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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/Simple_streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_GStreamer_and_RTP.html">Simple streaming the Linux desktop to Kodi using GStreamer and RTP</a>
  26       </div>
  27       <div class="date">
  28         12th July 2018
  29       </div>
  30       <div class="body">
  31         <p>Last night, I wrote
  32 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html">a
  33 recipe to stream a Linux desktop using VLC to a instance of Kodi</a>.
  34 During the day I received valuable feedback, and thanks to the
  35 suggestions I have been able to rewrite the recipe into a much simpler
  36 approach requiring no setup at all.  It is a single script that take
  37 care of it all.</p>
  38
  39 <p>This new script uses GStreamer instead of VLC to capture the
  40 desktop and stream it to Kodi.  This fixed the video quality issue I
  41 saw initially.  It further removes the need to add a m3u file on the
  42 Kodi machine, as it instead connects to
  43 <a href="https://kodi.wiki/view/JSON-RPC_API/v8">the JSON-RPC API in
  44 Kodi</a> and simply ask Kodi to play from the stream created using
  45 GStreamer.  Streaming the desktop to Kodi now become trivial.  Copy
  46 the script below, run it with the DNS name or IP address of the kodi
  47 server to stream to as the only argument, and watch your screen show
  48 up on the Kodi screen.  Note, it depend on multicast on the local
  49 network, so if you need to stream outside the local network, the
  50 script must be modified.  Also note, I have no idea if audio work, as
  51 I only care about the picture part.</p>
  52
  53 <blockquote><pre>
  54 #!/bin/sh
  55 #
  56 # Stream the Linux desktop view to Kodi.  See
  57 # http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html
  58 # for backgorund information.
  59
  60 # Make sure the stream is stopped in Kodi and the gstreamer process is
  61 # killed if something go wrong (for example if curl is unable to find the
  62 # kodi server).  Do the same when interrupting this script.
  63 kodicmd() {
  64     host="$1"
  65     cmd="$2"
  66     params="$3"
  67     curl --silent --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  68          --data-binary "{ \"id\": 1, \"jsonrpc\": \"2.0\", \"method\": \"$cmd\", \"params\": $params }" \
  69          "http://$host/jsonrpc"
  70 }
  71 cleanup() {
  72     if [ -n "$kodihost" ] ; then
  73         # Stop the playing when we end
  74         playerid=$(kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.GetActivePlayers "{}" |
  75                             jq .result[].playerid)
  76         kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.Stop "{ \"playerid\" : $playerid }" > /dev/null
  77     fi
  78     if [ "$gstpid" ] && kill -0 "$gstpid" >/dev/null 2>&1; then
  79         kill "$gstpid"
  80     fi
  81 }
  82 trap cleanup EXIT INT
  83
  84 if [ -n "$1" ]; then
  85     kodihost=$1
  86     shift
  87 else
  88     kodihost=kodi.local
  89 fi
  90
  91 mcast=239.255.0.1
  92 mcastport=1234
  93 mcastttl=1
  94
  95 pasrc=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' | \
  96   cut -d" " -f2|head -1)
  97 gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
  98   videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
  99   x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
 100   key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
 101   mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
 102   udpsink host=$mcast port=$mcastport ttl-mc=$mcastttl auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
 103   pulsesrc device=$pasrc ! audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux. \
 104   > /dev/null 2>&1 &
 105 gstpid=$!
 106
 107 # Give stream a second to get going
 108 sleep 1
 109
 110 # Ask kodi to start streaming using its JSON-RPC API
 111 kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.Open \
 112         "{\"item\": { \"file\": \"udp://@$mcast:$mcastport\" } }" > /dev/null
 113
 114 # wait for gst to end
 115 wait "$gstpid"
 116 </pre></blockquote>
 117
 118 <p>I hope you find the approach useful.  I know I do.</p>
 119
 120 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 121 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 122 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 123
 124       </div>
 125       <div class="tags">
 126
 127
 128         Tags: <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/video">video</a>.
 129
 130
 131       </div>
 132     </div>
 133     <div class="padding"></div>
 134
 135     <div class="entry">
 136       <div class="title">
 137         <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>
 138       </div>
 139       <div class="date">
 140         12th July 2018
 141       </div>
 142       <div class="body">
 143         <p>A while back, I was asked by a friend how to stream the desktop to
 144 my projector connected to Kodi.  I sadly had to admit that I had no
 145 idea, as it was a task I never had tried.  Since then, I have been
 146 looking for a way to do so, preferable without much extra software to
 147 install on either side.  Today I found a way that seem to kind of
 148 work.  Not great, but it is a start.</p>
 149
 150 <p>I had a look at several approaches, for example
 151 <a href="https://github.com/mfoetsch/dlna_live_streaming">using uPnP
 152 DLNA as described in 2011</a>, but it required a uPnP server, fuse and
 153 local storage enough to store the stream locally.  This is not going
 154 to work well for me, lacking enough free space, and it would
 155 impossible for my friend to get working.</p>
 156
 157 <p>Next, it occurred to me that perhaps I could use VLC to create a
 158 video stream that Kodi could play.  Preferably using
 159 broadcast/multicast, to avoid having to change any setup on the Kodi
 160 side when starting such stream.  Unfortunately, the only recipe I
 161 could find using multicast used the rtp protocol, and this protocol
 162 seem to not be supported by Kodi.</p>
 163
 164 <p>On the other hand, the rtsp protocol is working!  Unfortunately I
 165 have to specify the IP address of the streaming machine in both the
 166 sending command and the file on the Kodi server.  But it is showing my
 167 desktop, and thus allow us to have a shared look on the big screen at
 168 the programs I work on.</p>
 169
 170 <p>I did not spend much time investigating codeces.  I combined the
 171 rtp and rtsp recipes from
 172 <a href="https://wiki.videolan.org/Documentation:Streaming_HowTo/Command_Line_Examples/">the
 173 VLC Streaming HowTo/Command Line Examples</a>, and was able to get
 174 this working on the desktop/streaming end.</p>
 175
 176 <blockquote><pre>
 177 vlc screen:// --sout \
 178   '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{dst=projector.local,port=1234,sdp=rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp}'
 179 </pre></blockquote>
 180
 181 <p>I ssh-ed into my Kodi box and created a file like this with the
 182 same IP address:</p>
 183
 184 <blockquote><pre>
 185 echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp \
 186   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 187 </pre></blockquote>
 188
 189 <p>Note the 192.168.11.4 IP address is my desktops IP address.  As far
 190 as I can tell the IP must be hardcoded for this to work.  In other
 191 words, if someone elses machine is going to do the steaming, you have
 192 to update screenstream.m3u on the Kodi machine and adjust the vlc
 193 recipe.  To get started, locate the file in Kodi and select the m3u
 194 file while the VLC stream is running.  The desktop then show up in my
 195 big screen. :)</p>
 196
 197 <p>When using the same technique to stream a video file with audio,
 198 the audio quality is really bad.  No idea if the problem is package
 199 loss or bad parameters for the transcode.  I do not know VLC nor Kodi
 200 enough to tell.</p>
 201
 202 <p><strong>Update 2018-07-12</strong>: Johannes Schauer send me a few
 203 succestions and reminded me about an important step.  The "screen:"
 204 input source is only available once the vlc-plugin-access-extra
 205 package is installed on Debian.  Without it, you will see this error
 206 message: "VLC is unable to open the MRL 'screen://'.  Check the log
 207 for details."  He further found that it is possible to drop some parts
 208 of the VLC command line to reduce the amount of hardcoded information.
 209 It is also useful to consider using cvlc to avoid having the VLC
 210 window in the desktop view.  In sum, this give us this command line on
 211 the source end
 212
 213 <blockquote><pre>
 214 cvlc screen:// --sout \
 215   '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{sdp=rtsp://:8080/}'
 216 </pre></blockquote>
 217
 218 <p>and this on the Kodi end<p>
 219
 220 <blockquote><pre>
 221 echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/ \
 222   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 223 </pre></blockquote>
 224
 225 <p>Still bad image quality, though.  But I did discover that streaming
 226 a DVD using dvdsimple:///dev/dvd as the source had excellent video and
 227 audio quality, so I guess the issue is in the input or transcoding
 228 parts, not the rtsp part.  I've tried to change the vb and ab
 229 parameters to use more bandwidth, but it did not make a
 230 difference.</p>
 231
 232 <p>I further received a suggestion from Einar Haraldseid to try using
 233 gstreamer instead of VLC, and this proved to work great!  He also
 234 provided me with the trick to get Kodi to use a multicast stream as
 235 its source.  By using this monstrous oneliner, I can stream my desktop
 236 with good video quality in reasonable framerate to the 239.255.0.1
 237 multicast address on port 1234:
 238
 239 <blockquote><pre>
 240 gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
 241   videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
 242   x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
 243   key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
 244   mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
 245   udpsink host=239.255.0.1 port=1234 ttl-mc=1 auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
 246   pulsesrc device=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | \
 247     grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' |  cut -d" " -f2|head -1) ! \
 248   audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux.
 249 </pre></blockquote>
 250
 251 <p>and this on the Kodi end<p>
 252
 253 <blockquote><pre>
 254 echo udp://@239.255.0.1:1234 \
 255   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 256 </pre></blockquote>
 257
 258 <p>Note the trick to pick a valid pulseaudio source.  It might not
 259 pick the one you need.  This approach will of course lead to trouble
 260 if more than one source uses the same multicast port and address.
 261 Note the ttl-mc=1 setting, which limit the multicast packages to the
 262 local network.  If the value is increased, your screen will be
 263 broadcasted further, one network "hop" for each increase (read up on
 264 multicast to learn more. :)!</p>
 265
 266 <p>Having cracked how to get Kodi to receive multicast streams, I
 267 could use this VLC command to stream to the same multicast address.
 268 The image quality is way better than the rtsp approach, but gstreamer
 269 seem to be doing a better job.</p>
 270
 271 <blockquote><pre>
 272 cvlc screen:// --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{mux=ts,dst=239.255.0.1,port=1234,sdp=sap}'
 273 </pre></blockquote>
 274
 275 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 276 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 277 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 278
 279       </div>
 280       <div class="tags">
 281
 282
 283         Tags: <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/video">video</a>.
 284
 285
 286       </div>
 287     </div>
 288     <div class="padding"></div>
 289
 290     <div class="entry">
 291       <div class="title">
 292         <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>
 293       </div>
 294       <div class="date">
 295          9th July 2018
 296       </div>
 297       <div class="body">
 298         <p>Five years ago,
 299 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_.html">I
 300 measured what the most supported MIME type in Debian was</a>, by
 301 analysing the desktop files in all packages in the archive.  Since
 302 then, the DEP-11 AppStream system has been put into production, making
 303 the task a lot easier.  This made me want to repeat the measurement,
 304 to see how much things changed.  Here are the new numbers, for
 305 unstable only this time:
 306
 307 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
 308
 309 <pre>
 310   count MIME type
 311   ----- -----------------------
 312      56 image/jpeg
 313      55 image/png
 314      49 image/tiff
 315      48 image/gif
 316      39 image/bmp
 317      38 text/plain
 318      37 audio/mpeg
 319      34 application/ogg
 320      33 audio/x-flac
 321      32 audio/x-mp3
 322      30 audio/x-wav
 323      30 audio/x-vorbis+ogg
 324      29 image/x-portable-pixmap
 325      27 inode/directory
 326      27 image/x-portable-bitmap
 327      27 audio/x-mpeg
 328      26 application/x-ogg
 329      25 audio/x-mpegurl
 330      25 audio/ogg
 331      24 text/html
 332 </pre>
 333
 334 <p>The list was created like this using a sid chroot: "cat
 335 /var/lib/apt/lists/*sid*_dep11_Components-amd64.yml.gz| zcat | awk '/^
 336 - \S+\/\S+$/ {print $2 }' | sort | uniq -c | sort -nr | head -20"</p>
 337
 338 <p>It is interesting to see how image formats have passed text/plain
 339 as the most announced supported MIME type.  These days, thanks to the
 340 AppStream system, if you run into a file format you do not know, and
 341 want to figure out which packages support the format, you can find the
 342 MIME type of the file using "file --mime &lt;filename&gt;", and then
 343 look up all packages announcing support for this format in their
 344 AppStream metadata (XML or .desktop file) using "appstreamcli
 345 what-provides mimetype &lt;mime-type&gt;.  For example if you, like
 346 me, want to know which packages support inode/directory, you can get a
 347 list like this:</p>
 348
 349 <p><blockquote><pre>
 350 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype inode/directory | grep Package: | sort
 351 Package: anjuta
 352 Package: audacious
 353 Package: baobab
 354 Package: cervisia
 355 Package: chirp
 356 Package: dolphin
 357 Package: doublecmd-common
 358 Package: easytag
 359 Package: enlightenment
 360 Package: ephoto
 361 Package: filelight
 362 Package: gwenview
 363 Package: k4dirstat
 364 Package: kaffeine
 365 Package: kdesvn
 366 Package: kid3
 367 Package: kid3-qt
 368 Package: nautilus
 369 Package: nemo
 370 Package: pcmanfm
 371 Package: pcmanfm-qt
 372 Package: qweborf
 373 Package: ranger
 374 Package: sirikali
 375 Package: spacefm
 376 Package: spacefm
 377 Package: vifm
 378 %
 379 </pre></blockquote></p>
 380
 381 <p>Using the same method, I can quickly discover that the Sketchup file
 382 format is not yet supported by any package in Debian:</p>
 383
 384 <p><blockquote><pre>
 385 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/vnd.sketchup.skp
 386 Could not find component providing 'mimetype::application/vnd.sketchup.skp'.
 387 %
 388 </pre></blockquote></p>
 389
 390 <p>Yesterday I used it to figure out which packages support the STL 3D
 391 format:</p>
 392
 393 <p><blockquote><pre>
 394 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/sla|grep Package
 395 Package: cura
 396 Package: meshlab
 397 Package: printrun
 398 %
 399 </pre></blockquote></p>
 400
 401 <p>PS: A new version of Cura was uploaded to Debian yesterday.</p>
 402
 403 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 404 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 405 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 406
 407       </div>
 408       <div class="tags">
 409
 410
 411         Tags: <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>.
 412
 413
 414       </div>
 415     </div>
 416     <div class="padding"></div>
 417
 418     <div class="entry">
 419       <div class="title">
 420         <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>
 421       </div>
 422       <div class="date">
 423          8th July 2018
 424       </div>
 425       <div class="body">
 426         <p>Quite regularly, I let my Debian Sid/Unstable chroot stay untouch
 427 for a while, and when I need to update it there is not enough free
 428 space on the disk for apt to do a normal 'apt upgrade'.  I normally
 429 would resolve the issue by doing 'apt install &lt;somepackages&gt;' to
 430 upgrade only some of the packages in one batch, until the amount of
 431 packages to download fall below the amount of free space available.
 432 Today, I had about 500 packages to upgrade, and after a while I got
 433 tired of trying to install chunks of packages manually.  I concluded
 434 that I did not have the spare hours required to complete the task, and
 435 decided to see if I could automate it.  I came up with this small
 436 script which I call 'apt-in-chunks':</p>
 437
 438 <p><blockquote><pre>
 439 #!/bin/sh
 440 #
 441 # Upgrade packages when the disk is too full to upgrade every
 442 # upgradable package in one lump.  Fetching packages to upgrade using
 443 # apt, and then installing using dpkg, to avoid changing the package
 444 # flag for manual/automatic.
 445
 446 set -e
 447
 448 ignore() {
 449     if [ "$1" ]; then
 450         grep -v "$1"
 451     else
 452         cat
 453     fi
 454 }
 455
 456 for p in $(apt list --upgradable | ignore "$@" |cut -d/ -f1 | grep -v '^Listing...'); do
 457     echo "Upgrading $p"
 458     apt clean
 459     apt install --download-only -y $p
 460     for f in /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb; do
 461         if [ -e "$f" ]; then
 462             dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb
 463             break
 464         fi
 465     done
 466 done
 467 </pre></blockquote></p>
 468
 469 <p>The script will extract the list of packages to upgrade, try to
 470 download the packages needed to upgrade one package, install the
 471 downloaded packages using dpkg.  The idea is to upgrade packages
 472 without changing the APT mark for the package (ie the one recording of
 473 the package was manually requested or pulled in as a dependency).  To
 474 use it, simply run it as root from the command line.  If it fail, try
 475 'apt install -f' to clean up the mess and run the script again.  This
 476 might happen if the new packages conflict with one of the old
 477 packages.  dpkg is unable to remove, while apt can do this.</p>
 478
 479 <p>It take one option, a package to ignore in the list of packages to
 480 upgrade.  The option to ignore a package is there to be able to skip
 481 the packages that are simply too large to unpack.  Today this was
 482 'ghc', but I have run into other large packages causing similar
 483 problems earlier (like TeX).</p>
 484
 485 <p>Update 2018-07-08: Thanks to Paul Wise, I am aware of two
 486 alternative ways to handle this.  The "unattended-upgrades
 487 --minimal-upgrade-steps" option will try to calculate upgrade sets for
 488 each package to upgrade, and then upgrade them in order, smallest set
 489 first.  It might be a better option than my above mentioned script.
 490 Also, "aptutude upgrade" can upgrade single packages, thus avoiding
 491 the need for using "dpkg -i" in the script above.</p>
 492
 493 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 494 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 495 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 496
 497       </div>
 498       <div class="tags">
 499
 500
 501         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 502
 503
 504       </div>
 505     </div>
 506     <div class="padding"></div>
 507
 508     <div class="entry">
 509       <div class="title">
 510         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/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>
 511       </div>
 512       <div class="date">
 513         13th February 2018
 514       </div>
 515       <div class="body">
 516         <p>A new version of the
 517 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura">3D printer slicer
 518 software Cura</a>, version 3.1.0, is now available in Debian Testing
 519 (aka Buster) and Debian Unstable (aka Sid).  I hope you find it
 520 useful.  It was uploaded the last few days, and the last update will
 521 enter testing tomorrow.  See the
 522 <a href="https://ultimaker.com/en/products/cura-software/release-notes">release
 523 notes</a> for the list of bug fixes and new features.  Version 3.2
 524 was announced 6 days ago.  We will try to get it into Debian as
 525 well.</p>
 526
 527 <p>More information related to 3D printing is available on the
 528 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/3DPrinting">3D printing</a> and
 529 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/3D-printer">3D printer</a> wiki pages
 530 in Debian.</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/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>.
 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/Cura__the_nice_3D_print_slicer__is_now_in_Debian_Unstable.html">Cura, the nice 3D print slicer, is now in Debian Unstable</a>
 550       </div>
 551       <div class="date">
 552         17th December 2017
 553       </div>
 554       <div class="body">
 555         <p>After several months of working and waiting, I am happy to report
 556 that the nice and user friendly 3D printer slicer software Cura just
 557 entered Debian Unstable.  It consist of five packages,
 558 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura">cura</a>,
 559 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura-engine">cura-engine</a>,
 560 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libarcus">libarcus</a>,
 561 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/fdm-materials">fdm-materials</a>,
 562 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libsavitar">libsavitar</a> and
 563 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/uranium">uranium</a>.  The last
 564 two, uranium and cura, entered Unstable yesterday.  This should make
 565 it easier for Debian users to print on at least the Ultimaker class of
 566 3D printers.  My nearest 3D printer is an Ultimaker 2+, so it will
 567 make life easier for at least me. :)</p>
 568
 569 <p>The work to make this happen was done by Gregor Riepl, and I was
 570 happy to assist him in sponsoring the packages.  With the introduction
 571 of Cura, Debian is up to three 3D printer slicers at your service,
 572 Cura, Slic3r and Slic3r Prusa.  If you own or have access to a 3D
 573 printer, give it a go. :)</p>
 574
 575 <p>The 3D printer software is maintained by the 3D printer Debian
 576 team, flocking together on the
 577 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/3dprinter-general">3dprinter-general</a>
 578 mailing list and the
 579 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-3dprinting">#debian-3dprinting</a>
 580 IRC channel.</p>
 581
 582 <p>The next step for Cura in Debian is to update the cura package to
 583 version 3.0.3 and then update the entire set of packages to version
 584 3.1.0 which showed up the last few days.</p>
 585
 586       </div>
 587       <div class="tags">
 588
 589
 590         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>.
 591
 592
 593       </div>
 594     </div>
 595     <div class="padding"></div>
 596
 597     <div class="entry">
 598       <div class="title">
 599         <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>
 600       </div>
 601       <div class="date">
 602          9th October 2017
 603       </div>
 604       <div class="body">
 605         <p>At my nearby maker space,
 606 <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Sonen</a>, I heard the story that it
 607 was easier to generate gcode files for theyr 3D printers (Ultimake 2+)
 608 on Windows and MacOS X than Linux, because the software involved had
 609 to be manually compiled and set up on Linux while premade packages
 610 worked out of the box on Windows and MacOS X.  I found this annoying,
 611 as the software involved,
 612 <a href="https://github.com/Ultimaker/Cura">Cura</a>, is free software
 613 and should be trivial to get up and running on Linux if someone took
 614 the time to package it for the relevant distributions.  I even found
 615 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/706656">a request for adding into
 616 Debian</a> from 2013, which had seem some activity over the years but
 617 never resulted in the software showing up in Debian.  So a few days
 618 ago I offered my help to try to improve the situation.</p>
 619
 620 <p>Now I am very happy to see that all the packages required by a
 621 working Cura in Debian are uploaded into Debian and waiting in the NEW
 622 queue for the ftpmasters to have a look.  You can track the progress
 623 on
 624 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?email=3dprinter-general%40lists.alioth.debian.org">the
 625 status page for the 3D printer team</a>.</p>
 626
 627 <p>The uploaded packages are a bit behind upstream, and was uploaded
 628 now to get slots in <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW
 629 queue</a> while we work up updating the packages to the latest
 630 upstream version.</p>
 631
 632 <p>On a related note, two competitors for Cura, which I found harder
 633 to use and was unable to configure correctly for Ultimaker 2+ in the
 634 short time I spent on it, are already in Debian.  If you are looking
 635 for 3D printer "slicers" and want something already available in
 636 Debian, check out
 637 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r">slic3r</a> and
 638 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r-prusa">slic3r-prusa</a>.
 639 The latter is a fork of the former.</p>
 640
 641 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 642 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 643 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 644
 645       </div>
 646       <div class="tags">
 647
 648
 649         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>.
