4)</a></li>
14176
14177  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
14178
14179  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (9)</a></li>
14180
14181  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/verkidetfri">verkidetfri (15)</a></li>
14182
14183  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (73)</a></li>
14184
14185  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
14186
14187  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (42)</a></li>
14188
14189 </ul>
14190
14191
14192     </div>
14193     <p style="text-align: right">
14194  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
14195 </p>
14196
14197   </body>
14198 </html>