 650
 651
 652       </div>
 653     </div>
 654     <div class="padding"></div>
 655
 656     <div class="entry">
 657       <div class="title">
 658         <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>
 659       </div>
 660       <div class="date">
 661         29th September 2017
 662       </div>
 663       <div class="body">
 664         <p>Every mobile phone announce its existence over radio to the nearby
 665 mobile cell towers.  And this radio chatter is available for anyone
 666 with a radio receiver capable of receiving them.  Details about the
 667 mobile phones with very good accuracy is of course collected by the
 668 phone companies, but this is not the topic of this blog post.  The
 669 mobile phone radio chatter make it possible to figure out when a cell
 670 phone is nearby, as it include the SIM card ID (IMSI).  By paying
 671 attention over time, one can see when a phone arrive and when it leave
 672 an area.  I believe it would be nice to make this information more
 673 available to the general public, to make more people aware of how
 674 their phones are announcing their whereabouts to anyone that care to
 675 listen.</p>
 676
 677 <p>I am very happy to report that we managed to get something
 678 visualizing this information up and running for
 679 <a href="http://norwaymakers.org/osf17">Oslo Skaperfestival 2017</a>
 680 (Oslo Makers Festival) taking place today and tomorrow at Deichmanske
 681 library.  The solution is based on the
 682 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Easier_recipe_to_observe_the_cell_phones_around_you.html">simple
 683 recipe for listening to GSM chatter</a> I posted a few days ago, and
 684 will show up at the stand of <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Åpen
 685 Sone from the Computer Science department of the University of
 686 Oslo</a>.  The presentation will show the nearby mobile phones (aka
 687 IMSIs) as dots in a web browser graph, with lines to the dot
 688 representing mobile base station it is talking to. It was working in
 689 the lab yesterday, and was moved into place this morning.</p>
 690
 691 <p>We set up a fairly powerful desktop machine using Debian
 692 Buster/Testing with several (five, I believe) RTL2838 DVB-T receivers
 693 connected and visualize the visible cell phone towers using an
 694 <a href="https://github.com/marlow925/hopglass">English version of
 695 Hopglass</a>.  A fairly powerfull machine is needed as the
 696 grgsm_livemon_headless processes from
 697 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a> converting
 698 the radio signal to data packages is quite CPU intensive.</p>
 699
 700 <p>The frequencies to listen to, are identified using a slightly
 701 patched scan-and-livemon (to set the --args values for each receiver),
 702 and the Hopglass data is generated using the
 703 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/IMSI-catcher/tree/meshviewer-output">patches
 704 in my meshviewer-output branch</a>.  For some reason we could not get
 705 more than four SDRs working.  There is also a geographical map trying
 706 to show the location of the base stations, but I believe their
 707 coordinates are hardcoded to some random location in Germany, I
 708 believe.  The code should be replaced with code to look up location in
 709 a text file, a sqlite database or one of the online databases
 710 mentioned in
 711 <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher/issues/14">the github
 712 issue for the topic</a>.
 713
 714 <p>If this sound interesting, visit the stand at the festival!</p>
 715
 716       </div>
 717       <div class="tags">
 718
 719
 720         Tags: <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>.
 721
 722
 723       </div>
 724     </div>
 725     <div class="padding"></div>
 726
 727     <div class="entry">
 728       <div class="title">
 729         <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>
 730       </div>
 731       <div class="date">
 732         24th September 2017
 733       </div>
 734       <div class="body">
 735         <p>A little more than a month ago I wrote
 736 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simpler_recipe_on_how_to_make_a_simple__7_IMSI_Catcher_using_Debian.html">how
 737 to observe the SIM card ID (aka IMSI number) of mobile phones talking
 738 to nearby mobile phone base stations using Debian GNU/Linux and a
 739 cheap USB software defined radio</a>, and thus being able to pinpoint
 740 the location of people and equipment (like cars and trains) with an
 741 accuracy of a few kilometer.  Since then we have worked to make the
 742 procedure even simpler, and it is now possible to do this without any
 743 manual frequency tuning and without building your own packages.</p>
 744
 745 <p>The <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a>
 746 package is now included in Debian testing and unstable, and the
 747 IMSI-catcher code no longer require root access to fetch and decode
 748 the GSM data collected using gr-gsm.</p>
 749
 750 <p>Here is an updated recipe, using packages built by Debian and a git
 751 clone of two python scripts:</p>
 752
 753 <ol>
 754
 755 <li>Start with a Debian machine running the Buster version (aka
 756   testing).</li>
 757
 758 <li>Run '<tt>apt install gr-gsm python-numpy python-scipy
 759   python-scapy</tt>' as root to install required packages.</li>
 760
 761 <li>Fetch the code decoding GSM packages using '<tt>git clone
 762   github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher.git</tt>'.</li>
 763
 764 <li>Insert USB software defined radio supported by GNU Radio.</li>
 765
 766 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
 767   scan-and-livemon</tt>' to locate the frequency of nearby base
 768   stations and start listening for GSM packages on one of them.</li>
 769
 770 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
 771   simple_IMSI-catcher.py</tt>' to display the collected information.</li>
 772
 773 </ol>
 774
 775 <p>Note, due to a bug somewhere the scan-and-livemon program (actually
 776 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/issues/336">its underlying
 777 program grgsm_scanner</a>) do not work with the HackRF radio.  It does
 778 work with RTL 8232 and other similar USB radio receivers you can get
 779 very cheaply
 780 (<a href="https://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=rtl+2832">for example
 781 from ebay</a>), so for now the solution is to scan using the RTL radio
 782 and only use HackRF for fetching GSM data.</p>
 783
 784 <p>As far as I can tell, a cell phone only show up on one of the
 785 frequencies at the time, so if you are going to track and count every
 786 cell phone around you, you need to listen to all the frequencies used.
 787 To listen to several frequencies, use the --numrecv argument to
 788 scan-and-livemon to use several receivers.  Further, I am not sure if
 789 phones using 3G or 4G will show as talking GSM to base stations, so
 790 this approach might not see all phones around you.  I typically see
 791 0-400 IMSI numbers an hour when looking around where I live.</p>
 792
 793 <p>I've tried to run the scanner on a
 794 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi 2 and 3
 795 running Debian Buster</a>, but the grgsm_livemon_headless process seem
 796 to be too CPU intensive to keep up.  When GNU Radio print 'O' to
 797 stdout, I am told there it is caused by a buffer overflow between the
 798 radio and GNU Radio, caused by the program being unable to read the
 799 GSM data fast enough.  If you see a stream of 'O's from the terminal
 800 where you started scan-and-livemon, you need a give the process more
 801 CPU power.  Perhaps someone are able to optimize the code to a point
 802 where it become possible to set up RPi3 based GSM sniffers?  I tried
 803 using Raspbian instead of Debian, but there seem to be something wrong
 804 with GNU Radio on raspbian, causing glibc to abort().</p>
 805
 806       </div>
 807       <div class="tags">
 808
 809
 810         Tags: <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>.
 811
 812
 813       </div>
 814     </div>
 815     <div class="padding"></div>
 816
 817     <div class="entry">
 818       <div class="title">
 819         <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>
 820       </div>
 821       <div class="date">
 822          9th August 2017
 823       </div>
 824       <div class="body">
 825         <p>On friday, I came across an interesting article in the Norwegian
 826 web based ICT news magazine digi.no on
 827 <a href="https://www.digi.no/artikler/sikkerhetsforsker-lagde-enkel-imsi-catcher-for-60-kroner-na-kan-mobiler-kartlegges-av-alle/398588">how
 828 to collect the IMSI numbers of nearby cell phones</a> using the cheap
 829 DVB-T software defined radios.  The article refered to instructions
 830 and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjwgNd_as30">a recipe by
 831 Keld Norman on Youtube on how to make a simple $7 IMSI Catcher</a>, and I decided to test them out.</p>
 832
 833 <p>The instructions said to use Ubuntu, install pip using apt (to
 834 bypass apt), use pip to install pybombs (to bypass both apt and pip),
 835 and the ask pybombs to fetch and build everything you need from
 836 scratch.  I wanted to see if I could do the same on the most recent
 837 Debian packages, but this did not work because pybombs tried to build
 838 stuff that no longer build with the most recent openssl library or
 839 some other version skew problem.  While trying to get this recipe
 840 working, I learned that the apt->pip->pybombs route was a long detour,
 841 and the only piece of software dependency missing in Debian was the
 842 gr-gsm package.  I also found out that the lead upstream developer of
 843 gr-gsm (the name stand for GNU Radio GSM) project already had a set of
 844 Debian packages provided in an Ubuntu PPA repository.  All I needed to
 845 do was to dget the Debian source package and built it.</p>
 846
 847 <p>The IMSI collector is a python script listening for packages on the
 848 loopback network device and printing to the terminal some specific GSM
 849 packages with IMSI numbers in them.  The code is fairly short and easy
 850 to understand.  The reason this work is because gr-gsm include a tool
 851 to read GSM data from a software defined radio like a DVB-T USB stick
 852 and other software defined radios, decode them and inject them into a
 853 network device on your Linux machine (using the loopback device by
 854 default).  This proved to work just fine, and I've been testing the
 855 collector for a few days now.</p>
 856
 857 <p>The updated and simpler recipe is thus to</p>
 858
 859 <ol>
 860
 861 <li>start with a Debian machine running Stretch or newer,</li>
 862
 863 <li>build and install the gr-gsm package available from
 864 <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>
 865
 866 <li>clone the git repostory from <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher">https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher</a>,</li>
 867
 868 <li>run grgsm_livemon and adjust the frequency until the terminal
 869 where it was started is filled with a stream of text (meaning you
 870 found a GSM station).</li>
 871
 872 <li>go into the IMSI-catcher directory and run 'sudo python simple_IMSI-catcher.py' to extract the IMSI numbers.</li>
 873
 874 </ol>
 875
 876 <p>To make it even easier in the future to get this sniffer up and
 877 running, I decided to package
 878 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/">the gr-gsm project</a>
 879 for Debian (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/871055">WNPP
 880 #871055</a>), and the package was uploaded into the NEW queue today.
 881 Luckily the gnuradio maintainer has promised to help me, as I do not
 882 know much about gnuradio stuff yet.</p>
 883
 884 <p>I doubt this "IMSI cacher" is anywhere near as powerfull as
 885 commercial tools like
 886 <a href="https://www.thespyphone.com/portable-imsi-imei-catcher/">The
 887 Spy Phone Portable IMSI / IMEI Catcher</a> or the
 888 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_phone_tracker">Harris
 889 Stingray</a>, but I hope the existance of cheap alternatives can make
 890 more people realise how their whereabouts when carrying a cell phone
 891 is easily tracked.  Seeing the data flow on the screen, realizing that
 892 I live close to a police station and knowing that the police is also
 893 wearing cell phones, I wonder how hard it would be for criminals to
 894 track the position of the police officers to discover when there are
 895 police near by, or for foreign military forces to track the location
 896 of the Norwegian military forces, or for anyone to track the location
 897 of government officials...</p>
 898
 899 <p>It is worth noting that the data reported by the IMSI-catcher
 900 script mentioned above is only a fraction of the data broadcasted on
 901 the GSM network.  It will only collect one frequency at the time,
 902 while a typical phone will be using several frequencies, and not all
 903 phones will be using the frequencies tracked by the grgsm_livemod
 904 program.  Also, there is a lot of radio chatter being ignored by the
 905 simple_IMSI-catcher script, which would be collected by extending the
 906 parser code.  I wonder if gr-gsm can be set up to listen to more than
 907 one frequency?</p>
 908
 909       </div>
 910       <div class="tags">
 911
 912
 913         Tags: <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>.
 914
 915
 916       </div>
 917     </div>
 918     <div class="padding"></div>
 919
 920     <div class="entry">
 921       <div class="title">
 922         <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>
 923       </div>
 924       <div class="date">
 925         25th July 2017
 926       </div>
 927       <div class="body">
 928         <p align="center"><img align="center" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-07-25-debian-handbook-nb-testprint.png"/></p>
 929
 930 <p>I finally received a copy of the Norwegian Bokmål edition of
 931 "<a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian Administrator's
 932 Handbook</a>".  This test copy arrived in the mail a few days ago, and
 933 I am very happy to hold the result in my hand.   We spent around one and a half year translating it. This paperbook edition
 934 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/#norwegian">is available
 935 from lulu.com</a>.  If you buy it quickly, you save 25% on the list
 936 price.  The book is also available for download in electronic form as
 937 PDF, EPUB and Mobipocket, as can be
 938 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/browse/nb-NO/stable/">read online
 939 as a web page</a>.</p>
 940
 941 <p>This is the second book I publish (the first was the book
 942 "<a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a>" by Lawrence Lessig
 943 in
 944 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22440520.html">English</a>,
 945 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/culture-libre/paperback/product-22645082.html">French</a>
 946 and
 947 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/fri-kultur/paperback/product-22441576.html">Norwegian
 948 Bokmål</a>), and I am very excited to finally wrap up this
 949 project.  I hope
 950 "<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
 951 for Debian-administratoren</a>" will be well received.</p>
 952
 953       </div>
 954       <div class="tags">
 955
 956
 957         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>.
 958
 959
 960       </div>
 961     </div>
 962     <div class="padding"></div>
 963
 964     <div class="entry">
 965       <div class="title">
 966         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/N_r_nynorskoversettelsen_svikter_til_eksamen___.html">Når nynorskoversettelsen svikter til eksamen...</a>
 967       </div>
 968       <div class="date">
 969          3rd June 2017
 970       </div>
 971       <div class="body">
 972         <p><a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/norge/Krever-at-elever-ma-fa-annullert-eksamen-etter-rot-med-oppgavetekster-622459b.html">Aftenposten
 973 melder i dag</a> om feil i eksamensoppgavene for eksamen i politikk og
 974 menneskerettigheter, der teksten i bokmåls og nynorskutgaven ikke var
 975 like.  Oppgaveteksten er gjengitt i artikkelen, og jeg ble nysgjerring
 976 på om den fri oversetterløsningen
 977 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium</a> ville gjort en bedre
 978 jobb enn Utdanningsdirektoratet.  Det kan se slik ut.</p>
 979
 980 <p>Her er bokmålsoppgaven fra eksamenen:</p>
 981
 982 <blockquote>
 983 <p>Drøft utfordringene knyttet til nasjonalstatenes og andre aktørers
 984 rolle og muligheter til å håndtere internasjonale utfordringer, som
 985 for eksempel flykningekrisen.</p>
 986
 987 <p>Vedlegge er eksempler på tekster som kan gi relevante perspektiver
 988 på temaet:</p>
 989 <ol>
 990 <li>Flykningeregnskapet 2016, UNHCR og IDMC
 991 <li>«Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015
 992 </ol>
 993
 994 </blockquote>
 995
 996 <p>Dette oversetter Apertium slik:</p>
 997
 998 <blockquote>
 999 <p>Drøft utfordringane knytte til nasjonalstatane sine og rolla til
1000 andre aktørar og høve til å handtera internasjonale utfordringar, som
1001 til dømes *flykningekrisen.</p>
1002
1003 <p>Vedleggja er døme på tekster som kan gje relevante perspektiv på
1004 temaet:</p>
1005
1006 <ol>
1007 <li>*Flykningeregnskapet 2016, *UNHCR og *IDMC</li>
1008 <li>«*Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015</li>
1009 </ol>
1010
1011 </blockquote>
1012
1013 <p>Ord som ikke ble forstått er markert med stjerne (*), og trenger
1014 ekstra språksjekk.  Men ingen ord er forsvunnet, slik det var i
1015 oppgaven elevene fikk presentert på eksamen.  Jeg mistenker dog at
1016 "andre aktørers rolle og muligheter til ..." burde vært oversatt til
1017 "rolla til andre aktørar og deira høve til ..." eller noe slikt, men
1018 det er kanskje flisespikking.  Det understreker vel bare at det alltid
1019 trengs korrekturlesning etter automatisk oversettelse.</p>
1020
1021       </div>
1022       <div class="tags">
1023
1024
1025         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>.
1026
1027
1028       </div>
1029     </div>
1030     <div class="padding"></div>
1031
1032     <div class="entry">
1033       <div class="title">
1034         <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>
1035       </div>
1036       <div class="date">
1037          9th March 2017
1038       </div>
1039       <div class="body">
1040         <p>Over the years, administrating thousand of NFS mounting linux
1041 computers at the time, I often needed a way to detect if the machine
1042 was experiencing NFS hang.  If you try to use <tt>df</tt> or look at a
1043 file or directory affected by the hang, the process (and possibly the
1044 shell) will hang too.  So you want to be able to detect this without
1045 risking the detection process getting stuck too.  It has not been
1046 obvious how to do this.  When the hang has lasted a while, it is
1047 possible to find messages like these in dmesg:</p>
1048
1049 <p><blockquote>
1050 nfs: server nfsserver not responding, still trying
1051 <br>nfs: server nfsserver OK
1052 </blockquote></p>
1053
1054 <p>It is hard to know if the hang is still going on, and it is hard to
1055 be sure looking in dmesg is going to work.  If there are lots of other
1056 messages in dmesg the lines might have rotated out of site before they
1057 are noticed.</p>
1058
1059 <p>While reading through the nfs client implementation in linux kernel
1060 code, I came across some statistics that seem to give a way to detect
1061 it.  The om_timeouts sunrpc value in the kernel will increase every
1062 time the above log entry is inserted into dmesg.  And after digging a
1063 bit further, I discovered that this value show up in
1064 /proc/self/mountstats on Linux.</p>
1065
1066 <p>The mountstats content seem to be shared between files using the
1067 same file system context, so it is enough to check one of the
1068 mountstats files to get the state of the mount point for the machine.
1069 I assume this will not show lazy umounted NFS points, nor NFS mount
1070 points in a different process context (ie with a different filesystem
1071 view), but that does not worry me.</p>
1072
1073 <p>The content for a NFS mount point look similar to this:</p>
1074
1075 <p><blockquote><pre>
1076 [...]
1077 device /dev/mapper/Debian-var mounted on /var with fstype ext3
1078 device nfsserver:/mnt/nfsserver/home0 mounted on /mnt/nfsserver/home0 with fstype nfs statvers=1.1
1079         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
1080         age:    7863311
1081         caps:   caps=0x3fe7,wtmult=4096,dtsize=8192,bsize=0,namlen=255
1082         sec:    flavor=1,pseudoflavor=1
1083         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
1084         bytes:  166253035039 219519120027 0 0 40783504807 185466229638 11677877 45561809
1085         RPC iostats version: 1.0  p/v: 100003/3 (nfs)
1086         xprt:   tcp 925 1 6810 0 0 111505412 111480497 109 2672418560317 0 248 53869103 22481820
1087         per-op statistics
1088                 NULL: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1089              GETATTR: 61063106 61063108 0 9621383060 6839064400 453650 77291321 78926132
1090              SETATTR: 463469 463470 0 92005440 66739536 63787 603235 687943
1091               LOOKUP: 17021657 17021657 0 3354097764 4013442928 57216 35125459 35566511
1092               ACCESS: 14281703 14290009 5 2318400592 1713803640 1709282 4865144 7130140
1093             READLINK: 125 125 0 20472 18620 0 1112 1118
1094                 READ: 4214236 4214237 0 715608524 41328653212 89884 22622768 22806693
1095                WRITE: 8479010 8494376 22 187695798568 1356087148 178264904 51506907 231671771
1096               CREATE: 171708 171708 0 38084748 46702272 873 1041833 1050398
1097                MKDIR: 3680 3680 0 773980 993920 26 23990 24245
1098              SYMLINK: 903 903 0 233428 245488 6 5865 5917
1099                MKNOD: 80 80 0 20148 21760 0 299 304
1100               REMOVE: 429921 429921 0 79796004 61908192 3313 2710416 2741636
1101                RMDIR: 3367 3367 0 645112 484848 22 5782 6002
1102               RENAME: 466201 466201 0 130026184 121212260 7075 5935207 5961288
1103                 LINK: 289155 289155 0 72775556 67083960 2199 2565060 2585579
1104              READDIR: 2933237 2933237 0 516506204 13973833412 10385 3190199 3297917
1105          READDIRPLUS: 1652839 1652839 0 298640972 6895997744 84735 14307895 14448937
1106               FSSTAT: 6144 6144 0 1010516 1032192 51 9654 10022
1107               FSINFO: 2 2 0 232 328 0 1 1
1108             PATHCONF: 1 1 0 116 140 0 0 0
1109               COMMIT: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1110
1111 device binfmt_misc mounted on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc with fstype binfmt_misc
1112 [...]
1113 </pre></blockquote></p>
1114
1115 <p>The key number to look at is the third number in the per-op list.
1116 It is the number of NFS timeouts experiences per file system
1117 operation.  Here 22 write timeouts and 5 access timeouts.  If these
1118 numbers are increasing, I believe the machine is experiencing NFS
1119 hang.  Unfortunately the timeout value do not start to increase right
1120 away.  The NFS operations need to time out first, and this can take a
1121 while.  The exact timeout value depend on the setup.  For example the
1122 defaults for TCP and UDP mount points are quite different, and the
1123 timeout value is affected by the soft, hard, timeo and retrans NFS
1124 mount options.</p>
1125
1126 <p>The only way I have been able to get working on Debian and RedHat
1127 Enterprise Linux for getting the timeout count is to peek in /proc/.
1128 But according to
1129 <ahref="http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19253-01/816-4555/netmonitor-12/index.html">Solaris
1130 10 System Administration Guide: Network Services</a>, the 'nfsstat -c'
1131 command can be used to get these timeout values.  But this do not work
1132 on Linux, as far as I can tell.  I
1133 <ahref="http://bugs.debian.org/857043">asked Debian about this</a>,
1134 but have not seen any replies yet.</p>
1135
1136 <p>Is there a better way to figure out if a Linux NFS client is
1137 experiencing NFS hangs?  Is there a way to detect which processes are
1138 affected?  Is there a way to get the NFS mount going quickly once the
1139 network problem causing the NFS hang has been cleared?  I would very
1140 much welcome some clues, as we regularly run into NFS hangs.</p>
1141
1142       </div>
1143       <div class="tags">
1144
1145
1146         Tags: <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>.
1147
1148
1149       </div>
1150     </div>
1151     <div class="padding"></div>
1152
1153     <div class="entry">
1154       <div class="title">
1155         <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>
1156       </div>
1157       <div class="date">
1158          3rd March 2017
1159       </div>
1160       <div class="body">
1161         <p>For almost a year now, we have been working on making a Norwegian
1162 Bokmål edition of <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian
1163 Administrator's Handbook</a>.  Now, thanks to the tireless effort of
1164 Ole-Erik, Ingrid and Andreas, the initial translation is complete, and
1165 we are working on the proof reading to ensure consistent language and
1166 use of correct computer science terms.  The plan is to make the book
1167 available on paper, as well as in electronic form.  For that to
1168 happen, the proof reading must be completed and all the figures need
1169 to be translated.  If you want to help out, get in touch.</p>
1170
1171 <p><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-handbook/debian-handbook-nb-NO.pdf">A
1172
1173 fresh PDF edition</a> in A4 format (the final book will have smaller
1174 pages) of the book created every morning is available for
1175 proofreading.  If you find any errors, please
1176 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">visit
1177 Weblate and correct the error</a>.  The
1178 <a href="http://l.github.io/debian-handbook/stat/nb-NO/index.html">state
1179 of the translation including figures</a> is a useful source for those
1180 provide Norwegian bokmål screen shots and figures.</p>
1181
1182       </div>
1183       <div class="tags">
1184
1185
1186         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>.
1187
1188
1189       </div>
1190     </div>
1191     <div class="padding"></div>
1192
1193     <div class="entry">
1194       <div class="title">
1195         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlimited_randomness_with_the_ChaosKey_.html">Unlimited randomness with the ChaosKey?</a>
1196       </div>
1197       <div class="date">
1198          1st March 2017
1199       </div>
1200       <div class="body">
1201         <p>A few days ago I ordered a small batch of
1202 <a href="http://altusmetrum.org/ChaosKey/">the ChaosKey</a>, a small
1203 USB dongle for generating entropy created by Bdale Garbee and Keith
1204 Packard.  Yesterday it arrived, and I am very happy to report that it
1205 work great!  According to its designers, to get it to work out of the
1206 box, you need the Linux kernel version 4.1 or later.  I tested on a
1207 Debian Stretch machine (kernel version 4.9), and there it worked just
1208 fine, increasing the available entropy very quickly.  I wrote a small
1209 test oneliner to test.  It first print the current entropy level,
1210 drain /dev/random, and then print the entropy level for five seconds.
1211 Here is the situation without the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
1212
1213 <blockquote><pre>
1214 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1215   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
1216   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
1217      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1218      sleep 1; \
1219   done
1220 300
1221 0+1 oppføringer inn
1222 0+1 oppføringer ut
1223 28 byte kopiert, 0,000264565 s, 106 kB/s
1224 4
1225 8
1226 12
1227 17
1228 21
1229 %
1230 </pre></blockquote>
1231
1232 <p>The entropy level increases by 3-4 every second.  In such case any
1233 application requiring random bits (like a HTTPS enabled web server)
1234 will halt and wait for more entrpy.  And here is the situation with
1235 the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
1236
1237 <blockquote><pre>
1238 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1239   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
1240   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
1241      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1242      sleep 1; \
1243   done
1244 1079
1245 0+1 oppføringer inn
1246 0+1 oppføringer ut
1247 104 byte kopiert, 0,000487647 s, 213 kB/s
1248 433
1249 1028
1250 1031
1251 1035
1252 1038
1253 %
1254 </pre></blockquote>
1255
1256 <p>Quite the difference. :) I bought a few more than I need, in case
1257 someone want to buy one here in Norway. :)</p>
1258
1259 <p>Update: The dongle was presented at Debconf last year.  You might
1260 find <a href="https://debconf16.debconf.org/talks/94/">the talk
1261 recording illuminating</a>.  It explains exactly what the source of
1262 randomness is, if you are unable to spot it from the schema drawing
1263 available from the ChaosKey web site linked at the start of this blog
1264 post.</p>
1265
1266       </div>
1267       <div class="tags">
1268
1269
1270         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1271
1272
1273       </div>
1274     </div>
1275     <div class="padding"></div>
1276
1277     <div class="entry">
1278       <div class="title">
1279         <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>
1280       </div>
1281       <div class="date">
1282          9th January 2017
1283       </div>
1284       <div class="body">
1285         <p>Did you ever wonder where the web trafic really flow to reach the
1286 web servers, and who own the network equipment it is flowing through?
1287 It is possible to get a glimpse of this from using traceroute, but it
1288 is hard to find all the details.  Many years ago, I wrote a system to
1289 map the Norwegian Internet (trying to figure out if our plans for a
1290 network game service would get low enough latency, and who we needed
1291 to talk to about setting up game servers close to the users.  Back
1292 then I used traceroute output from many locations (I asked my friends
1293 to run a script and send me their traceroute output) to create the
1294 graph and the map.  The output from traceroute typically look like
1295 this:
1296
1297 <p><pre>
1298 traceroute to www.stortinget.no (85.88.67.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
1299  1  uio-gw10.uio.no (129.240.202.1)  0.447 ms  0.486 ms  0.621 ms
1300  2  uio-gw8.uio.no (129.240.24.229)  0.467 ms  0.578 ms  0.675 ms
1301  3  oslo-gw1.uninett.no (128.39.65.17)  0.385 ms  0.373 ms  0.358 ms
1302  4  te3-1-2.br1.fn3.as2116.net (193.156.90.3)  1.174 ms  1.172 ms  1.153 ms
1303  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
1304  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
1305  7  89.191.10.146 (89.191.10.146)  0.931 ms  0.917 ms  0.955 ms
1306  8  * * *
1307  9  * * *
1308 [...]
1309 </pre></p>
1310
1311 <p>This show the DNS names and IP addresses of (at least some of the)
1312 network equipment involved in getting the data traffic from me to the
1313 www.stortinget.no server, and how long it took in milliseconds for a
1314 package to reach the equipment and return to me.  Three packages are
1315 sent, and some times the packages do not follow the same path.  This
1316 is shown for hop 5, where three different IP addresses replied to the
1317 traceroute request.</p>
1318
1319 <p>There are many ways to measure trace routes.  Other good traceroute
1320 implementations I use are traceroute (using ICMP packages) mtr (can do
1321 both ICMP, UDP and TCP) and scapy (python library with ICMP, UDP, TCP
1322 traceroute and a lot of other capabilities).  All of them are easily
1323 available in <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>.</p>
1324
1325 <p>This time around, I wanted to know the geographic location of
1326 different route points, to visualize how visiting a web page spread
1327 information about the visit to a lot of servers around the globe.  The
1328 background is that a web site today often will ask the browser to get
1329 from many servers the parts (for example HTML, JSON, fonts,
1330 JavaScript, CSS, video) required to display the content.  This will
1331 leak information about the visit to those controlling these servers
1332 and anyone able to peek at the data traffic passing by (like your ISP,
1333 the ISPs backbone provider, FRA, GCHQ, NSA and others).</p>
1334
1335 <p>Lets pick an example, the Norwegian parliament web site
1336 www.stortinget.no.  It is read daily by all members of parliament and
1337 their staff, as well as political journalists, activits and many other
1338 citizens of Norway.  A visit to the www.stortinget.no web site will
1339 ask your browser to contact 8 other servers: ajax.googleapis.com,
1340 insights.hotjar.com, script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com,
1341 stats.g.doubleclick.net, www.google-analytics.com,
1342 www.googletagmanager.com and www.netigate.se.  I extracted this by
1343 asking <a href="http://phantomjs.org/">PhantomJS</a> to visit the
1344 Stortinget web page and tell me all the URLs PhantomJS downloaded to
1345 render the page (in HAR format using
1346 <a href="https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/blob/master/examples/netsniff.js">their
1347 netsniff example</a>.  I am very grateful to Gorm for showing me how
1348 to do this).  My goal is to visualize network traces to all IP
1349 addresses behind these DNS names, do show where visitors personal
1350 information is spread when visiting the page.</p>
1351
1352 <p align="center"><a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml"><img
1353 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>
1354
1355 <p>When I had a look around for options, I could not find any good
1356 free software tools to do this, and decided I needed my own traceroute
1357 wrapper outputting KML based on locations looked up using GeoIP.  KML
1358 is easy to work with and easy to generate, and understood by several
1359 of the GIS tools I have available.  I got good help from by NUUG
1360 colleague Anders Einar with this, and the result can be seen in
1361 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/kmltraceroute">my
1362 kmltraceroute git repository</a>.  Unfortunately, the quality of the
1363 free GeoIP databases I could find (and the for-pay databases my
1364 friends had access to) is not up to the task.  The IP addresses of
1365 central Internet infrastructure would typically be placed near the
1366 controlling companies main office, and not where the router is really
1367 located, as you can see from <a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml">the
1368 KML file I created</a> using the GeoLite City dataset from MaxMind.
1369
1370 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg"><img
1371 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>
1372
1373 <p>I also had a look at the visual traceroute graph created by
1374 <a href="http://www.secdev.org/projects/scapy/">the scrapy project</a>,
1375 showing IP network ownership (aka AS owner) for the IP address in
1376 question.
1377 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg">The
1378 graph display a lot of useful information about the traceroute in SVG
1379 format</a>, and give a good indication on who control the network
1380 equipment involved, but it do not include geolocation.  This graph
1381 make it possible to see the information is made available at least for
1382 UNINETT, Catchcom, Stortinget, Nordunet, Google, Amazon, Telia, Level
1383 3 Communications and NetDNA.</p>
1384
1385 <p align="center"><a href="https://geotraceroute.com/index.php?node=4&host=www.stortinget.no"><img
1386 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>
1387
1388 <p>In the process, I came across the
1389 <a href="https://geotraceroute.com/">web service GeoTraceroute</a> by
1390 Salim Gasmi.  Its methology of combining guesses based on DNS names,
1391 various location databases and finally use latecy times to rule out
1392 candidate locations seemed to do a very good job of guessing correct
1393 geolocation.  But it could only do one trace at the time, did not have
1394 a sensor in Norway and did not make the geolocations easily available
1395 for postprocessing.  So I contacted the developer and asked if he
1396 would be willing to share the code (he refused until he had time to
1397 clean it up), but he was interested in providing the geolocations in a
1398 machine readable format, and willing to set up a sensor in Norway.  So
1399 since yesterday, it is possible to run traces from Norway in this
1400 service thanks to a sensor node set up by
1401 <a href="https://www.nuug.no/">the NUUG assosiation</a>, and get the
1402 trace in KML format for further processing.</p>
1403
1404 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.kml"><img
1405 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>
1406
1407 <p>Here we can see a lot of trafic passes Sweden on its way to
1408 Denmark, Germany, Holland and Ireland.  Plenty of places where the
1409 Snowden confirmations verified the traffic is read by various actors
1410 without your best interest as their top priority.</p>
1411
1412 <p>Combining KML files is trivial using a text editor, so I could loop
1413 over all the hosts behind the urls imported by www.stortinget.no and
1414 ask for the KML file from GeoTraceroute, and create a combined KML
1415 file with all the traces (unfortunately only one of the IP addresses
1416 behind the DNS name is traced this time.  To get them all, one would
1417 have to request traces using IP number instead of DNS names from
1418 GeoTraceroute).  That might be the next step in this project.</p>
1419
1420 <p>Armed with these tools, I find it a lot easier to figure out where
1421 the IP traffic moves and who control the boxes involved in moving it.
1422 And every time the link crosses for example the Swedish border, we can
1423 be sure Swedish Signal Intelligence (FRA) is listening, as GCHQ do in
1424 Britain and NSA in USA and cables around the globe.  (Hm, what should
1425 we tell them? :) Keep that in mind if you ever send anything
1426 unencrypted over the Internet.</p>
1427
1428 <p>PS: KML files are drawn using
1429 <a href="http://ivanrublev.me/kml/">the KML viewer from Ivan
1430 Rublev<a/>, as it was less cluttered than the local Linux application
1431 Marble.  There are heaps of other options too.</p>
1432
1433 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1434 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1435 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</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/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>.
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/Appstream_just_learned_how_to_map_hardware_to_packages_too_.html">Appstream just learned how to map hardware to packages too!</a>
1451       </div>
1452       <div class="date">
1453         23rd December 2016
1454       </div>
1455       <div class="body">
1456         <p>I received a very nice Christmas present today.  As my regular
1457 readers probably know, I have been working on the
1458 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the Isenkram
1459 system</a> for many years.  The goal of the Isenkram system is to make
1460 it easier for users to figure out what to install to get a given piece
1461 of hardware to work in Debian, and a key part of this system is a way
1462 to map hardware to packages.  Isenkram have its own mapping database,
1463 and also uses data provided by each package using the AppStream
1464 metadata format.  And today,
1465 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/appstream">AppStream</a> in
1466 Debian learned to look up hardware the same way Isenkram is doing it,
1467 ie using fnmatch():</p>
1468
1469 <p><pre>
1470 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias \
1471   usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
1472 Identifier: pymissile [generic]
1473 Name: pymissile
1474 Summary: Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher
1475 Package: pymissile
1476 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias usb:v0694p0002d0000
1477 Identifier: libnxt [generic]
1478 Name: libnxt
1479 Summary: utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NXT brick
1480 Package: libnxt
1481 ---
1482 Identifier: t2n [generic]
1483 Name: t2n
1484 Summary: Simple command-line tool for Lego NXT
1485 Package: t2n
1486 ---
1487 Identifier: python-nxt [generic]
1488 Name: python-nxt
1489 Summary: Python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot
1490 Package: python-nxt
1491 ---
1492 Identifier: nbc [generic]
1493 Name: nbc
1494 Summary: C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks
1495 Package: nbc
1496 %
1497 </pre></p>
1498
1499 <p>A similar query can be done using the combined AppStream and
1500 Isenkram databases using the isenkram-lookup tool:</p>
1501
1502 <p><pre>
1503 % isenkram-lookup usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
1504 pymissile
1505 % isenkram-lookup usb:v0694p0002d0000
1506 libnxt
1507 nbc
1508 python-nxt
1509 t2n
1510 %
1511 </pre></p>
1512
1513 <p>You can find modalias values relevant for your machine using
1514 <tt>cat $(find /sys/devices/ -name modalias)</tt>.
1515
1516 <p>If you want to make this system a success and help Debian users
1517 make the most of the hardware they have, please
1518 help<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add
1519 AppStream metadata for your package following the guidelines</a>
1520 documented in the wiki.  So far only 11 packages provide such
1521 information, among the several hundred hardware specific packages in
1522 Debian. The Isenkram database on the other hand contain 101 packages,
1523 mostly related to USB dongles.  Most of the packages with hardware
1524 mapping in AppStream are LEGO Mindstorms related, because I have, as
1525 part of my involvement in
1526 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the Debian LEGO
1527 team</a> given priority to making sure LEGO users get proposed the
1528 complete set of packages in Debian for that particular hardware.  The
1529 team also got a nice Christmas present today.  The
1530 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/nxt-firmware">nxt-firmware
1531 package</a> made it into Debian.  With this package in place, it is
1532 now possible to use the LEGO Mindstorms NXT unit with only free
1533 software, as the nxt-firmware package contain the source and firmware
1534 binaries for the NXT brick.</p>
1535
1536 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1537 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1538 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1539
1540       </div>
1541       <div class="tags">
1542
1543
1544         Tags: <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>.
1545
1546
1547       </div>
1548     </div>
1549     <div class="padding"></div>
1550
1551     <div class="entry">
1552       <div class="title">
1553         <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>
1554       </div>
1555       <div class="date">
1556         20th December 2016
1557       </div>
1558       <div class="body">
1559         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
1560 system</a> I wrote two years ago to make it easier in Debian to find
1561 and install packages to get your hardware dongles to work, is still
1562 going strong.  It is a system to look up the hardware present on or
1563 connected to the current system, and map the hardware to Debian
1564 packages.  It can either be done using the tools in isenkram-cli or
1565 using the user space daemon in the isenkram package.  The latter will
1566 notify you, when inserting new hardware, about what packages to
1567 install to get the dongle working.  It will even provide a button to
1568 click on to ask packagekit to install the packages.</p>
1569
1570 <p>Here is an command line example from my Thinkpad laptop:</p>
1571
1572 <p><pre>
1573 % isenkram-lookup
1574 bluez
1575 cheese
1576 ethtool
1577 fprintd
1578 fprintd-demo
1579 gkrellm-thinkbat
1580 hdapsd
1581 libpam-fprintd
1582 pidgin-blinklight
1583 thinkfan
1584 tlp
1585 tp-smapi-dkms
1586 tp-smapi-source
1587 tpb
1588 %
1589 </pre></p>
1590
1591 <p>It can also list the firware package providing firmware requested
1592 by the load kernel modules, which in my case is an empty list because
1593 I have all the firmware my machine need:
1594
1595 <p><pre>
1596 % /usr/sbin/isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
1597 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
1598 %
1599 </pre></p>
1600
1601 <p>The last few days I had a look at several of the around 250
1602 packages in Debian with udev rules.  These seem like good candidates
1603 to install when a given hardware dongle is inserted, and I found
1604 several that should be proposed by isenkram.  I have not had time to
1605 check all of them, but am happy to report that now there are 97
1606 packages packages mapped to hardware by Isenkram.  11 of these
1607 packages provide hardware mapping using AppStream, while the rest are
1608 listed in the modaliases file provided in isenkram.</p>
1609
1610 <p>These are the packages with hardware mappings at the moment.  The
1611 <strong>marked packages</strong> are also announcing their hardware
1612 support using AppStream, for everyone to use:</p>
1613
1614 <p>air-quality-sensor, alsa-firmware-loaders, argyll,
1615 <strong>array-info</strong>, avarice, avrdude, b43-fwcutter,
1616 bit-babbler, bluez, bluez-firmware, <strong>brltty</strong>,
1617 <strong>broadcom-sta-dkms</strong>, calibre, cgminer, cheese, colord,
1618 <strong>colorhug-client</strong>, dahdi-firmware-nonfree, dahdi-linux,
1619 dfu-util, dolphin-emu, ekeyd, ethtool, firmware-ipw2x00, fprintd,
1620 fprintd-demo, <strong>galileo</strong>, gkrellm-thinkbat, gphoto2,
1621 gpsbabel, gpsbabel-gui, gpsman, gpstrans, gqrx-sdr, gr-fcdproplus,
1622 gr-osmosdr, gtkpod, hackrf, hdapsd, hdmi2usb-udev, hpijs-ppds, hplip,
1623 ipw3945-source, ipw3945d, kde-config-tablet, kinect-audio-setup,
1624 <strong>libnxt</strong>, libpam-fprintd, <strong>lomoco</strong>,
1625 madwimax, minidisc-utils, mkgmap, msi-keyboard, mtkbabel,
1626 <strong>nbc</strong>, <strong>nqc</strong>, nut-hal-drivers, ola,
1627 open-vm-toolbox, open-vm-tools, openambit, pcgminer, pcmciautils,
1628 pcscd, pidgin-blinklight, printer-driver-splix,
1629 <strong>pymissile</strong>, python-nxt, qlandkartegt,
1630 qlandkartegt-garmin, rosegarden, rt2x00-source, sispmctl,
1631 soapysdr-module-hackrf, solaar, squeak-plugins-scratch, sunxi-tools,
1632 <strong>t2n</strong>, thinkfan, thinkfinger-tools, tlp, tp-smapi-dkms,
1633 tp-smapi-source, tpb, tucnak, uhd-host, usbmuxd, viking,
1634 virtualbox-ose-guest-x11, w1retap, xawtv, xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse,
1635 xserver-xorg-input-wacom, xserver-xorg-video-qxl,
1636 xserver-xorg-video-vmware, yubikey-personalization and
1637 zd1211-firmware</p>
1638
1639 <p>If you know of other packages, please let me know with a wishlist
1640 bug report against the isenkram-cli package, and ask the package
1641 maintainer to
1642 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add AppStream
1643 metadata according to the guidelines</a> to provide the information
1644 for everyone.  In time, I hope to get rid of the isenkram specific
1645 hardware mapping and depend exclusively on AppStream.</p>
1646
1647 <p>Note, the AppStream metadata for broadcom-sta-dkms is matching too
1648 much hardware, and suggest that the package with with any ethernet
1649 card.  See <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/838735">bug #838735</a> for
1650 the details.  I hope the maintainer find time to address it soon.  In
1651 the mean time I provide an override in isenkram.</p>
1652
1653       </div>
1654       <div class="tags">
1655
1656
1657         Tags: <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>.
1658
1659
1660       </div>
1661     </div>
1662     <div class="padding"></div>
1663
1664     <div class="entry">
1665       <div class="title">
1666         <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>
1667       </div>
1668       <div class="date">
1669         11th December 2016
1670       </div>
1671       <div class="body">
1672         <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-12-11-nice-oolite.png"/></p>
1673
1674 <p>In my early years, I played
1675 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Classic_Elite">the epic game
1676 Elite</a> on my PC.  I spent many months trading and fighting in
1677 space, and reached the 'elite' fighting status before I moved on.  The
1678 original Elite game was available on Commodore 64 and the IBM PC
1679 edition I played had a 64 KB executable.  I am still impressed today
1680 that the authors managed to squeeze both a 3D engine and details about
1681 more than 2000 planet systems across 7 galaxies into a binary so
1682 small.</p>
1683
1684 <p>I have known about <a href="http://www.oolite.org/">the free
1685 software game Oolite inspired by Elite</a> for a while, but did not
1686 really have time to test it properly until a few days ago.  It was
1687 great to discover that my old knowledge about trading routes were
1688 still valid.  But my fighting and flying abilities were gone, so I had
1689 to retrain to be able to dock on a space station.  And I am still not
1690 able to make much resistance when I am attacked by pirates, so I
1691 bougth and mounted the most powerful laser in the rear to be able to
1692 put up at least some resistance while fleeing for my life. :)</p>
1693
1694 <p>When playing Elite in the late eighties, I had to discover
1695 everything on my own, and I had long lists of prices seen on different
1696 planets to be able to decide where to trade what.  This time I had the
1697 advantages of the
1698 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Main_Page">Elite wiki</a>,
1699 where information about each planet is easily available with common
1700 price ranges and suggested trading routes.  This improved my ability
1701 to earn money and I have been able to earn enough to buy a lot of
1702 useful equipent in a few days.  I believe I originally played for
1703 months before I could get a docking computer, while now I could get it
1704 after less then a week.</p>
1705
1706 <p>If you like science fiction and dreamed of a life as a vagabond in
1707 space, you should try out Oolite.  It is available for Linux, MacOSX
1708 and Windows, and is included in Debian and derivatives since 2011.</p>
1709
1710 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1711 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1712 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1713
1714       </div>
1715       <div class="tags">
1716
1717
1718         Tags: <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>.
1719
1720
1721       </div>
1722     </div>
1723     <div class="padding"></div>
1724
1725     <div class="entry">
1726       <div class="title">
1727         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Quicker_Debian_installations_using_eatmydata.html">Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</a>
1728       </div>
1729       <div class="date">
1730         25th November 2016
1731       </div>
1732       <div class="body">
1733         <p>Two years ago, I did some experiments with eatmydata and the Debian
1734 installation system, observing how using
1735 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">eatmydata
1736 could speed up the installation</a> quite a bit.  My testing measured
1737 speedup around 20-40 percent for Debian Edu, where we install around
1738 1000 packages from within the installer.  The eatmydata package
1739 provide a way to disable/delay file system flushing.  This is a bit
1740 risky in the general case, as files that should be stored on disk will
1741 stay only in memory a bit longer than expected, causing problems if a
1742 machine crashes at an inconvenient time.  But for an installation, if
1743 the machine crashes during installation the process is normally
1744 restarted, and avoiding disk operations as much as possible to speed
1745 up the process make perfect sense.
1746
1747 <p>I added code in the Debian Edu specific installation code to enable
1748 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libeatmydata">eatmydata</a>,
1749 but did not have time to push it any further.  But a few months ago I
1750 picked it up again and worked with the libeatmydata package maintainer
1751 Mattia Rizzolo to make it easier for everyone to get this installation
1752 speedup in Debian.  Thanks to our cooperation There is now an
1753 eatmydata-udeb package in Debian testing and unstable, and simply
1754 enabling/installing it in debian-installer (d-i) is enough to get the
1755 quicker installations.  It can be enabled using preseeding.  The
1756 following untested kernel argument should do the trick:</p>
1757
1758 <blockquote><pre>
1759 preseed/early_command="anna-install eatmydata-udeb"
1760 </pre></blockquote>
1761
1762 <p>This should ask d-i to install the package inside the d-i
1763 environment early in the installation sequence.  Having it installed
1764 in d-i in turn will make sure the relevant scripts are called just
1765 after debootstrap filled /target/ with the freshly installed Debian
1766 system to configure apt to run dpkg with eatmydata.  This is enough to
1767 speed up the installation process.  There is a proposal to
1768 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/841153">extend the idea a bit further
1769 by using /etc/ld.so.preload instead of apt.conf</a>, but I have not
1770 tested its impact.</p>
1771
1772
1773       </div>
1774       <div class="tags">
1775
1776
1777         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>.
1778
1779
1780       </div>
1781     </div>
1782     <div class="padding"></div>
1783
1784     <div class="entry">
1785       <div class="title">
1786         <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>
1787       </div>
1788       <div class="date">
1789         24th November 2016
1790       </div>
1791       <div class="body">
1792         <p>I Norge er det mange som trenger å skrive både bokmål og nynorsk.
1793 Eksamensoppgaver, offentlige brev og nyheter er eksempler på tekster
1794 der det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skoleoppgavene som
1795 elever over det ganske land skal levere inn hvert år.  Det mange ikke
1796 vet er at selv om de kommersielle alternativene
1797 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google Translate</a> og
1798 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing Translator</a> ikke kan
1799 bidra med å oversette mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finnes det et
1800 utmerket fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Oversetterverktøyet
1801 Apertium har støtte for en rekke språkkombinasjoner, og takket være
1802 den utrettelige innsatsen til blant annet Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
1803 en bruke webtjenesten til å fylle inn en tekst på bokmål eller
1804 nynorsk, og få den automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
1805 Resultatet er ikke perfekt, men et svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og til
1806 er resultatet så bra at det kan benyttes uten endringer.  Jeg vet
1807 f.eks. at store deler av Joomla ble oversatt til nynorsk ved hjelp
1808 Apertium.  Høres det ut som noe du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så fall
1809 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
1810 teksten din i webskjemaet der.
1811
1812 <p>Hvis du trenger maskinell tilgang til den bakenforliggende
1813 teknologien kan du enten installere pakken
1814 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">apertium-nno-nob</a>
1815 på en Debian-maskin eller bruke web-API-et tilgjengelig fra
1816 api.apertium.org.  Se
1817 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">API-dokumentasjonen</a>
1818 for detaljer om web-API-et.  Her kan du se hvordan resultatet blir for
1819 denne teksten som ble skrevet på bokmål over maskinoversatt til
1820 nynorsk.</p>
1821
1822 <hr/>
1823
1824 <p>I Noreg er det mange som treng å skriva både bokmål og nynorsk.
1825 Eksamensoppgåver, offentlege brev og nyhende er døme på tekster der
1826 det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skuleoppgåvene som
1827 elevar over det ganske land skal levera inn kvart år.  Det mange ikkje
1828 veit er at sjølv om dei kommersielle alternativa
1829 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google *Translate</a> og
1830 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing *Translator</a> ikkje
1831 kan bidra med å omsetja mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finst det eit
1832 utmerka fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Omsetjarverktøyet
1833 *Apertium har støtte for ei rekkje språkkombinasjonar, og takka vera
1834 den utrøyttelege innsatsen til blant anna Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
1835 ein bruka *webtjenesten til å fylla inn ei tekst på bokmål eller
1836 nynorsk, og få den *automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
1837 Resultatet er ikkje perfekt, men eit svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og
1838 til er resultatet så bra at det kan nyttast utan endringar.  Eg veit
1839 t.d. at store delar av *Joomla vart omsett til nynorsk ved hjelp
1840 *Apertium.  Høyrast det ut som noko du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så
1841 fall <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">*Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
1842 teksta di i *webskjemaet der.
1843
1844 <p>Viss du treng *maskinell tilgjenge til den *bakenforliggende
1845 teknologien kan du anten installera pakken
1846 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">*apertium-*nno-*nob</a>
1847 på ein *Debian-maskin eller bruka *web-*API-eit tilgjengeleg frå
1848 *api.*apertium.org.  Sjå
1849 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">*API-dokumentasjonen</a>
1850 for detaljar om *web-*API-eit.  Her kan du sjå korleis resultatet vert
1851 for denne teksta som vart skreva på bokmål over *maskinoversatt til
1852 nynorsk.</p>
1853
1854       </div>
1855       <div class="tags">
1856
1857
1858         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>.
1859
1860
1861       </div>
1862     </div>
1863     <div class="padding"></div>
1864
1865     <div class="entry">
1866       <div class="title">
1867         <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>
1868       </div>
1869       <div class="date">
1870         13th November 2016
1871       </div>
1872       <div class="body">
1873         <p><a href="http://coz-profiler.org/">The Coz profiler</a>, a nice
1874 profiler able to run benchmarking experiments on the instrumented
1875 multi-threaded program, finally
1876 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/coz-profiler">made it into
1877 Debian unstable yesterday</A>.  Lluís Vilanova and I have spent many
1878 months since
1879 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">I
1880 blogged about the coz tool</a> in August working with upstream to make
1881 it suitable for Debian.  There are still issues with clang
1882 compatibility, inline assembly only working x86 and minimized
1883 JavaScript libraries.</p>
1884
1885 <p>To test it, install 'coz-profiler' using apt and run it like this:</p>
1886
1887 <p><blockquote>
1888 <tt>coz run --- /path/to/binary-with-debug-info</tt>
1889 </blockquote></p>
1890
1891 <p>This will produce a profile.coz file in the current working
1892 directory with the profiling information.  This is then given to a
1893 JavaScript application provided in the package and available from
1894 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">a project web page</a>.
1895 To start the local copy, invoke it in a browser like this:</p>
1896
1897 <p><blockquote>
1898 <tt>sensible-browser /usr/share/coz-profiler/viewer/index.htm</tt>
1899 </blockquote></p>
1900
1901 <p>See the project home page and the
1902 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">USENIX
1903 ;login: article on Coz</a> for more information on how it is
1904 working.</p>
1905
1906       </div>
1907       <div class="tags">
1908
1909
1910         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1911
1912
1913       </div>
1914     </div>
1915     <div class="padding"></div>
1916
1917     <div class="entry">
1918       <div class="title">
1919         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_own_self_balancing_Lego_Segway.html">My own self balancing Lego Segway</a>
1920       </div>
1921       <div class="date">
1922          4th November 2016
1923       </div>
1924       <div class="body">
1925         <p>A while back I received a Gyro sensor for the NXT
1926 <a href="mindstorms.lego.com">Mindstorms</a> controller as a birthday
1927 present.  It had been on my wishlist for a while, because I wanted to
1928 build a Segway like balancing lego robot.  I had already built
1929 <a href="http://www.nxtprograms.com/NXT2/segway/">a simple balancing
1930 robot</a> with the kids, using the light/color sensor included in the
1931 NXT kit as the balance sensor, but it was not working very well.  It
1932 could balance for a while, but was very sensitive to the light
1933 condition in the room and the reflective properties of the surface and
1934 would fall over after a short while.  I wanted something more robust,
1935 and had
1936 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=NGY1044">the
1937 gyro sensor from HiTechnic</a> I believed would solve it on my
1938 wishlist for some years before it suddenly showed up as a gift from my
1939 loved ones. :)</p>
1940
1941 <p>Unfortunately I have not had time to sit down and play with it
1942 since then.  But that changed some days ago, when I was searching for
1943 lego segway information and came across a recipe from HiTechnic for
1944 building
1945 <a href="http://www.hitechnic.com/blog/gyro-sensor/htway/">the
1946 HTWay</a>, a segway like balancing robot.  Build instructions and
1947 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/upload/786-HTWayC.nxc">source
1948 code</a> was included, so it was just a question of putting it all
1949 together.  And thanks to the great work of many Debian developers, the
1950 compiler needed to build the source for the NXT is already included in
1951 Debian, so I was read to go in less than an hour.  The resulting robot
1952 do not look very impressive in its simplicity:</p>
1953
1954 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-robot.jpeg"></p>
1955
1956 <p>Because I lack the infrared sensor used to control the robot in the
1957 design from HiTechnic, I had to comment out the last task
1958 (taskControl).  I simply placed /* and */ around it get the program
1959 working without that sensor present.  Now it balances just fine until
1960 the battery status run low:</p>
1961
1962 <p align="center"><video width="70%" controls="true">
1963    <source src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-balancing.ogv" type="video/ogg">
1964 </video></p>
1965
1966 <p>Now we would like to teach it how to follow a line and take remote
1967 control instructions using the included Bluetooth receiver in the NXT.</p>
1968
1969 <p>If you, like me, love LEGO and want to make sure we find the tools
1970 they need to work with LEGO in Debian and all our derivative
1971 distributions like Ubuntu, check out
1972 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the LEGO designers
1973 project page</a> and join the Debian LEGO team.  Personally I own a
1974 RCX and NXT controller (no EV3), and would like to make sure the
1975 Debian tools needed to program the systems I own work as they
1976 should.</p>
1977
1978       </div>
1979       <div class="tags">
1980
1981
1982         Tags: <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>.
1983
1984
1985       </div>
1986     </div>
1987     <div class="padding"></div>
1988
1989     <div class="entry">
1990       <div class="title">
1991         <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>
1992       </div>
1993       <div class="date">
1994         10th October 2016
1995       </div>
1996       <div class="body">
1997         <p>In July
1998 <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
1999 wrote how to get the Signal Chrome/Chromium app working</a> without
2000 the ability to receive SMS messages (aka without a cell phone).  It is
2001 time to share some experiences and provide an updated setup.</p>
2002
2003 <p>The Signal app have worked fine for several months now, and I use
2004 it regularly to chat with my loved ones.  I had a major snag at the
2005 end of my summer vacation, when the the app completely forgot my
2006 setup, identity and keys.  The reason behind this major mess was
2007 running out of disk space.  To avoid that ever happening again I have
2008 started storing everything in <tt>userdata/</tt> in git, to be able to
2009 roll back to an earlier version if the files are wiped by mistake.  I
2010 had to use it once after introducing the git backup.  When rolling
2011 back to an earlier version, one need to use the 'reset session' option
2012 in Signal to get going, and notify the people you talk with about the
2013 problem.  I assume there is some sequence number tracking in the
2014 protocol to detect rollback attacks.  The git repository is rather big
2015 (674 MiB so far), but I have not tried to figure out if some of the
2016 content can be added to a .gitignore file due to lack of spare
2017 time.</p>
2018
2019 <p>I've also hit the 90 days timeout blocking, and noticed that this
2020 make it impossible to send messages using Signal.  I could still
2021 receive them, but had to patch the code with a new timestamp to send.
2022 I believe the timeout is added by the developers to force people to
2023 upgrade to the latest version of the app, even when there is no
2024 protocol changes, to reduce the version skew among the user base and
2025 thus try to keep the number of support requests down.</p>
2026
2027 <p>Since my original recipe, the Signal source code changed slightly,
2028 making the old patch fail to apply cleanly.  Below is an updated
2029 patch, including the shell wrapper I use to start Signal.  The
2030 original version required a new user to locate the JavaScript console
2031 and call a function from there.  I got help from a friend with more
2032 JavaScript knowledge than me to modify the code to provide a GUI
2033 button instead.  This mean that to get started you just need to run
2034 the wrapper and click the 'Register without mobile phone' to get going
2035 now.  I've also modified the timeout code to always set it to 90 days
2036 in the future, to avoid having to patch the code regularly.</p>
2037
2038 <p>So, the updated recipe for Debian Jessie:</p>
2039
2040 <ol>
2041
2042 <li>First, install required packages to get the source code and the
2043 browser you need.  Signal only work with Chrome/Chromium, as far as I
2044 know, so you need to install it.
2045
2046 <pre>
2047 apt install git tor chromium
2048 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
2049 </pre></li>
2050
2051 <li>Modify the source code using command listed in the the patch
2052 block below.</li>
2053
2054 <li>Start Signal using the run-signal-app wrapper (for example using
2055 <tt>`pwd`/run-signal-app</tt>).
2056
2057 <li>Click on the 'Register without mobile phone', will in a phone
2058 number you can receive calls to the next minute, receive the
2059 verification code and enter it into the form field and press
2060 'Register'.  Note, the phone number you use will be user Signal
2061 username, ie the way others can find you on Signal.</li>
2062
2063 <li>You can now use Signal to contact others.  Note, new contacts do
2064 not show up in the contact list until you restart Signal, and there is
2065 no way to assign names to Contacts.  There is also no way to create or
2066 update chat groups.  I suspect this is because the web app do not have
2067 a associated contact database.</li>
2068
2069 </ol>
2070
2071 <p>I am still a bit uneasy about using Signal, because of the way its
2072 main author moxie0 reject federation and accept dependencies to major
2073 corporations like Google (part of the code is fetched from Google) and
2074 Amazon (the central coordination point is owned by Amazon).  See for
2075 example
2076 <a href="https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37">the
2077 LibreSignal issue tracker</a> for a thread documenting the authors
2078 view on these issues.  But the network effect is strong in this case,
2079 and several of the people I want to communicate with already use
2080 Signal.  Perhaps we can all move to <a href="https://ring.cx/">Ring</a>
2081 once it <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/830265">work on my
2082 laptop</a>?  It already work on Windows and Android, and is included
2083 in <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/ring">Debian</a> and
2084 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ring">Ubuntu</a>, but not
2085 working on Debian Stable.</p>
2086
2087 <p>Anyway, this is the patch I apply to the Signal code to get it
2088 working.  It switch to the production servers, disable to timeout,
2089 make registration easier and add the shell wrapper:</p>
2090
2091 <pre>
2092 cd Signal-Desktop; cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p1
2093 diff --git a/js/background.js b/js/background.js
2094 index 24b4c1d..579345f 100644
2095 --- a/js/background.js
2096 +++ b/js/background.js
2097 @@ -33,9 +33,9 @@
2098          });
2099      });
2100
2101 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
2102 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org';
2103      var SERVER_PORTS = [80, 4433, 8443];
2104 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
2105 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
2106      var messageReceiver;
2107      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
2108          if (messageReceiver) {
2109 diff --git a/js/expire.js b/js/expire.js
2110 index 639aeae..beb91c3 100644
2111 --- a/js/expire.js
2112 +++ b/js/expire.js
2113 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
2114  ;(function() {
2115      'use strict';
2116 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
2117 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = Date.now() + (90 * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
2118
2119      window.extension = window.extension || {};
2120
2121 diff --git a/js/views/install_view.js b/js/views/install_view.js
2122 index 7816f4f..1d6233b 100644
2123 --- a/js/views/install_view.js
2124 +++ b/js/views/install_view.js
2125 @@ -38,7 +38,8 @@
2126              return {
2127                  'click .step1': this.selectStep.bind(this, 1),
2128                  'click .step2': this.selectStep.bind(this, 2),
2129 -                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3)
2130 +                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3),
2131 +                'click .callreg': function() { extension.install('standalone') },
2132              };
2133          },
2134          clearQR: function() {
2135 diff --git a/options.html b/options.html
2136 index dc0f28e..8d709f6 100644
2137 --- a/options.html
2138 +++ b/options.html
2139 @@ -14,7 +14,10 @@
2140          &lt;div class='nav'>
2141            &lt;h1>{{ installWelcome }}&lt;/h1>
2142            &lt;p>{{ installTagline }}&lt;/p>
2143 -          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a> &lt;/div>
2144 +          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a>
2145 +           &lt;br> &lt;a class="button callreg">Register without mobile phone&lt;/a>
2146 +
2147 +         &lt;/div>
2148            &lt;span class='dot step1 selected'>&lt;/span>
2149            &lt;span class='dot step2'>&lt;/span>
2150            &lt;span class='dot step3'>&lt;/span>
2151 --- /dev/null   2016-10-07 09:55:13.730181472 +0200
2152 +++ b/run-signal-app   2016-10-10 08:54:09.434172391 +0200
2153 @@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
2154 +#!/bin/sh
2155 +set -e
2156 +cd $(dirname $0)
2157 +mkdir -p userdata
2158 +userdata="`pwd`/userdata"
2159 +if [ -d "$userdata" ] && [ ! -d "$userdata/.git" ] ; then
2160 +    (cd $userdata && git init)
2161 +fi
2162 +(cd $userdata && git add . && git commit -m "Current status." || true)
2163 +exec chromium \
2164 +  --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
2165 +  --user-data-dir=$userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
2166 EOF
2167 chmod a+rx run-signal-app
2168 </pre>
2169
2170 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2171 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2172 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2173
2174       </div>
2175       <div class="tags">
2176
2177
2178         Tags: <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>.
2179
2180
2181       </div>
2182     </div>
2183     <div class="padding"></div>
2184
2185     <div class="entry">
2186       <div class="title">
2187         <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>
2188       </div>
2189       <div class="date">
2190          7th October 2016
2191       </div>
2192       <div class="body">
2193         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
2194 system</a> provide a practical and easy way to figure out which
2195 packages support the hardware in a given machine.  The command line
2196 tool <tt>isenkram-lookup</tt> and the tasksel options provide a
2197 convenient way to list and install packages relevant for the current
2198 hardware during system installation, both user space packages and
2199 firmware packages. The GUI background daemon on the other hand provide
2200 a pop-up proposing to install packages when a new dongle is inserted
2201 while using the computer.  For example, if you plug in a smart card
2202 reader, the system will ask if you want to install <tt>pcscd</tt> if
2203 that package isn't already installed, and if you plug in a USB video
2204 camera the system will ask if you want to install <tt>cheese</tt> if
2205 cheese is currently missing.  This already work just fine.</p>
2206
2207 <p>But Isenkram depend on a database mapping from hardware IDs to
2208 package names.  When I started no such database existed in Debian, so
2209 I made my own data set and included it with the isenkram package and
2210 made isenkram fetch the latest version of this database from git using
2211 http.  This way the isenkram users would get updated package proposals
2212 as soon as I learned more about hardware related packages.</p>
2213
2214 <p>The hardware is identified using modalias strings.  The modalias
2215 design is from the Linux kernel where most hardware descriptors are
2216 made available as a strings that can be matched using filename style
2217 globbing.  It handle USB, PCI, DMI and a lot of other hardware related
2218 identifiers.</p>
2219
2220 <p>The downside to the Isenkram specific database is that there is no
2221 information about relevant distribution / Debian version, making
2222 isenkram propose obsolete packages too.  But along came AppStream, a
2223 cross distribution mechanism to store and collect metadata about
2224 software packages.  When I heard about the proposal, I contacted the
2225 people involved and suggested to add a hardware matching rule using
2226 modalias strings in the specification, to be able to use AppStream for
2227 mapping hardware to packages.  This idea was accepted and AppStream is
2228 now a great way for a package to announce the hardware it support in a
2229 distribution neutral way.  I wrote
2230 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">a
2231 recipe on how to add such meta-information</a> in a blog post last
2232 December.  If you have a hardware related package in Debian, please
2233 announce the relevant hardware IDs using AppStream.</p>
2234
2235 <p>In Debian, almost all packages that can talk to a LEGO Mindestorms
2236 RCX or NXT unit, announce this support using AppStream.  The effect is
2237 that when you insert such LEGO robot controller into your Debian
2238 machine, Isenkram will propose to install the packages needed to get
2239 it working.  The intention is that this should allow the local user to
2240 start programming his robot controller right away without having to
2241 guess what packages to use or which permissions to fix.</p>
2242
2243 <p>But when I sat down with my son the other day to program our NXT
2244 unit using his Debian Stretch computer, I discovered something
2245 annoying.  The local console user (ie my son) did not get access to
2246 the USB device for programming the unit.  This used to work, but no
2247 longer in Jessie and Stretch.  After some investigation and asking
2248 around on #debian-devel, I discovered that this was because udev had
2249 changed the mechanism used to grant access to local devices.  The
2250 ConsoleKit mechanism from <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>
2251 no longer applied, because LDAP users no longer was added to the
2252 plugdev group during login.  Michael Biebl told me that this method
2253 was obsolete and the new method used ACLs instead.  This was good
2254 news, as the plugdev mechanism is a mess when using a remote user
2255 directory like LDAP.  Using ACLs would make sure a user lost device
2256 access when she logged out, even if the user left behind a background
2257 process which would retain the plugdev membership with the ConsoleKit
2258 setup.  Armed with this knowledge I moved on to fix the access problem
2259 for the LEGO Mindstorms related packages.</p>
2260
2261 <p>The new system uses a udev tag, 'uaccess'.  It can either be
2262 applied directly for a device, or is applied in
2263 /lib/udev/rules.d/70-uaccess.rules for classes of devices.  As the
2264 LEGO Mindstorms udev rules did not have a class, I decided to add the
2265 tag directly in the udev rules files included in the packages.  Here
2266 is one example.  For the nqc C compiler for the RCX, the
2267 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/60-nqc.rules</tt> file now look like this:
2268
2269 <p><pre>
2270 SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ACTION=="add", ATTR{idVendor}=="0694", ATTR{idProduct}=="0001", \
2271     SYMLINK+="rcx-%k", TAG+="uaccess"
2272 </pre></p>
2273
2274 <p>The key part is the 'TAG+="uaccess"' at the end.  I suspect all
2275 packages using plugdev in their /lib/udev/rules.d/ files should be
2276 changed to use this tag (either directly or indirectly via
2277 <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>).  Perhaps a lintian check should be created
2278 to detect this?</p>
2279
2280 <p>I've been unable to find good documentation on the uaccess feature.
2281 It is unclear to me if the uaccess tag is an internal implementation
2282 detail like the udev-acl tag used by
2283 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>.  If it is, I guess the
2284 indirect method is the preferred way.  Michael
2285 <a href="https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/4288">asked for more
2286 documentation from the systemd project</a> and I hope it will make
2287 this clearer.  For now I use the generic classes when they exist and
2288 is already handled by <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>, and add the tag
2289 directly if no such class exist.</p>
2290
2291 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
2292 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
2293 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
2294
2295 <p>To help out making life for LEGO constructors in Debian easier,
2296 please join us on our IRC channel
2297 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> and join
2298 the <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/debian-lego/">Debian
2299 LEGO team</a> in the Alioth project we created yesterday.  A mailing
2300 list is not yet created, but we are working on it. :)</p>
2301
2302 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2303 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2304 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2305
2306       </div>
2307       <div class="tags">
2308
2309
2310         Tags: <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>.
2311
2312
2313       </div>
2314     </div>
2315     <div class="padding"></div>
2316
2317     <div class="entry">
2318       <div class="title">
2319         <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>
2320       </div>
2321       <div class="date">
2322         30th August 2016
2323       </div>
2324       <div class="body">
2325         <p>In April we
2326 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">started
2327 to work</a> on a Norwegian Bokmål edition of the "open access" book on
2328 how to set up and administrate a Debian system.  Today I am happy to
2329 report that the first draft is now publicly available.  You can find
2330 it on <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/">get the Debian
2331 Administrator's Handbook page</a> (under Other languages).  The first
2332 eight chapters have a first draft translation, and we are working on
2333 proofreading the content.  If you want to help out, please start
2334 contributing using
2335 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
2336 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
2337 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
2338 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
2339 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
2340 contributors</a>.  A good way to contribute is to proofread the text
2341 and update weblate if you find errors.</p>
2342
2343 <p>Our goal is still to make the Norwegian book available on paper as well as
2344 electronic form.</p>
2345
2346       </div>
2347       <div class="tags">
2348
2349
2350         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>.
2351
2352
2353       </div>
2354     </div>
2355     <div class="padding"></div>
2356
2357     <div class="entry">
2358       <div class="title">
2359         <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>
2360       </div>
2361       <div class="date">
2362         11th August 2016
2363       </div>
2364       <div class="body">
2365         <p>This summer, I read a great article
2366 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">coz:
2367 This Is the Profiler You're Looking For</a>" in USENIX ;login: about
2368 how to profile multi-threaded programs.  It presented a system for
2369 profiling software by running experiences in the running program,
2370 testing how run time performance is affected by "speeding up" parts of
2371 the code to various degrees compared to a normal run.  It does this by
2372 slowing down parallel threads while the "faster up" code is running
2373 and measure how this affect processing time.  The processing time is
2374 measured using probes inserted into the code, either using progress
2375 counters (COZ_PROGRESS) or as latency meters (COZ_BEGIN/COZ_END).  It
2376 can also measure unmodified code by measuring complete the program
2377 runtime and running the program several times instead.</p>
2378
2379 <p>The project and presentation was so inspiring that I would like to
2380 get the system into Debian.  I
2381 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=830708">created
2382 a WNPP request for it</a> and contacted upstream to try to make the
2383 system ready for Debian by sending patches.  The build process need to
2384 be changed a bit to avoid running 'git clone' to get dependencies, and
2385 to include the JavaScript web page used to visualize the collected
2386 profiling information included in the source package.
2387 But I expect that should work out fairly soon.</p>
2388
2389 <p>The way the system work is fairly simple.  To run an coz experiment
2390 on a binary with debug symbols available, start the program like this:
2391
2392 <p><blockquote><pre>
2393 coz run --- program-to-run
2394 </pre></blockquote></p>
2395
2396 <p>This will create a text file profile.coz with the instrumentation
2397 information.  To show what part of the code affect the performance
2398 most, use a web browser and either point it to
2399 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/</a>
2400 or use the copy from git (in the gh-pages branch).  Check out this web
2401 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
2402 profiling more useful you include &lt;coz.h&gt; and insert the
2403 COZ_PROGRESS or COZ_BEGIN and COZ_END at appropriate places in the
2404 code, rebuild and run the profiler.  This allow coz to do more
2405 targeted experiments.</p>
2406
2407 <p>A video published by ACM
2408 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE0V-p1odPg">presenting the
2409 Coz profiler</a> is available from Youtube.  There is also a paper
2410 from the 25th Symposium on Operating Systems Principles available
2411 titled
2412 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/conference/atc16/technical-sessions/presentation/curtsinger">Coz:
2413 finding code that counts with causal profiling</a>.</p>
2414
2415 <p><a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz">The source code</a>
2416 for Coz is available from github.  It will only build with clang
2417 because it uses a
2418 <a href="https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=55606">C++
2419 feature missing in GCC</a>, but I've submitted
2420 <a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz/pull/67">a patch to solve
2421 it</a> and hope it will be included in the upstream source soon.</p>
2422
2423 <p>Please get in touch if you, like me, would like to see this piece
2424 of software in Debian.  I would very much like some help with the
2425 packaging effort, as I lack the in depth knowledge on how to package
2426 C++ libraries.</p>
2427
2428       </div>
2429       <div class="tags">
2430
2431
2432         Tags: <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>.
2433
2434
2435       </div>
2436     </div>
2437     <div class="padding"></div>
2438
2439     <div class="entry">
2440       <div class="title">
2441         <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>
2442       </div>
2443       <div class="date">
2444          7th July 2016
2445       </div>
2446       <div class="body">
2447         <p>Yesterday, I tried to unlock a HTC Desire HD phone, and it proved
2448 to be a slight challenge.  Here is the recipe if I ever need to do it
2449 again.  It all started by me wanting to try the recipe to set up
2450 <a href="https://blog.torproject.org/blog/mission-impossible-hardening-android-security-and-privacy">an
2451 hardened Android installation</a> from the Tor project blog on a
2452 device I had access to.  It is a old mobile phone with a broken
2453 microphone The initial idea had been to just
2454 <a href="http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Install_CM_for_ace">install
2455 CyanogenMod on it</a>, but did not quite find time to start on it
2456 until a few days ago.</p>
2457
2458 <p>The unlock process is supposed to be simple: (1) Boot into the boot
2459 loader (press volume down and power at the same time), (2) select
2460 'fastboot' before (3) connecting the device via USB to a Linux
2461 machine, (4) request the device identifier token by running 'fastboot
2462 oem get_identifier_token', (5) request the device unlocking key using
2463 the <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader/">HTC developer web
2464 site</a> and unlock the phone using the key file emailed to you.</p>
2465
2466 <p>Unfortunately, this only work fi you have hboot version 2.00.0029
2467 or newer, and the device I was working on had 2.00.0027.  This
2468 apparently can be easily fixed by downloading a Windows program and
2469 running it on your Windows machine, if you accept the terms Microsoft
2470 require you to accept to use Windows - which I do not.  So I had to
2471 come up with a different approach.  I got a lot of help from AndyCap
2472 on #nuug, and would not have been able to get this working without
2473 him.</p>
2474
2475 <p>First I needed to extract the hboot firmware from
2476 <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/ruu/PD9810000_Ace_Sense30_S_hboot_2.00.0029.exe">the
2477 windows binary for HTC Desire HD</a> downloaded as 'the RUU' from HTC.
2478 For this there is is <a href="https://github.com/kmdm/unruu/">a github
2479 project named unruu</a> using libunshield.  The unshield tool did not
2480 recognise the file format, but unruu worked and extracted rom.zip,
2481 containing the new hboot firmware and a text file describing which
2482 devices it would work for.</p>
2483
2484 <p>Next, I needed to get the new firmware into the device.  For this I
2485 followed some instructions
2486 <a href="http://www.htc1guru.com/2013/09/new-ruu-zips-posted/">available
2487 from HTC1Guru.com</a>, and ran these commands as root on a Linux
2488 machine with Debian testing:</p>
2489
2490 <p><pre>
2491 adb reboot-bootloader
2492 fastboot oem rebootRUU
2493 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
2494 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
2495 fastboot reboot
2496 </pre></p>
2497
2498 <p>The flash command apparently need to be done twice to take effect,
2499 as the first is just preparations and the second one do the flashing.
2500 The adb command is just to get to the boot loader menu, so turning the
2501 device on while holding volume down and the power button should work
2502 too.</p>
2503
2504 <p>With the new hboot version in place I could start following the
2505 instructions on the HTC developer web site.  I got the device token
2506 like this:</p>
2507
2508 <p><pre>
2509 fastboot oem get_identifier_token 2>&1 | sed 's/(bootloader) //'
2510 </pre>
2511
2512 <p>And once I got the unlock code via email, I could use it like
2513 this:</p>
2514
2515 <p><pre>
2516 fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin
2517 </pre></p>
2518
2519 <p>And with that final step in place, the phone was unlocked and I
2520 could start stuffing the software of my own choosing into the device.
2521 So far I only inserted a replacement recovery image to wipe the phone
2522 before I start.  We will see what happen next.  Perhaps I should
2523 install <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> on it. :)</p>
2524
2525       </div>
2526       <div class="tags">
2527
2528
2529         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>.
2530
2531
2532       </div>
2533     </div>
2534     <div class="padding"></div>
2535
2536     <div class="entry">
2537       <div class="title">
2538         <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>
2539       </div>
2540       <div class="date">
2541          3rd July 2016
2542       </div>
2543       <div class="body">
2544         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to test
2545 <a href="https://whispersystems.org/">the Signal app</a>, as it is
2546 said to provide end to end encrypted communication and several of my
2547 friends and family are already using it.  As I by choice do not own a
2548 mobile phone, this proved to be harder than expected.  And I wanted to
2549 have the source of the client and know that it was the code used on my
2550 machine.  But yesterday I managed to get it working.  I used the
2551 Github source, compared it to the source in
2552 <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/signal-private-messenger/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk?hl=en-US">the
2553 Signal Chrome app</a> available from the Chrome web store, applied
2554 patches to use the production Signal servers, started the app and
2555 asked for the hidden "register without a smart phone" form.  Here is
2556 the recipe how I did it.</p>
2557
2558 <p>First, I fetched the Signal desktop source from Github, using
2559
2560 <pre>
2561 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
2562 </pre>
2563
2564 <p>Next, I patched the source to use the production servers, to be
2565 able to talk to other Signal users:</p>
2566
2567 <pre>
2568 cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p0
2569 diff -ur ./js/background.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js
2570 --- ./js/background.js  2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
2571 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js    2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
2572 @@ -47,8 +47,8 @@
2573          });
2574      });
2575
2576 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
2577 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
2578 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org:4433';
2579 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
2580      var messageReceiver;
2581      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
2582          if (messageReceiver) {
2583 diff -ur ./js/expire.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js
2584 --- ./js/expire.js      2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
2585 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
2586 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
2587  ;(function() {
2588      'use strict';
2589 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
2590 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 1474492690000;
2591
2592      window.extension = window.extension || {};
2593
2594 EOF
2595 </pre>
2596
2597 <p>The first part is changing the servers, and the second is updating
2598 an expiration timestamp.  This timestamp need to be updated regularly.
2599 It is set 90 days in the future by the build process (Gruntfile.js).
2600 The value is seconds since 1970 times 1000, as far as I can tell.</p>
2601
2602 <p>Based on a tip and good help from the #nuug IRC channel, I wrote a
2603 script to launch Signal in Chromium.</p>
2604
2605 <pre>
2606 #!/bin/sh
2607 cd $(dirname $0)
2608 mkdir -p userdata
2609 exec chromium \
2610   --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
2611   --user-data-dir=`pwd`/userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
2612 </pre>
2613
2614 <p> The script start the app and configure Chromium to use the Tor
2615 SOCKS5 proxy to make sure those controlling the Signal servers (today
2616 Amazon and Whisper Systems) as well as those listening on the lines
2617 will have a harder time location my laptop based on the Signal
2618 connections if they use source IP address.</p>
2619
2620 <p>When the script starts, one need to follow the instructions under
2621 "Standalone Registration" in the CONTRIBUTING.md file in the git
2622 repository.  I right clicked on the Signal window to get up the
2623 Chromium debugging tool, visited the 'Console' tab and wrote
2624 'extension.install("standalone")' on the console prompt to get the
2625 registration form.  Then I entered by land line phone number and
2626 pressed 'Call'.  5 seconds later the phone rang and a robot voice
2627 repeated the verification code three times.  After entering the number
2628 into the verification code field in the form, I could start using
2629 Signal from my laptop.
2630
2631 <p>As far as I can tell, The Signal app will leak who is talking to
2632 whom and thus who know who to those controlling the central server,
2633 but such leakage is hard to avoid with a centrally controlled server
2634 setup.  It is something to keep in mind when using Signal - the
2635 content of your chats are harder to intercept, but the meta data
2636 exposing your contact network is available to people you do not know.
2637 So better than many options, but not great.  And sadly the usage is
2638 connected to my land line, thus allowing those controlling the server
2639 to associate it to my home and person.  I would prefer it if only
2640 those I knew could tell who I was on Signal.  There are options
2641 avoiding such information leakage, but most of my friends are not
2642 using them, so I am stuck with Signal for now.</p>
2643
2644 <p><strong>Update 2017-01-10</strong>: There is an updated blog post
2645 on this topic in
2646 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience
2647 and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile
2648 phone</a>.</p>
2649
2650       </div>
2651       <div class="tags">
2652
2653
2654         Tags: <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>.
2655
2656
2657       </div>
2658     </div>
2659     <div class="padding"></div>
2660
2661     <div class="entry">
2662       <div class="title">
2663         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_new__best__multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?</a>
2664       </div>
2665       <div class="date">
2666          6th June 2016
2667       </div>
2668       <div class="body">
2669         <p>When I set out a few weeks ago to figure out
2670 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">which
2671 multimedia player in Debian claimed to support most file formats /
2672 MIME types</a>, I was a bit surprised how varied the sets of MIME types
2673 the various players claimed support for.  The range was from 55 to 130
2674 MIME types.  I suspect most media formats are supported by all
2675 players, but this is not really reflected in the MimeTypes values in
2676 their desktop files.  There are probably also some bogus MIME types
2677 listed, but it is hard to identify which one this is.</p>
2678
2679 <p>Anyway, in the mean time I got in touch with upstream for some of
2680 the players suggesting to add more MIME types to their desktop files,
2681 and decided to spend some time myself improving the situation for my
2682 favorite media player VLC.  The fixes for VLC entered Debian unstable
2683 yesterday. The complete list of MIME types can be seen on the
2684 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">Multimedia
2685 player MIME type support status</a> Debian wiki page.</p>
2686
2687 <p>The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?  It is VLC, followed by
2688 totem, parole, kplayer, gnome-mpv, mpv, smplayer, mplayer-gui and
2689 kmplayer.  I am sure some of the other players desktop files support
2690 several of the formats currently listed as working only with vlc,
2691 toten and parole.</p>
2692
2693 <p>A sad observation is that only 14 MIME types are listed as
2694 supported by all the tested multimedia players in Debian in their
2695 desktop files: audio/mpeg, audio/vnd.rn-realaudio, audio/x-mpegurl,
2696 audio/x-ms-wma, audio/x-scpls, audio/x-wav, video/mp4, video/mpeg,
2697 video/quicktime, video/vnd.rn-realvideo, video/x-matroska,
2698 video/x-ms-asf, video/x-ms-wmv and video/x-msvideo.  Personally I find
2699 it sad that video/ogg and video/webm is not supported by all the media
2700 players in Debian.  As far as I can tell, all of them can handle both
2701 formats.</p>
2702
2703       </div>
2704       <div class="tags">
2705
2706
2707         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>.
2708
2709
2710       </div>
2711     </div>
2712     <div class="padding"></div>
2713
2714     <div class="entry">
2715       <div class="title">
2716         <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>
2717       </div>
2718       <div class="date">
2719          5th June 2016
2720       </div>
2721       <div class="body">
2722         <p>Many years ago, when koffice was fresh and with few users, I
2723 decided to test its presentation tool when making the slides for a
2724 talk I was giving for NUUG on Japhar, a free Java virtual machine.  I
2725 wrote the first draft of the slides, saved the result and went to bed
2726 the day before I would give the talk.  The next day I took a plane to
2727 the location where the meeting should take place, and on the plane I
2728 started up koffice again to polish the talk a bit, only to discover
2729 that kpresenter refused to load its own data file.  I cursed a bit and
2730 started making the slides again from memory, to have something to
2731 present when I arrived.  I tested that the saved files could be
2732 loaded, and the day seemed to be rescued.  I continued to polish the
2733 slides until I suddenly discovered that the saved file could no longer
2734 be loaded into kpresenter.  In the end I had to rewrite the slides
2735 three times, condensing the content until the talk became shorter and
2736 shorter.  After the talk I was able to pinpoint the problem &ndash;
2737 kpresenter wrote inline images in a way itself could not understand.
2738 Eventually that bug was fixed and kpresenter ended up being a great
2739 program to make slides.  The point I'm trying to make is that we
2740 expect a program to be able to load its own data files, and it is
2741 embarrassing to its developers if it can't.</p>
2742
2743 <p>Did you ever experience a program failing to load its own data
2744 files from the desktop file browser?  It is not a uncommon problem.  A
2745 while back I discovered that the screencast recorder
2746 gtk-recordmydesktop would save an Ogg Theora video file the KDE file
2747 browser would refuse to open.  No video player claimed to understand
2748 such file.  I tracked down the cause being <tt>file --mime-type</tt>
2749 returning the application/ogg MIME type, which no video player I had
2750 installed listed as a MIME type they would understand.  I asked for
2751 <a href="http://bugs.gw.com/view.php?id=382">file to change its
2752 behavour</a> and use the MIME type video/ogg instead.  I also asked
2753 several video players to add video/ogg to their desktop files, to give
2754 the file browser an idea what to do about Ogg Theora files.  After a
2755 while, the desktop file browsers in Debian started to handle the
2756 output from gtk-recordmydesktop properly.</p>
2757
2758 <p>But history repeats itself.  A few days ago I tested the music
2759 system Rosegarden again, and I discovered that the KDE and xfce file
2760 browsers did not know what to do with the Rosegarden project files
2761 (*.rg).  I've reported <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/825993">the
2762 rosegarden problem to BTS</a> and a fix is commited to git and will be
2763 included in the next upload.  To increase the chance of me remembering
2764 how to fix the problem next time some program fail to load its files
2765 from the file browser, here are some notes on how to fix it.</p>
2766
2767 <p>The file browsers in Debian in general operates on MIME types.
2768 There are two sources for the MIME type of a given file.  The output from
2769 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> mentioned above, and the content of the
2770 shared MIME type registry (under /usr/share/mime/).  The file MIME
2771 type is mapped to programs supporting the MIME type, and this
2772 information is collected from
2773 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/desktop-entry-spec/">the
2774 desktop files</a> available in /usr/share/applications/.  If there is
2775 one desktop file claiming support for the MIME type of the file, it is
2776 activated when asking to open a given file.  If there are more, one
2777 can normally select which one to use by right-clicking on the file and
2778 selecting the wanted one using 'Open with' or similar.  In general
2779 this work well.  But it depend on each program picking a good MIME
2780 type (preferably
2781 <a href="http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">a
2782 MIME type registered with IANA</a>), file and/or the shared MIME
2783 registry recognizing the file and the desktop file to list the MIME
2784 type in its list of supported MIME types.</p>
2785
2786 <p>The <tt>/usr/share/mime/packages/rosegarden.xml</tt> entry for
2787 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/shared-mime-info-spec">the
2788 Shared MIME database</a> look like this:</p>
2789
2790 <p><blockquote><pre>
2791 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
2792 &lt;mime-info xmlns="http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info"&gt;
2793   &lt;mime-type type="audio/x-rosegarden"&gt;
2794     &lt;sub-class-of type="application/x-gzip"/&gt;
2795     &lt;comment&gt;Rosegarden project file&lt;/comment&gt;
2796     &lt;glob pattern="*.rg"/&gt;
2797   &lt;/mime-type&gt;
2798 &lt;/mime-info&gt;
2799 </pre></blockquote></p>
2800
2801 <p>This states that audio/x-rosegarden is a kind of application/x-gzip
2802 (it is a gzipped XML file).  Note, it is much better to use an
2803 official MIME type registered with IANA than it is to make up ones own
2804 unofficial ones like the x-rosegarden type used by rosegarden.</p>
2805
2806 <p>The desktop file of the rosegarden program failed to list
2807 audio/x-rosegarden in its list of supported MIME types, causing the
2808 file browsers to have no idea what to do with *.rg files:</p>
2809
2810 <p><blockquote><pre>
2811 % grep Mime /usr/share/applications/rosegarden.desktop
2812 MimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition;audio/x-rosegarden-device;audio/x-rosegarden-project;audio/x-rosegarden-template;audio/midi;
2813 X-KDE-NativeMimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition
2814 %
2815 </pre></blockquote></p>
2816
2817 <p>The fix was to add "audio/x-rosegarden;" at the end of the
2818 MimeType= line.</p>
2819
2820 <p>If you run into a file which fail to open the correct program when
2821 selected from the file browser, please check out the output from
2822 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> for the file, ensure the file ending and
2823 MIME type is registered somewhere under /usr/share/mime/ and check
2824 that some desktop file under /usr/share/applications/ is claiming
2825 support for this MIME type.  If not, please report a bug to have it
2826 fixed. :)</p>
2827
2828       </div>
2829       <div class="tags">
2830
2831
2832         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2833
2834
2835       </div>
2836     </div>
2837     <div class="padding"></div>
2838
2839     <div class="entry">
2840       <div class="title">
2841         <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>
2842       </div>
2843       <div class="date">
2844         25th May 2016
2845       </div>
2846       <div class="body">
2847         <p><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">The isenkram
2848 system</a> is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware
2849 related packages.  The idea is to have a database of mappings between
2850 hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to
2851 install the packages to use a given hardware dongle.  Some use cases
2852 are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software
2853 needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it
2854 proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader;
2855 and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to
2856 install the driver for it.  The system work well, and even have a few
2857 command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the
2858 hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).</p>
2859
2860 <p>The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found
2861 good documentation and example code on how to use it.  But aptdaemon
2862 is going away and is generally being replaced by
2863 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/">PackageKit</a>,
2864 so Isenkram needed a rewrite.  And today, thanks to the great patch
2865 from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the
2866 rewrite finally took place.  I've just uploaded a new version of
2867 Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default
2868 for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit.  To check it out,
2869 install the <tt>isenkram</tt> package and insert some hardware dongle
2870 and see if it is recognised.</p>
2871
2872 <p>If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for
2873 the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup
2874 program.  This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:</p>
2875
2876 <p><blockquote><pre>
2877 % isenkram-lookup
2878 bluez
2879 cheese
2880 fprintd
2881 fprintd-demo
2882 gkrellm-thinkbat
2883 hdapsd
2884 libpam-fprintd
2885 pidgin-blinklight
2886 thinkfan
2887 tleds
2888 tp-smapi-dkms
2889 tp-smapi-source
2890 tpb
2891 %p
2892 </pre></blockquote></p>
2893
2894 <p>The hardware mappings come from several places.  The preferred way
2895 is for packages to announce their hardware support using
2896 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
2897 cross distribution appstream system</a>.
2898 See
2899 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">previous
2900 blog posts about isenkram</a> to learn how to do that.</p>
2901
2902       </div>
2903       <div class="tags">
2904
2905
2906         Tags: <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>.
2907
2908
2909       </div>
2910     </div>
2911     <div class="padding"></div>
2912
2913     <div class="entry">
2914       <div class="title">
2915         <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>
2916       </div>
2917       <div class="date">
2918         23rd May 2016
2919       </div>
2920       <div class="body">
2921         <p>Yesterday I updated the
2922 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats
2923 package in Debian</a> with a few patches sent to me by skilled and
2924 enterprising users.  There were some nice user and visible changes.
2925 First of all, both desktop menu entries now work.  A design flaw in
2926 one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was
2927 dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available.
2928 The script worked when called from the command line, but not when
2929 called from the desktop menu.  I changed this to look for a DISPLAY
2930 variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the
2931 graph window pop up as expected.</p>
2932
2933 <p>The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the
2934 graphs (the one showing the last few hours).  New is also the user of
2935 colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red.  The percentages
2936 of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design
2937 capacity.</p>
2938
2939 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-rate.png"/></p>
2940
2941 <p>The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery
2942 statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to
2943 visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time.  The red
2944 line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent:
2945
2946 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-history.png"/></p>
2947
2948 <p>In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80
2949 percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is
2950 shrinking. :(</p>
2951
2952 <p>The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle
2953 more hardware models.  On some hardware, Linux power supply
2954 information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the
2955 collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/.  Now
2956 both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the
2957 machine.</p>
2958
2959 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
2960 check out the
2961 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
2962 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
2963 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from <a
2964 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2965 Patches are very welcome.</p>
2966
2967 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2968 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2969 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2970
2971       </div>
2972       <div class="tags">
2973
2974
2975         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2976
2977
2978       </div>
2979     </div>
2980     <div class="padding"></div>
2981
2982     <div class="entry">
2983       <div class="title">
2984         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_with_ZFS_on_Linux_included.html">Debian now with ZFS on Linux included</a>
2985       </div>
2986       <div class="date">
2987         12th May 2016
2988       </div>
2989       <div class="body">
2990         <p>Today, after many years of hard work from many people,
2991 <a href="http://zfsonlinux.org/">ZFS for Linux</a> finally entered
2992 Debian.  The package status can be seen on
2993 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/zfs-linux">the package tracker
2994 for zfs-linux</a>.  and
2995 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
2996 team status page</a>. If you want to help out, please join us.
2997 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">The
2998 source code</a> is available via git on Alioth.  It would also be
2999 great if you could help out with
3000 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/dkms">the dkms package</a>, as
3001 it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.</p>
3002
3003       </div>
3004       <div class="tags">
3005
3006
3007         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3008
3009
3010       </div>
3011     </div>
3012     <div class="padding"></div>
3013
3014     <div class="entry">
3015       <div class="title">
3016         <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>
3017       </div>
3018       <div class="date">
3019          8th May 2016
3020       </div>
3021       <div class="body">
3022         <p><strong>Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in
3023 Debian claim support for most file formats.</strong></p>
3024
3025 <p>A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser
3026 plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian
3027 Edu.  I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types
3028 for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser
3029 plugin supported most file formats / media types.
3030 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">The
3031 result</a> can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have
3032 not been updated for a while.  But browser plugins are less relevant
3033 these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone
3034 players.</p>
3035
3036 <p>A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable
3037 player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National
3038 Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why.  The cause is a
3039 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/822245">missing MIME type in the VLC
3040 desktop file</a>.  In the process I wrote a script to compare the set
3041 of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin,
3042 only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the
3043 two for VLC.  This discovery made me dig up the script I used to
3044 compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files
3045 instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian
3046 support most file formats.</p>
3047
3048 <p>The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as
3049 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">a
3050 table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included
3051 in the table</a>, with the package supporting most MIME types being
3052 listed first in the table.</p>
3053
3054 </p>The best multimedia player in Debian?  It is totem, followed by
3055 parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and
3056 kmplayer.  Time for the other players to update their announced MIME
3057 support?</p>
3058
3059       </div>
3060       <div class="tags">
3061
3062
3063         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>.
3064
3065
3066       </div>
3067     </div>
3068     <div class="padding"></div>
3069
3070     <div class="entry">
3071       <div class="title">
3072         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Pyra___handheld_computer_with_Debian_preinstalled.html">The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled</a>
3073       </div>
3074       <div class="date">
3075          4th May 2016
3076       </div>
3077       <div class="body">
3078         A friend of mine made me aware of
3079 <a href="https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/">The Pyra</a>, a
3080 handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled.  I
3081 would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)</p>
3082
3083 <p>The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB
3084 plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5"
3085 LCD touch screen.  The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole
3086 day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests
3087 confirming this.  The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the
3088 last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before
3089 production started.</p>
3090
3091 <p>As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with
3092 Debian.  Please let me know if you know of any others.  Is it the
3093 first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?</p>
3094
3095       </div>
3096       <div class="tags">
3097
3098
3099         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3100
3101
3102       </div>
3103     </div>
3104     <div class="padding"></div>
3105
3106     <div class="entry">
3107       <div class="title">
3108         <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>
3109       </div>
3110       <div class="date">
3111         10th April 2016
3112       </div>
3113       <div class="body">
3114         <p>During this weekends
3115 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Oslo__Takk_for_feilfiksingsfesten.shtml">bug
3116 squashing party and developer gathering</a>, we decided to do our part
3117 to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian
3118 Bokmål, and got in touch with the people behind the
3119 <a href="http://debian-handbook.info/">Debian Administrator's Handbook
3120 project</a> to get started.  If you want to help out, please start
3121 contributing using
3122 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
3123 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
3124 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
3125 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
3126 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
3127 contributors</a>.</p>
3128
3129 <p>The book is already available on paper in English, French and
3130 Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian
3131 Bokmål too.  In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and
3132 Mobi versions available.  And there are incomplete translations
3133 available for many more languages.</p>
3134
3135       </div>
3136       <div class="tags">
3137
3138
3139         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>.
3140
3141
3142       </div>
3143     </div>
3144     <div class="padding"></div>
3145
3146     <div class="entry">
3147       <div class="title">
3148         <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>
3149       </div>
3150       <div class="date">
3151          7th April 2016
3152       </div>
3153       <div class="body">
3154         <p>Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related
3155 packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found.  I use
3156 ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so.
3157 But I might be wrong.</p>
3158
3159 <p>According to
3160 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=spl-linux">the popcon
3161 results for spl-linux</a>, there are 1019 Debian installations, or
3162 0.53% of the population, with the package installed.  As far as I know
3163 the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS
3164 on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS
3165 installation on Linux in Debian.  In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian
3166 the ZFS feature is already available, and there
3167 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=zfsutils">the popcon
3168 results for zfsutils</a> show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of
3169 the population.  So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.</p>
3170
3171 <p>But even though the Debian project leader Lucas Nussbaum
3172 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2015/04/msg00006.html">announced
3173 in April 2015</a> that the legal obstacles blocking ZFS on Debian were
3174 cleared, the package is still not in Debian.  The package is again in
3175 the NEW queue.  Several uploads have been rejected so far because the
3176 debian/copyright file was incomplete or wrong, but there is no reason
3177 to give up.  The current status can be seen on
3178 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
3179 team status page</a>, and
3180 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">the
3181 source code</a> is available on Alioth.</p>
3182
3183 <p>As I want ZFS to be included in next version of Debian to make sure
3184 my home server can function in the future using only official Debian
3185 packages, and the current blocker is to get the debian/copyright file
3186 accepted by the FTP masters in Debian, I decided a while back to try
3187 to help out the team.  This was the background for my blog post about
3188 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">creating,
3189 updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>, and I
3190 used the techniques I explored there to try to find any errors in the
3191 copyright file.  It is not very easy to check every one of the around
3192 2000 files in the source package, but I hope we this time got it
3193 right.  If you want to help out, check out the git source and try to
3194 find missing entries in the debian/copyright file.</p>
3195
3196       </div>
3197       <div class="tags">
3198
3199
3200         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3201
3202
3203       </div>
3204     </div>
3205     <div class="padding"></div>
3206
3207     <div class="entry">
3208       <div class="title">
3209         <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>
3210       </div>
3211       <div class="date">
3212         23rd March 2016
3213       </div>
3214       <div class="body">
3215         <p>Since this morning, the battery-stats package in Debian include an
3216 extended collector that will collect the complete battery history for
3217 later processing and graphing.  The original collector store the
3218 battery level as percentage of last full level, while the new
3219 collector also record battery vendor, model, serial number, design
3220 full level, last full level and current battery level.  This make it
3221 possible to predict the lifetime of the battery as well as visualise
3222 the energy flow when the battery is charging or discharging.</p>
3223
3224 <p>The new tools are available in <tt>/usr/share/battery-stats/</tt>
3225 in the version 0.5.1 package in unstable.  Get the new battery level graph
3226 and lifetime prediction by running:
3227
3228 <p><pre>
3229 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph /var/log/battery-stats.csv
3230 </pre></p>
3231
3232 <p>Or select the 'Battery Level Graph' from your application menu.</p>
3233
3234 <p>The flow in/out of the battery can be seen by running (no menu
3235 entry yet):</p>
3236
3237 <p><pre>
3238 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph-flow
3239 </pre></p>
3240
3241 <p>I'm not quite happy with the way the data is visualised, at least
3242 when there are few data points.  The graphs look a bit better with a
3243 few years of data.</p>
3244
3245 <p>A while back one important feature I use in the battery stats
3246 collector broke in Debian.  The scripts in
3247 <tt>/usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/</tt> were no longer executed.  I
3248 suspect it happened when Jessie started using systemd, but I do not
3249 know.  The issue is reported as
3250 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/818649">bug #818649</a> against
3251 pm-utils.  I managed to work around it by adding an udev rule to call
3252 the collector script every time the power connector is connected and
3253 disconnected.  With this fix in place it was finally time to make a
3254 new release of the package, and get it into Debian.</p>
3255
3256 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
3257 check out the
3258 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
3259 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
3260 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from
3261 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3262 As always, patches are very welcome.</p>
3263
3264       </div>
3265       <div class="tags">
3266
3267
3268         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3269
3270
3271       </div>
3272     </div>
3273     <div class="padding"></div>
3274
3275     <div class="entry">
3276       <div class="title">
3277         <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>
3278       </div>
3279       <div class="date">
3280         15th March 2016
3281       </div>
3282       <div class="body">
3283         <p>Back in September, I blogged about
3284 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">the
3285 system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery</a>, and
3286 how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced).  I
3287 created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing,
3288 but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already
3289 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">a battery-stats
3290 package in Debian</a> that should do the same thing, and I did not see
3291 a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be
3292 fixed instead.  I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and
3293 hoped someone would step in and fix it.  But no-one did.</p>
3294
3295 <p>I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own
3296 hands.  The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of
3297 battery stats (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">available from github</a>) and part of the team maintaining
3298 battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally
3299 able to collect battery status using the <tt>/sys/class/power_supply/</tt>
3300 information provided by the Linux kernel.  If you install the
3301 battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a
3302 graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the
3303 status of the battery.  The source package build and work just fine in
3304 Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not
3305 tested).  The default graph you get for that system look like this:</p>
3306
3307 <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>
3308
3309 <p>My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the
3310 battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details
3311 about the battery.  The scripts are merged into the upstream
3312 battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work
3313 yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way.  Will have to test a
3314 bit more before I make a new release.</p>
3315
3316 <p>I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I
3317 suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it
3318 impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing
3319 and graphing.</p>
3320
3321 <p>If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop
3322 battery, check out the battery-stats package in
3323 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">Debian</a> and
3324 on
3325 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3326 I would love some help to improve the system further.</p>
3327
3328       </div>
3329       <div class="tags">
3330
3331
3332         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3333
3334
3335       </div>
3336     </div>
3337     <div class="padding"></div>
3338
3339     <div class="entry">
3340       <div class="title">
3341         <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>
3342       </div>
3343       <div class="date">
3344         19th February 2016
3345       </div>
3346       <div class="body">
3347         <p>Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to
3348 details.  And one of the details is the content of the
3349 debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by
3350 the code in the package in question, preferably in
3351 <a href="https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/">machine
3352 readable DEP5 format</a>.</p>
3353
3354 <p>For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write
3355 and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the
3356 package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters.  So getting it right
3357 the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save
3358 both you and the ftpmasters some work..  Today, while trying to figure
3359 out what was wrong with
3360 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=686447">the
3361 zfsonlinux copyright file</a>, I decided to spend some time on
3362 figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least
3363 semi-automatically.</p>
3364
3365 <p>Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the
3366 file based on the code in the source package,
3367 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/debmake">debmake</a></tt>
3368 and <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cme">cme</a></tt>.  I'm
3369 not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to
3370 create a sensible draft file.  As far as I can tell, none of them can
3371 be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be
3372 polished a bit before the file is OK to upload.  I found the debmake
3373 option in
3374 <a href="http://goofying-with-debian.blogspot.com/2014/07/debmake-checking-source-against-dep-5.html">a
3375 blog posts from 2014</a>.
3376
3377 <p>To generate using debmake, use the -cc option:
3378
3379 <p><pre>
3380 debmake -cc > debian/copyright
3381 </pre></p>
3382
3383 <p>Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so
3384 this might not be the best option.</p>
3385
3386 <p>The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found
3387 this approach in
3388 <a href="https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2015/04/05/improving-creation-of-debian-copyright-file/">a
3389 blog post from 2015</a>.  To generate using cme, use the 'update
3390 dpkg-copyright' option:
3391
3392 <p><pre>
3393 cme update dpkg-copyright
3394 </pre></p>
3395
3396 <p>This will create or update debian/copyright.  The cme tool seem to
3397 handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.</p>
3398
3399 <p>When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to
3400 check if the file is correct.  For this I found two good options,
3401 <tt>debmake -k</tt> and <tt>license-reconcile</tt>.  The former seem
3402 to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect
3403 ineffective blocks in the copyright file.  The latter reports missing
3404 copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license
3405 names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0).  I suspect it is good to use both and
3406 fix all issues reported by them before uploading.  But I do not know
3407 if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a
3408 copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.</p>
3409
3410 <p>The devscripts tool <tt>licensecheck</tt> deserve mentioning.  It
3411 will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements.
3412 It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but
3413 can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.</p>
3414
3415 <p>Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update
3416 debian/copyright file.  Please let me know, or blog about it on
3417 planet.debian.org.</p>
3418
3419 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
3420 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
3421 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
3422
3423 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-20</strong>: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel
3424 on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file
3425
3426 <p><pre>
3427 licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
3428   /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
3429 </pre></p>
3430
3431 <p>He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the
3432 version control system to make it easier to discover license and
3433 copyright changes in the upstream source.  I will try to do the same
3434 with my packages in the future.</p>
3435
3436 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-21</strong>: The cme author recommended
3437 against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed
3438 command line.</p>
3439
3440       </div>
3441       <div class="tags">
3442
3443
3444         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3445
3446
3447       </div>
3448     </div>
3449     <div class="padding"></div>
3450
3451     <div class="entry">
3452       <div class="title">
3453         <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>
3454       </div>
3455       <div class="date">
3456          4th February 2016
3457       </div>
3458       <div class="body">
3459         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">appstream system</a>
3460 is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very
3461 convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given
3462 firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it.  This can
3463 be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog
3464 about. :)</p>
3465
3466 <p>Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware
3467 file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly
3468 picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian
3469 unstable.  In general you would be looking for the firmware requested
3470 by the kernel during kernel module loading.  To find the package
3471 providing the example file, do like this:</p>
3472
3473 <blockquote><pre>
3474 % apt install appstream
3475 [...]
3476 % apt update
3477 [...]
3478 % appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
3479   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
3480 firmware-qlogic
3481 %
3482 </pre></blockquote>
3483
3484 <p>See <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">the
3485 appstream wiki</a> page to learn how to embed the package metadata in
3486 a way appstream can use.</p>
3487
3488 <p>This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a
3489 given MIME type.  This is very useful when you get a file you do not
3490 know how to handle.  First find the mime type using <tt>file
3491 --mime-type</tt>, and next look up the package providing support for
3492 it.  Lets say you got an SVG file.  Its MIME type is image/svg+xml,
3493 and you can find all packages handling this type like this:</p>
3494
3495 <blockquote><pre>
3496 % apt install appstream
3497 [...]
3498 % apt update
3499 [...]
3500 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
3501   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
3502 bkchem
3503 phototonic
3504 inkscape
3505 shutter
3506 tetzle
3507 geeqie
3508 xia
3509 pinta
3510 gthumb
3511 karbon
3512 comix
3513 mirage
3514 viewnior
3515 postr
3516 ristretto
3517 kolourpaint4
3518 eog
3519 eom
3520 gimagereader
3521 midori
3522 %
3523 </pre></blockquote>
3524
3525 <p>I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for
3526 packages providing appstream metadata.</p>
3527
3528       </div>
3529       <div class="tags">
3530
3531
3532         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3533
3534
3535       </div>
3536     </div>
3537     <div class="padding"></div>
3538
3539     <div class="entry">
3540       <div class="title">
3541         <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>
3542       </div>
3543       <div class="date">
3544         24th January 2016
3545       </div>
3546       <div class="body">
3547         <p>Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around
3548 with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their
3549 position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long
3550 time (like every time a SMS is received or sent).  And if their
3551 computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called
3552 mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often
3553 also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access
3554 during installation).  And when these programs send out information to
3555 central collection points, the location is often included, unless
3556 extra care is taken to not send the location.  The provided
3557 information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is
3558 good and bad, depend on your point of view).  What is certain, is that
3559 the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and
3560 perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way,
3561 when they share their whereabouts with private and public
3562 entities.</p>
3563
3564 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-01-24-nice-creepy-desktop-window.png"></p>
3565
3566 <p>The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out
3567 when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing.  It is
3568 unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government
3569 officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from
3570 unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information.  But the
3571 public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software
3572 tool to do so is called
3573 <a href="http://www.geocreepy.com/">Creepy or Cree.py</a>.  I
3574 discovered it when I read
3575 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Slik-kan-du-bli-overvaket-pa-Twitter-og-Instagram-uten-a-ane-det-7787884.html">an
3576 article about Creepy</a> in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i
3577 November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian.
3578 The python program was in Debian, but
3579 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/creepy">the version in
3580 Debian</a> was completely broken and practically unmaintained.  I
3581 uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not
3582 have time to fix it then.  This Christmas I decided to finally try to
3583 get Creepy operational in Debian.  Now a fixed version is available in
3584 Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches
3585 are now included
3586 <a href="https://github.com/jkakavas/creepy">upstream</a>.</p>
3587
3588 <p>The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from
3589 Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a
3590 complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a
3591 given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all
3592 these services.  Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at
3593 least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these
3594 days it is impossible.  This mean that to use Creepy, you need to
3595 configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide
3596 information to them about your search interests.  This should be taken
3597 into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information
3598 about yourself with the services.</p>
3599
3600 <p>The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least
3601 geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital
3602 of Norway.  One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at
3603 information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the
3604 information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area.
3605 I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in
3606 twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a
3607 Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time,
3608 making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other
3609 things.  A similar technique have been
3610 <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl">used
3611 to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine</a>, and it is both a powerful
3612 tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people
3613 understand the value of the private information they provide to the
3614 public.</p>
3615
3616 <p>The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as
3617 it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at
3618 least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and
3619 python-requests-toolbelt).</p>
3620
3621 <p>(I have uploaded
3622 <a href="https://screenshots.debian.net/package/creepy">the image to
3623 screenshots.debian.net</a> and licensed it under the same terms as the
3624 Creepy program in Debian.)</p>
3625
3626       </div>
3627       <div class="tags">
3628
3629
3630         Tags: <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>.
3631
3632
3633       </div>
3634     </div>
3635     <div class="padding"></div>
3636
3637     <div class="entry">
3638       <div class="title">
3639         <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>
3640       </div>
3641       <div class="date">
3642         15th January 2016
3643       </div>
3644       <div class="body">
3645         <p>During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum
3646 <a href="https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/meeting/331/what-is-to-be-done/">observed
3647 that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to
3648 believe a computer have a given security hole</a> if it download a
3649 security fix from a Debian mirror.  This is a good reason to always
3650 use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those
3651 listening do not know which IP address to attack.  In August, Richard
3652 Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible
3653 to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that
3654 download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and
3655 <a href="http://richardhartmann.de/blog/posts/2015/08/24-Tor-enabled_Debian_mirror/">proposed
3656 to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror</a>.  He
3657 was not the first to propose this, as the
3658 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/apt-transport-tor">apt-transport-tor</a></tt>
3659 package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt
3660 to use <a href="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</a>, but I was not
3661 aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.</p>
3662
3663 <p>Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian
3664 sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central
3665 Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making
3666 it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes,
3667 making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.</p>
3668
3669 <p>Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by
3670 installing <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> and replacing http and https
3671 urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead
3672 of the official Debian mirror site.  I recommend installing
3673 <tt>etckeeper</tt> before you start to have a history of the changes
3674 done in /etc/.</p>
3675
3676 <blockquote><pre>
3677 apt install apt-transport-tor
3678 sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
3679 sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
3680 </pre></blockquote>
3681
3682 <p>If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run
3683 the sed commands for these too.  The sed command is assuming your are
3684 using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror.  Adjust the command (or just
3685 edit the file manually) to match your mirror.</p>
3686
3687 <p>This work in Debian Jessie and later.  Note that tools like
3688 <tt>apt-file</tt> only recently started using the apt transport
3689 system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs.  For
3690 <tt>apt-file</tt> you need the version currently in experimental,
3691 which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable.  So if you
3692 need a working <tt>apt-file</tt>, this is not for you.</p>
3693
3694 <p>Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start
3695 using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you
3696 update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus
3697 masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine.  Using Tor will
3698 become normal for the machine in question.</p>
3699
3700 <p>On <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox</a>, APT
3701 is set up by default to use <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> when Tor is
3702 enabled.  It would be great if it was the default on any Debian
3703 system.</p>
3704
3705       </div>
3706       <div class="tags">
3707
3708
3709         Tags: <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>.
3710
3711
3712       </div>
3713     </div>
3714     <div class="padding"></div>
3715
3716     <div class="entry">
3717       <div class="title">
3718         <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>
3719       </div>
3720       <div class="date">
3721         23rd December 2015
3722       </div>
3723       <div class="body">
3724         <p>When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to
3725 call the car license plate numbers in those days.  I would write the
3726 numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids
3727 to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some
3728 exotic or special region codes and numbers.  It was a fun game to pass
3729 time, as we kids have plenty of it.</p>
3730
3731 <p>A few days I came across
3732 <a href="https://github.com/openalpr/openalpr">the OpenALPR
3733 project</a>, a free software project to automatically discover and
3734 report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the
3735 "car numbers" in a machine readable format.  I've been looking for
3736 such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the
3737 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition">automatic
3738 number plate recognition</a> tool only is available in the hands of
3739 the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to
3740 even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance.  I
3741 discovered the developer
3742 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/747509">wanted to get the tool into
3743 Debian</a>, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to
3744 help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian
3745 archive.</p>
3746
3747 <p>Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded
3748 it into Debian, where it currently
3749 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org//new/openalpr_2.2.1-1.html">waits
3750 in the NEW queue</a> for review by the Debian ftpmasters.</p>
3751
3752 <p>I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful
3753 for the common folks, ie those not running a large government
3754 surveillance system?  Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike
3755 and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified
3756 when number plates on my watch list are discovered.  Another use case
3757 was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home
3758 to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his
3759 car.  When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone
3760 capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to
3761 open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway.  I
3762 guess for such use case it make sense.  I am sure there are other use
3763 cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.</p>
3764
3765 <p>If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check
3766 out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/
3767 before running "debuild" to build the source.  Or wait a bit until the
3768 package show up in unstable.</p>
3769
3770       </div>
3771       <div class="tags">
3772
3773
3774         Tags: <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>.
3775
3776
3777       </div>
3778     </div>
3779     <div class="padding"></div>
3780
3781     <div class="entry">
3782       <div class="title">
3783         <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>
3784       </div>
3785       <div class="date">
3786         20th December 2015
3787       </div>
3788       <div class="body">
3789         <p>Around three years ago, I created
3790 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the isenkram
3791 system</a> to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing
3792 hardware related packages.  A GUI system in the isenkram package will
3793 present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by
3794 relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine.  The same
3795 lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line
3796 tools in the isenkram-cli package.  In addition to mapping hardware,
3797 it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to
3798 install needed firmware packages automatically.  The key for this
3799 system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other
3800 words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work
3801 with.</p>
3802
3803 <p>I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and
3804 adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run
3805 time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available.
3806 I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in
3807 the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I
3808 was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings,
3809 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
3810 appstream system</a> was announced.  I got in touch and suggested to
3811 add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use
3812 appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the
3813 Debian version of appstream.</p>
3814
3815 <p>A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible,
3816 and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for
3817 appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages.  The only
3818 package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my
3819 pymissile package.  I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out
3820 how do add the required
3821 <a href="https://appstream.debian.org/html/sid/main/metainfo/pymissile.html">metadata
3822 in pymissile</a>.  I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with
3823 this content:</p>
3824
3825 <blockquote><pre>
3826 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
3827 &lt;component&gt;
3828   &lt;id&gt;pymissile&lt;/id&gt;
3829   &lt;metadata_license&gt;MIT&lt;/metadata_license&gt;
3830   &lt;name&gt;pymissile&lt;/name&gt;
3831   &lt;summary&gt;Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher&lt;/summary&gt;
3832   &lt;description&gt;
3833     &lt;p&gt;
3834       Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
3835       Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
3836       motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
3837       launcher.
3838     &lt;/p&gt;
3839   &lt;/description&gt;
3840   &lt;provides&gt;
3841     &lt;modalias&gt;usb:v1130p0202d*&lt;/modalias&gt;
3842   &lt;/provides&gt;
3843 &lt;/component&gt;
3844 </pre></blockquote>
3845
3846 <p>The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value,
3847 which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings
3848 (modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel.  In this case, it
3849 will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code
3850 0202.</p>
3851
3852 <p>Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files
3853 are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide
3854 appstream files.  Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for
3855 these files.  A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as
3856 it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions
3857 (in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use).  But
3858 it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as
3859 upstream for this project is dormant.</p>
3860
3861 <p>To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the
3862 mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the
3863 appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary
3864 package under /usr/share/appdata/.  I did this by adding the following
3865 line to debian/pymissile.install:</p>
3866
3867 <blockquote><pre>
3868 debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
3869 </pre></blockquote>
3870
3871 <p>With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list
3872 all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI
3873 pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already
3874 installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in
3875 question.</p>
3876
3877 <p>Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the
3878 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a> proposal.</p>
3879
3880 <p>To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine,
3881 try running this command on the command line:</p>
3882
3883 <blockquote><pre>
3884 cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
3885 </pre></blockquote>
3886
3887 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
3888 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
3889 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
3890
3891       </div>
3892       <div class="tags">
3893
3894
3895         Tags: <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>.
3896
3897
3898       </div>
3899     </div>
3900     <div class="padding"></div>
3901
3902     <div class="entry">
3903       <div class="title">
3904         <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>
3905       </div>
3906       <div class="date">
3907         30th November 2015
3908       </div>
3909       <div class="body">
3910         <p>A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled
3911 "<a href="http://bonedaddy.net/pabs3/log/2015/11/27/sfc-supporter/">The
3912 GPL is not magic pixie dust</a>" explain the importance of making sure
3913 the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GPL</a> is enforced.
3914 I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:<p>
3915
3916 <blockquote>
3917
3918 <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>
3919
3920 <blockquote>
3921 The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.<br/>
3922
3923 The first step is to choose a
3924 <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft</a> license for your
3925 code.<br/>
3926
3927 The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license,
3928 <b>it must be enforced</b><br/>
3929
3930 and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of
3931 work<br/>
3932
3933 is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do.
3934 </blockquote>
3935
3936 <p><small>-- <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/">Bradley Kuhn</a>, in
3937 <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in Freedom">FaiF</a>
3938 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode
3939 0x57</a></small></p>
3940
3941 <p>As the Debian Website
3942 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/794116">used</a>
3943 <a href="https://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/webwml/webwml/english/intro/free.wml?r1=1.24&amp;r2=1.25">to</a>
3944 imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to
3945 the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful
3946 software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or
3947 software products.  Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created
3948 to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but
3949 such licenses are not enough.  With the ongoing adoption of Free
3950 Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's
3951 expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of
3952 ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always.  As Karen
3953 and Bradley explained in <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in
3954 Freedom">FaiF</a>
3955 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode 0x57</a>,
3956 copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court
3957 to protect it.  The reality of today's world is that legal
3958 representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming.  With
3959 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/">gpl-violations.org</a> in hiatus
3960 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/news/20151027-homepage-recovers/">until</a>
3961 some time in 2016, the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software
3962 Freedom Conservancy</a> (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender
3963 of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations.
3964 In March the SFC supported a
3965 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">lawsuit
3966 by Christoph Hellwig</a> against VMware for refusing to
3967 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/vmware-lawsuit-faq.html">comply
3968 with the GPL</a> in relation to their use of parts of the Linux
3969 kernel.  Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and
3970 conferences
3971 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">blocked
3972 or cancelled their talks</a>.  As a result they have decided to rely
3973 less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of
3974 individuals who support Free Software and copyleft.  So the SFC has
3975 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/23/2015fundraiser/">launched</a>
3976 a <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">campaign</a> to create
3977 a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by
3978 supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free
3979 Software.</p>
3980
3981 <p>If you support Free Software,
3982 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/26/like-what-I-do/">like</a>
3983 what the SFC do, agree with their
3984 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">compliance
3985 principles</a>, are happy about their
3986 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">successes</a> in 2015,
3987 work on a project that is an SFC
3988 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/members/current/">member</a> and or
3989 just want to stand up for copyleft, please join
3990 <a href="https://identi.ca/cwebber/image/JQGPA4qbTyyp3-MY8QpvuA">Christopher
3991 Allan Webber</a>,
3992 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">Carol
3993 Smith</a>,
3994 <a href="http://www.jonobacon.org/2015/11/25/supporting-software-freedom-conservancy/">Jono
3995 Bacon</a>, myself and
3996 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/sponsors/#supporters">others</a> in
3997 becoming a
3998 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">supporter</a>.  For the
3999 next week your donation will be
4000 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/27/black-friday/">matched</a>
4001 by an anonymous donor.  Please also consider asking your employer to
4002 match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC.  Don't forget to
4003 spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or
4004 social media accounts.</p>
4005
4006 </blockquote>
4007
4008 <p>I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter
4009 of Software Freedom Conservancy myself.  Perhaps you should be a
4010 supporter too?</p>
4011
4012       </div>
4013       <div class="tags">
4014
4015
4016         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>.
4017
4018
4019       </div>
4020     </div>
4021     <div class="padding"></div>
4022
4023     <div class="entry">
4024       <div class="title">
4025         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/PGP_key_transition_statement_for_key_EE4E02F9.html">PGP key transition statement for key EE4E02F9</a>
4026       </div>
4027       <div class="date">
4028         17th November 2015
4029       </div>
4030       <div class="body">
4031         <p>I've needed a new OpenPGP key for a while, but have not had time to
4032 set it up properly.  I wanted to generate it offline and have it
4033 available on <a href="http://shop.kernelconcepts.de/#openpgp">a OpenPGP
4034 smart card</a> for daily use, and learning how to do it and finding
4035 time to sit down with an offline machine almost took forever.  But
4036 finally I've been able to complete the process, and have now moved
4037 from my old GPG key to a new GPG key.  See
4038 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-11-17-new-gpg-key-transition.txt">the
4039 full transition statement, signed with both my old and new key</a> for
4040 the details.  This is my new key:</p>
4041
4042 <pre>
4043 pub   3936R/<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/111D6B29EE4E02F9.html">111D6B29EE4E02F9</a> 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-14]
4044       Key fingerprint = 3AC7 B2E3 ACA5 DF87 78F1  D827 111D 6B29 EE4E 02F9
4045 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
4046 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@debian.org&gt;
4047 sub   4096R/87BAFB0E 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4048 sub   4096R/F91E6DE9 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4049 sub   4096R/A0439BAB 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4050 </pre>
4051
4052 <p>The key can be downloaded from the OpenPGP key servers, signed by
4053 my old key.</p>
4054
4055 <p>If you signed my old key
4056 (<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/DB4CCC4B2A30D729.html">DB4CCC4B2A30D729</a>),
4057 I'd very much appreciate a signature on my new key, details and
4058 instructions in the transition statement. I m happy to reciprocate if
4059 you have a similarly signed transition statement to present.</p>
4060
4061       </div>
4062       <div class="tags">
4063
4064
4065         Tags: <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>.
4066
4067
4068       </div>
4069     </div>
4070     <div class="padding"></div>
4071
4072     <div class="entry">
4073       <div class="title">
4074         <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>
4075       </div>
4076       <div class="date">
4077         24th September 2015
4078       </div>
4079       <div class="body">
4080         <p>When I get a new laptop, the battery life time at the start is OK.
4081 But this do not last.  The last few laptops gave me a feeling that
4082 within a year, the life time is just a fraction of what it used to be,
4083 and it slowly become painful to use the laptop without power connected
4084 all the time.  Because of this, when I got a new Thinkpad X230 laptop
4085 about two years ago, I decided to monitor its battery state to have
4086 more hard facts when the battery started to fail.</p>
4087
4088 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-24-laptop-battery-graph.png"/>
4089
4090 <p>First I tried to find a sensible Debian package to record the
4091 battery status, assuming that this must be a problem already handled
4092 by someone else.  I found
4093 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>,
4094 which collects statistics from the battery, but it was completely
4095 broken.  I sent a few suggestions to the maintainer, but decided to
4096 write my own collector as a shell script while I waited for feedback
4097 from him.  Via
4098 <a href="http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html">a
4099 blog post about the battery development on a MacBook Air</a> I also
4100 discovered
4101 <a href="https://github.com/jradavenport/batlog.git">batlog</a>, not
4102 available in Debian.</p>
4103
4104 <p>I started my collector 2013-07-15, and it has been collecting
4105 battery stats ever since. Now my
4106 /var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log file contain around 115,000
4107 measurements, from the time the battery was working great until now,
4108 when it is unable to charge above 7% of original capacity.  My
4109 collector shell script is quite simple and look like this:</p>
4110
4111 <pre>
4112 #!/bin/sh
4113 # Inspired by
4114 # http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html
4115 # See also
4116 # http://blog.sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/01/02/debian-how-to-monitor-battery-capacity/
4117 logfile=/var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log
4118
4119 files="manufacturer model_name technology serial_number \
4120     energy_full energy_full_design energy_now cycle_count status"
4121
4122 if [ ! -e "$logfile" ] ; then
4123     (
4124         printf "timestamp,"
4125         for f in $files; do
4126             printf "%s," $f
4127         done
4128         echo
4129     ) > "$logfile"
4130 fi
4131
4132 log_battery() {
4133     # Print complete message in one echo call, to avoid race condition
4134     # when several log processes run in parallel.
4135     msg=$(printf "%s," $(date +%s); \
4136         for f in $files; do \
4137             printf "%s," $(cat $f); \
4138         done)
4139     echo "$msg"
4140 }
4141
4142 cd /sys/class/power_supply
4143
4144 for bat in BAT*; do
4145     (cd $bat && log_battery >> "$logfile")
4146 done
4147 </pre>
4148
4149 <p>The script is called when the power management system detect a
4150 change in the power status (power plug in or out), and when going into
4151 and out of hibernation and suspend.  In addition, it collect a value
4152 every 10 minutes.  This make it possible for me know when the battery
4153 is discharging, charging and how the maximum charge change over time.
4154 The code for the Debian package
4155 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-status">is now
4156 available on github</a>.</p>
4157
4158 <p>The collected log file look like this:</p>
4159
4160 <pre>
4161 timestamp,manufacturer,model_name,technology,serial_number,energy_full,energy_full_design,energy_now,cycle_count,status,
4162 1376591133,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,62800000,62160000,39050000,0,Discharging,
4163 [...]
4164 1443090528,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
4165 1443090601,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
4166 </pre>
4167
4168 <p>I wrote a small script to create a graph of the charge development
4169 over time.  This graph depicted above show the slow death of my laptop
4170 battery.</p>
4171
4172 <p>But why is this happening?  Why are my laptop batteries always
4173 dying in a year or two, while the batteries of space probes and
4174 satellites keep working year after year.  If we are to believe
4175 <a href="http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries">Battery
4176 University</a>, the cause is me charging the battery whenever I have a
4177 chance, and the fix is to not charge the Lithium-ion batteries to 100%
4178 all the time, but to stay below 90% of full charge most of the time.
4179 I've been told that the Tesla electric cars
4180 <a href="http://my.teslamotors.com/de_CH/forum/forums/battery-charge-limit">limit
4181 the charge of their batteries to 80%</a>, with the option to charge to
4182 100% when preparing for a longer trip (not that I would want a car
4183 like Tesla where rights to privacy is abandoned, but that is another
4184 story), which I guess is the option we should have for laptops on
4185 Linux too.</p>
4186
4187 <p>Is there a good and generic way with Linux to tell the battery to
4188 stop charging at 80%, unless requested to charge to 100% once in
4189 preparation for a longer trip?  I found
4190 <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/34452/how-can-i-limit-battery-charging-to-80-capacity">one
4191 recipe on askubuntu for Ubuntu to limit charging on Thinkpad to
4192 80%</a>, but could not get it to work (kernel module refused to
4193 load).</p>
4194
4195 <p>I wonder why the battery capacity was reported to be more than 100%
4196 at the start.  I also wonder why the "full capacity" increases some
4197 times, and if it is possible to repeat the process to get the battery
4198 back to design capacity.  And I wonder if the discharge and charge
4199 speed change over time, or if this stay the same.  I did not yet try
4200 to write a tool to calculate the derivative values of the battery
4201 level, but suspect some interesting insights might be learned from
4202 those.</p>
4203
4204 <p>Update 2015-09-24: I got a tip to install the packages
4205 acpi-call-dkms and tlp (unfortunately missing in Debian stable)
4206 packages instead of the tp-smapi-dkms package I had tried to use
4207 initially, and use 'tlp setcharge 40 80' to change when charging start
4208 and stop.  I've done so now, but expect my existing battery is toast
4209 and need to be replaced.  The proposal is unfortunately Thinkpad
4210 specific.</p>
4211
4212       </div>
4213       <div class="tags">
4214
4215
4216         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4217
4218
4219       </div>
4220     </div>
4221     <div class="padding"></div>
4222
4223     <div class="entry">
4224       <div class="title">
4225         <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>
4226       </div>
4227       <div class="date">
4228          5th July 2015
4229       </div>
4230       <div class="body">
4231         <p>Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my
4232 need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback.  I wish to
4233 thank every one of these.  Several pointed me to the possibility of
4234 fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to
4235 do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the
4236 machine.  But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it
4237 with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live
4238 for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement.  If I did
4239 not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts
4240 using <a href="http://www.francecrans.com/">FrancEcrans</a>, but it
4241 might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.</p>
4242
4243 <p>One tip I got was to use the
4244 <a href="https://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=nb">Skinflint</a> web service to
4245 compare laptop models.  It seem to have more models available than
4246 prisjakt.no.  Another tip I got from someone I know have similar
4247 keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not
4248 very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook
4249 keyboards I tested.  Because of this, I will not consider it any further.
4250
4251 <p>When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the
4252 newest Thinkpad X model.  The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons
4253 (which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with
4254 Debian Sid/Unstable according to
4255 <a href="http://www.corsac.net/X250/">Corsac.net</a>.  The reports I
4256 got on the keyboard quality are not consistent.  Some say the keyboard
4257 is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good.
4258 Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250
4259 keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I
4260 keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to
4261 replace it.  I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk
4262 activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230.  I'm
4263 also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit
4264 noisy.  In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian
4265 Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.</p>
4266
4267 <p>I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was
4268 <a href="http://pro-star.com">Pro-Star</a>, another was
4269 <a href="http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/product/libreboot-x200/">Libreboot</a>.
4270 The latter look very attractive to me.</p>
4271
4272 <p>Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback.  It help a lot
4273 as I keep looking for a replacement.</p>
4274
4275 <p>Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the
4276 <a href="">lapstore.de</a> web shop for used laptops.  They got several
4277 different
4278 <a href="http://www.lapstore.de/f.php/shop/lapstore/f/411/lang/x/kw/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X_Serie/">old
4279 thinkpad X models</a>, and provide one year warranty.</p>
4280
4281       </div>
4282       <div class="tags">
4283
4284
4285         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4286
4287
4288       </div>
4289     </div>
4290     <div class="padding"></div>
4291
4292     <div class="entry">
4293       <div class="title">
4294         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/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>
4295       </div>
4296       <div class="date">
4297          3rd July 2015
4298       </div>
4299       <div class="body">
4300         <p>My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a
4301 replacement soon.  The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230
4302 started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken
4303 cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the
4304 flickering.</p>
4305
4306 <p>My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is
4307 still as
4308 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">I
4309 described them in 2013</a>.  The last time I bought a laptop, I had
4310 good help from
4311 <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/category.php?k=353">prisjakt.no</a>
4312 where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin,
4313 wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually.  Three button mouse
4314 and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three
4315 laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and
4316 G2) lack three mouse buttons).  It is also unclear to me how good the
4317 keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are.  I hope Lenovo have not messed up
4318 the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have
4319 deteriorated since X41.</p>
4320
4321 <p>I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options
4322 seem sensible to me?  Are there better services around to search the
4323 set of available laptops for features?  Please send me an email if you
4324 have suggestions.</p>
4325
4326 <p>Update 2015-07-23: I got a suggestion to check out the FSF
4327 <a href="http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom">list
4328 of endorsed hardware</a>, which is useful background information.</p>
4329
4330       </div>
4331       <div class="tags">
4332
4333
4334         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4335
4336
4337       </div>
4338     </div>
4339     <div class="padding"></div>
4340
4341     <div class="entry">
4342       <div class="title">
4343         <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>
4344       </div>
4345       <div class="date">
4346         22nd November 2014
4347       </div>
4348       <div class="body">
4349         <p>By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
4350 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
4351 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
4352 courtesy of
4353 <a href="http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html">Erich
4354 Schubert</a> and
4355 <a href="http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/">Simon
4356 McVittie</a>.
4357
4358 <p>If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
4359 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
4360 <tt>/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit</tt> with this content before
4361 you upgrade:</p>
4362
4363 <p><blockquote><pre>
4364 Package: systemd-sysv
4365 Pin: release o=Debian
4366 Pin-Priority: -1
4367 </pre></blockquote><p>
4368
4369 <p>This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
4370 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
4371 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
4372 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
4373 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.</p>
4374
4375 <p>If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
4376 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
4377 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
4378 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
4379 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
4380 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
4381
4382 <p><blockquote><pre>
4383 preseed/late_command="in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core"
4384 </pre></blockquote><p>
4385
4386 <p>Next, the line to use in a preseed file:</p>
4387
4388 <p><blockquote><pre>
4389 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
4390 </pre></blockquote><p>
4391
4392 <p>One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
4393 the sysvinit-core package.</p>
4394
4395 <p>I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
4396 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
4397 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
4398 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
4399 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
4400 Jessie is released.</p>
4401
4402 <p>Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
4403 <ahref="https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg">a
4404 blog post by Torsten Glaser</a>, added --purge to the preseed
4405 line.</p>
4406
4407       </div>
4408       <div class="tags">
4409
4410
4411         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>.
4412
4413
4414       </div>
4415     </div>
4416     <div class="padding"></div>
4417
4418     <div class="entry">
4419       <div class="title">
4420         <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>
4421       </div>
4422       <div class="date">
4423         10th November 2014
4424       </div>
4425       <div class="body">
4426         <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
4427 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
4428 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.</p>
4429
4430 <p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
4431 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
4432 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
4433 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
4434 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
4435 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
4436 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
4437 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed
4438 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a
4439 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
4440 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
4441 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
4442 <a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the
4443 Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems
4444 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p>
4445
4446 <p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
4447 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
4448 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
4449 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
4450 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
4451 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
4452 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
4453 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
4454 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
4455 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
4456 were fairly easy, and
4457 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the
4458 source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github.  I
4459 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
4460 useful approach.</p>
4461
4462 <p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
4463 mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to
4464 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
4465 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
4466 <tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow
4467 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
4468 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
4469 this:</p>
4470
4471 <p><blockquote><pre>
4472 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
4473   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
4474 </pre></blockquote></p>
4475
4476 <p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
4477 address with your own address to test your server. :)</p>
4478
4479 <p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
4480 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
4481 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
4482 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
4483 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
4484 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
4485 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
4486 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
4487 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
4488 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
4489 system.</p>
4490
4491 <p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
4492 <tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over
4493 SMTorP. :)</p>
4494
4495       </div>
4496       <div class="tags">
4497
4498
4499         Tags: <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>.
4500
4501
4502       </div>
4503     </div>
4504     <div class="padding"></div>
4505
4506     <div class="entry">
4507       <div class="title">
4508         <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>
4509       </div>
4510       <div class="date">
4511         22nd October 2014
4512       </div>
4513       <div class="body">
4514         <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
4515 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
4516 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
4517 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
4518 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
4519 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
4520 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
4521 <a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the
4522 listadmin program</a>.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
4523 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
4524 lists I recently took over:</p>
4525
4526 <p><blockquote><pre>
4527 % time listadmin xiph
4528 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4529 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4530
4531 real    0m1.709s
4532 user    0m0.232s
4533 sys     0m0.012s
4534 %
4535 </pre></blockquote></p>
4536
4537 <p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
4538 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
4539 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
4540 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
4541 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
4542 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
4543 program.</p>
4544
4545 <p>If you install
4546 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin
4547 package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt>
4548 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p>
4549
4550 <p><blockquote><pre>
4551 username username@example.org
4552 spamlevel 23
4553 default discard
4554 discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
4555
4556 password secret
4557 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
4558 mailman-list@lists.example.com
4559
4560 password hidden
4561 other-list@otherserver.example.org
4562 </pre></blockquote></p>
4563
4564 <p>There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
4565 learn the details.</p>
4566
4567 <p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
4568 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
4569 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
4570 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p>
4571
4572 <p><blockquote><pre>
4573 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
4574 </pre></blockquote></p>
4575
4576 <p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
4577 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
4578 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
4579 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
4580 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
4581 email.</p>
4582
4583 <p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
4584 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
4585 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
4586 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
4587 software.</p>
4588
4589 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
4590 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
4591 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
4592
4593 <p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in
4594 configuration example.  Also, I've been told that the
4595 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
4596 sure why.</p>
4597
4598       </div>
4599       <div class="tags">
4600
4601
4602         Tags: <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>.
4603
4604
4605       </div>
4606     </div>
4607     <div class="padding"></div>
4608
4609     <div class="entry">
4610       <div class="title">
4611         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html">Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</a>
4612       </div>
4613       <div class="date">
4614         17th October 2014
4615       </div>
4616       <div class="body">
4617         <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
4618 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
4619 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
4620 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
4621 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram
4622 package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
4623 to do this using simple preseeding.</p>
4624
4625 <p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
4626 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
4627 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
4628 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
4629 of this story.)</p>
4630
4631 <p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
4632 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
4633 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
4634 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
4635 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
4636 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
4637 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
4638 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
4639 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
4640 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p>
4641
4642 <p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
4643 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
4644 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
4645 hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p>
4646
4647 <p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
4648 firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p>
4649
4650 <p><blockquote><pre>
4651 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
4652 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
4653 </pre></blockquote></p>
4654
4655 <p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
4656 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
4657 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
4658 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
4659 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
4660 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
4661 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
4662 implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p>
4663
4664 <p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
4665 this recipe work for you. :)</p>
4666
4667 <p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
4668 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
4669 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
4670 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
4671 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p>
4672
4673 <p><blockquote><pre>
4674 Task: isenkram-packages
4675 Section: hardware
4676 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4677  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
4678  proposed.
4679 Test-new-install: show show
4680 Relevance: 8
4681 Packages: for-current-hardware
4682
4683 Task: isenkram-firmware
4684 Section: hardware
4685 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4686  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
4687  packages are proposed.
4688 Test-new-install: mark show
4689 Relevance: 8
4690 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
4691 </pre></blockquote></p>
4692
4693 <p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
4694 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
4695 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
4696 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
4697 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
4698
4699 <p><blockquote><pre>
4700 #!/bin/sh
4701 #
4702 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
4703 export PATH
4704 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
4705 </pre></blockquote></p>
4706
4707 <p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
4708 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p>
4709
4710 <p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
4711 installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
4712 --new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would
4713 install.</p>
4714
4715 <p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be
4716 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
4717 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p>
4718
4719       </div>
4720       <div class="tags">
4721
4722
4723         Tags: <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>.
4724
4725
4726       </div>
4727     </div>
4728     <div class="padding"></div>
4729
4730     <div class="entry">
4731       <div class="title">
4732         <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>
4733       </div>
4734       <div class="date">
4735          4th October 2014
4736       </div>
4737       <div class="body">
4738         <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
4739 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
4740 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
4741 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p>
4742
4743 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p>
4744
4745 <p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
4746 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
4747 <a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p>
4748
4749       </div>
4750       <div class="tags">
4751
4752
4753         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4754
4755
4756       </div>
4757     </div>
4758     <div class="padding"></div>
4759
4760     <div class="entry">
4761       <div class="title">
4762         <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>
4763       </div>
4764       <div class="date">
4765          4th October 2014
4766       </div>
4767       <div class="body">
4768         <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a>
4769 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
4770 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
4771 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
4772 Dibb.</p>
4773
4774 <p>I just wrapped up
4775 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a
4776 new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from
4777 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the
4778 download page</a>.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
4779 0.17.</p>
4780
4781 <ul>
4782
4783  <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li>
4784  <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
4785    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li>
4786  <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li>
4787  <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li>
4788  <li>Fix include orders</li>
4789  <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li>
4790  <li>Fix the chapter count</li>
4791  <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
4792    the palette size is the same.</li>
4793  <li>Fix array printing.</li>
4794  <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li>
4795  <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li>
4796  <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
4797    with more GCC compiler warnings.</li>
4798
4799 </ul>
4800
4801 <p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
4802 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
4803 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)</p>
4804
4805       </div>
4806       <div class="tags">
4807
4808
4809         Tags: <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>.
4810
4811
4812       </div>
4813     </div>
4814     <div class="padding"></div>
4815
4816     <div class="entry">
4817       <div class="title">
4818         <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>
4819       </div>
4820       <div class="date">
4821         26th September 2014
4822       </div>
4823       <div class="body">
4824         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4825 project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
4826 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
4827 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
4828 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
4829 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
4830 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
4831 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
4832 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
4833 future.  The
4834 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current
4835 status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
4836 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
4837 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
4838 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p>
4839
4840 <p>First, download the test ISO via
4841 <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>,
4842 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a>
4843 or rsync (use
4844 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
4845 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
4846 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
4847 install with some tweaking.</p>
4848
4849 <p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
4850 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p>
4851
4852 <p><blockquote><pre>
4853 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
4854 </pre></blockquote></p>
4855
4856 <p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
4857 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
4858 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
4859 due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p>
4860
4861 <p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
4862 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
4863 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
4864 your need.</p>
4865
4866 <p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
4867 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
4868 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
4869 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
4870 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
4871 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
4872 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
4873 days.</p>
4874
4875 <p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
4876 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
4877 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
4878 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
4879 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
4880 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
4881 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
4882 provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>.
4883 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p>
4884
4885 <p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
4886 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
4887 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p>
4888
4889       </div>
4890       <div class="tags">
4891
4892
4893         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>.
4894
4895
4896       </div>
4897     </div>
4898     <div class="padding"></div>
4899
4900     <div class="entry">
4901       <div class="title">
4902         <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>
4903       </div>
4904       <div class="date">
4905         25th September 2014
4906       </div>
4907       <div class="body">
4908         <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a>
4909 to handle my fairly large DVD collection.  It is a nice command line
4910 tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length,
4911 etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format.  But lsdvd have not seen
4912 any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting
4913 its use with some DVDs.  Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I
4914 sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the
4915 project, without any reply.  But I use it regularly and would like to
4916 get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version
4917 into Debian</a>.  So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with
4918 the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that
4919 he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take
4920 over.  And yesterday, I became project admin.</p>
4921
4922 <p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian
4923 maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream
4924 project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly,
4925 collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place.
4926 I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git
4927 repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too.  If you got
4928 a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out
4929 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join
4930 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing
4931 list</a>. :)</p>
4932
4933       </div>
4934       <div class="tags">
4935
4936
4937         Tags: <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>.
4938
4939
4940       </div>
4941     </div>
4942     <div class="padding"></div>
4943
4944     <div class="entry">
4945       <div class="title">
4946         <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>
4947       </div>
4948       <div class="date">
4949         16th September 2014
4950       </div>
4951       <div class="body">
4952         <p>The <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> installer could be
4953 a lot quicker.  When we install more than 2000 packages in
4954 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> using
4955 tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever.
4956 A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in
4957 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/613428">bug #613428</a> about too
4958 much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package
4959 responsible for unpacking the binary packages.  Other parts (like code
4960 executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during
4961 installation.  All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to
4962 me.  If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try
4963 to salvage the half installed system.  So the failure sync-ing is
4964 supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really
4965 relevant while the installer is running.</p>
4966
4967 <p>A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file
4968 system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to
4969 change the code in several packages.  The idea is not new, but I have
4970 not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before.  It
4971 depend on the small and clever package
4972 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/eatmydata">eatmydata</a>, which
4973 uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to
4974 disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live
4975 dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly.  Instead of
4976 modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the
4977 packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages),
4978 it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace
4979 them with a simple shell wrapper calling
4980 "eatmydata&nbsp;$program&nbsp;$@", to get the same effect.
4981 Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple
4982 implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.</p>
4983
4984 <p>The effect was stunning.  In my first test it reduced the running
4985 time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44
4986 minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell
4987 Latitude D505 machine.  I am not quite sure what the optimised time
4988 would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf
4989 priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during
4990 installation.  As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation
4991 along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the
4992 installation.  I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie,
4993 and got these results.  The time measured is the time stamp in
4994 /var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the
4995 "pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement
4996 yourself.  In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the
4997 timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel
4998 dialog.</p>
4999
5000 <p><table>
5001
5002 <tr>
5003 <th>Machine/setup</th>
5004 <th>Original tasksel</th>
5005 <th>Optimised tasksel</th>
5006 <th>Reduction</th>
5007 </tr>
5008
5009 <tr>
5010 <td>Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE</td>
5011 <td>64 min (07:46-08:50)</td>
5012 <td><44 min (11:27-12:11)</td>
5013 <td>>20 min 18%</td>
5014 </tr>
5015
5016 <tr>
5017 <td>Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE</td>
5018 <td>57 min (08:48-09:45)</td>
5019 <td>34 min (07:43-08:17)</td>
5020 <td>23 min 40%</td>
5021 </tr>
5022
5023 <tr>
5024 <td>Latitude D505 Minimal</td>
5025 <td>22 min (10:37-10:59)</td>
5026 <td>11 min (11:16-11:27)</td>
5027 <td>11 min 50%</td>
5028 </tr>
5029
5030 <tr>
5031 <td>Thinkpad X200 Minimal</td>
5032 <td>6 min (08:19-08:25)</td>
5033 <td>4 min (08:04-08:08)</td>
5034 <td>2 min 33%</td>
5035 </tr>
5036
5037 <tr>
5038 <td>Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE</td>
5039 <td>19 min (09:21-09:40)</td>
5040 <td>15 min (10:25-10:40)</td>
5041 <td>4 min 21%</td>
5042 </tr>
5043
5044 </table></p>
5045
5046 <p>The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the
5047 time is spent downloading packages.  The connection to the Internet
5048 was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a
5049 significant factor in the measurement.  Download typically took a few
5050 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being
5051 installed.</p>
5052
5053 <p>The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in
5054 <a href="https://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/">Debian
5055 Installer</a>, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the
5056 finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the
5057 installation.  I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the
5058 post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the
5059 eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in
5060 Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO.  The
5061 negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this
5062 optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i.  If the code is
5063 moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger
5064 for the entire installation.</p>
5065
5066 <p>I've implemented this in the
5067 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-install">debian-edu-install</a>
5068 git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the
5069 Debian Edu installation.  If you want to test this yourself, you can
5070 create two files in the installer (or in an udeb).  One shell script
5071 need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:</p>
5072
5073 <p><blockquote><pre>
5074 #!/bin/sh
5075 set -e
5076 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5077 info() {
5078     logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
5079 }
5080 error() {
5081     logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
5082 }
5083 override_install() {
5084     apt-install eatmydata || true
5085     if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
5086         for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5087             file=/usr/bin/$bin
5088             # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
5089             if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
5090                 info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
5091                 printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
5092                     > /target$file.edu
5093                 chmod 755 /target$file.edu
5094                 in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5095                     --rename --quiet --add $file
5096                 ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
5097             else
5098                 error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
5099             fi
5100         done
5101     else
5102         error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
5103     fi
5104 }
5105
5106 override_install
5107 </pre></blockquote></p>
5108
5109 <p>To clean up, another shell script should go into
5110 /usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this:
5111
5112 <p><blockquote><pre>
5113 #! /bin/sh -e
5114 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5115 error() {
5116     logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
5117 }
5118 remove_install_override() {
5119     for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5120         file=/usr/bin/$bin
5121         if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
5122             rm /target$file
5123             in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5124                 --rename --quiet --remove $file
5125             rm /target$file.edu
5126         else
5127             error "Missing divert for $file."
5128         fi
5129     done
5130     sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
5131 }
5132
5133 remove_install_override
5134 </pre></blockquote></p>
5135
5136 <p>In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script
5137 edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and
5138 finish-install.d scripts.</p>
5139
5140 <p>By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal
5141 Debian installer too?  I suspect it should, but am not sure the
5142 current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough.  It also
5143 depend on the side effects of the change.  I'm not aware of any, but I
5144 guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing.
5145 Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and
5146 fsync() having effect?  Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to
5147 allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting
5148 everyone.</p>
5149
5150 <p>Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization
5151 will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of
5152 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">bug #702711</a>.  An updated
5153 eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.</p>
5154
5155 <p>Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and
5156 the optimization work again.  And I have discovered that the
5157 dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly
5158 simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package.  See
5159 tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.</p>
5160
5161 <p>Update 2014-11-11: Unfortunately, a new
5162 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/765738">bug #765738</a> in eatmydata only
5163 triggering on i386 made it into testing, and broke this installation
5164 optimization again.  If <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/768893">unblock
5165 request 768893</a> is accepted, it should be working again.</p>
5166
5167       </div>
5168       <div class="tags">
5169
5170
5171         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>.
5172
5173
5174       </div>
5175     </div>
5176     <div class="padding"></div>
5177
5178     <div class="entry">
5179       <div class="title">
5180         <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>
5181       </div>
5182       <div class="date">
5183         10th September 2014
5184       </div>
5185       <div class="body">
5186         <p>Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk with the
5187 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> about
5188 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20140909-sks-keyservers/">the
5189 OpenPGP keyserver pool sks-keyservers.net</a>, and was very happy to
5190 learn that there is a large set of publicly available key servers to
5191 use when looking for peoples public key.  So far I have used
5192 subkeys.pgp.net, and some times wwwkeys.nl.pgp.net when the former
5193 were misbehaving, but those days are ended.  The servers I have used
5194 up until yesterday have been slow and some times unavailable.  I hope
5195 those problems are gone now.</p>
5196
5197 <p>Behind the round robin DNS entry of the
5198 <a href="https://sks-keyservers.net/">sks-keyservers.net</a> service
5199 there is a pool of more than 100 keyservers which are checked every
5200 day to ensure they are well connected and up to date.  It must be
5201 better than what I have used so far. :)</p>
5202
5203 <p>Yesterdays speaker told me that the service is the default
5204 keyserver provided by the default configuration in GnuPG, but this do
5205 not seem to be used in Debian.  Perhaps it should?</p>
5206
5207 <p>Anyway, I've updated my ~/.gnupg/options file to now include this
5208 line:</p>
5209
5210 <p><blockquote><pre>
5211 keyserver pool.sks-keyservers.net
5212 </pre></blockquote></p>
5213
5214 <p>With GnuPG version 2 one can also locate the keyserver using SRV
5215 entries in DNS.  Just for fun, I did just that at work, so now every
5216 user of GnuPG at the University of Oslo should find a OpenGPG
5217 keyserver automatically should their need it:</p>
5218
5219 <p><blockquote><pre>
5220 % host -t srv _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no
5221 _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no has SRV record 0 100 11371 pool.sks-keyservers.net.
5222 %
5223 </pre></blockquote></p>
5224
5225 <p>Now if only
5226 <a href="http://ietfreport.isoc.org/idref/draft-shaw-openpgp-hkp/">the
5227 HKP lookup protocol</a> supported finding signature paths, I would be
5228 very happy.  It can look up a given key or search for a user ID, but I
5229 normally do not want that, but to find a trust path from my key to
5230 another key.  Given a user ID or key ID, I would like to find (and
5231 download) the keys representing a signature path from my key to the
5232 key in question, to be able to get a trust path between the two keys.
5233 This is as far as I can tell not possible today.  Perhaps something
5234 for a future version of the protocol?</p>
5235
5236       </div>
5237       <div class="tags">
5238
5239
5240         Tags: <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>.
5241
5242
5243       </div>
5244     </div>
5245     <div class="padding"></div>
5246
5247     <div class="entry">
5248       <div class="title">
5249         <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>
5250       </div>
5251       <div class="date">
5252         17th June 2014
5253       </div>
5254       <div class="body">
5255         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
5256 project</a> provide an instruction manual for teachers, system
5257 administrators and other users that contain useful tips for setting up
5258 and maintaining a Debian Edu installation.  This text is about how the
5259 text processing of this manual is handled in the project.</p>
5260
5261 <p>One goal of the project is to provide information in the native
5262 language of its users, and for this we need to handle translations.
5263 But we also want to make sure each language contain the same
5264 information, so for this we need a good way to keep the translations
5265 in sync.  And we want it to be easy for our users to improve the
5266 documentation, avoiding the need to learn special formats or tools to
5267 contribute, and the obvious way to do this is to make it possible to
5268 edit the documentation using a web browser.  We also want it to be
5269 easy for translators to keep the translation up to date, and give them
5270 help in figuring out what need to be translated. Here is the list of
5271 tools and the process we have found trying to reach all these
5272 goals.</p>
5273
5274 <p>We maintain the authoritative source of our manual in the
5275 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">Debian
5276 wiki</a>, as several wiki pages written in English.  It consist of one
5277 front page with references to the different chapters, several pages
5278 for each chapter, and finally one "collection page" gluing all the
5279 chapters together into one large web page (aka
5280 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/AllInOne">the
5281 AllInOne page</a>).  The AllInOne page is the one used for further
5282 processing and translations.  Thanks to the fact that the
5283 <a href="http://moinmo.in/">MoinMoin</a> installation on
5284 wiki.debian.org support exporting pages in
5285 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">the Docbook format</a>, we can fetch
5286 the list of pages to export using the raw version of the AllInOne
5287 page, loop over each of them to generate a Docbook XML version of the
5288 manual.  This process also download images and transform image
5289 references to use the locally downloaded images.  The generated
5290 Docbook XML files are slightly broken, so some post-processing is done
5291 using the <tt>documentation/scripts/get_manual</tt> program, and the
5292 result is a nice Docbook XML file (debian-edu-wheezy-manual.xml) and
5293 a handfull of images.  The XML file can now be used to generate PDF, HTML
5294 and epub versions of the English manual.  This is the basic step of
5295 our process, making PDF (using dblatex), HTML (using xsltproc) and
5296 epub (using dbtoepub) version from Docbook XML, and the resulting files
5297 are placed in the debian-edu-doc-en binary package.</p>
5298
5299 <p>But English documentation is not enough for us.  We want translated
5300 documentation too, and we want to make it easy for translators to
5301 track the English original.  For this we use the
5302 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/poxml.html">poxml</a> package,
5303 which allow us to transform the English Docbook XML file into a
5304 translation file (a .pot file), usable with the normal gettext based
5305 translation tools used by those translating free software.  The pot
5306 file is used to create and maintain translation files (several .po
5307 files), which the translations update with the native language
5308 translations of all titles, paragraphs and blocks of text in the
5309 original.  The next step is combining the original English Docbook XML
5310 and the translation file (say debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.po), to
5311 create a translated Docbook XML file (in this case
5312 debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.xml).  This translated (or partly
5313 translated, if the translation is not complete) Docbook XML file can
5314 then be used like the original to create a PDF, HTML and epub version
5315 of the documentation.</p>
5316
5317 <p>The translators use different tools to edit the .po files.  We
5318 recommend using
5319 <a href="http://www.kde.org/applications/development/lokalize/">lokalize</a>,
5320 while some use emacs and vi, others can use web based editors like
5321 <a href="http://pootle.translatehouse.org/">Poodle</a> or
5322 <a href="https://www.transifex.com/">Transifex</a>.  All we care about
5323 is where the .po file end up, in our git repository.  Updated
5324 translations can either be committed directly to git, or submitted as
5325 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/src:debian-edu-doc">bug reports
5326 against the debian-edu-doc package</a>.</p>
5327
5328 <p>One challenge is images, which both might need to be translated (if
5329 they show translated user applications), and are needed in different
5330 formats when creating PDF and HTML versions (epub is a HTML version in
5331 this regard).  For this we transform the original PNG images to the
5332 needed density and format during build, and have a way to provide
5333 translated images by storing translated versions in
5334 images/$LANGUAGECODE/.  I am a bit unsure about the details here.  The
5335 package maintainers know more.</p>
5336
5337 <p>If you wonder what the result look like, we provide
5338 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">the content
5339 of the documentation packages on the web</a>.  See for example the
5340 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/it/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.pdf">Italian
5341 PDF version</a> or the
5342 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/de/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.html">German
5343 HTML version</a>.  We do not yet build the epub version by default,
5344 but perhaps it will be done in the future.</p>
5345
5346 <p>To learn more, check out
5347 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-edu-doc.html">the
5348 debian-edu-doc package</a>,
5349 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">the
5350 manual on the wiki</a> and
5351 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/Translations">the
5352 translation instructions</a> in the manual.</p>
5353
5354       </div>
5355       <div class="tags">
5356
5357
5358         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>.
5359
5360
5361       </div>
5362     </div>
5363     <div class="padding"></div>
5364
5365     <div class="entry">
5366       <div class="title">
5367         <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>
5368       </div>
5369       <div class="date">
5370         23rd April 2014
5371       </div>
5372       <div class="body">
5373         <p>It would be nice if it was easier in Debian to get all the hardware
5374 related packages relevant for the computer installed automatically.
5375 So I implemented one, using
5376 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">my Isenkram
5377 package</a>.  To use it, install the tasksel and isenkram packages and
5378 run tasksel as user root.  You should be presented with a new option,
5379 "Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)".  When you
5380 select it, tasksel will install the packages isenkram claim is fit for
5381 the current hardware, hot pluggable or not.<p>
5382
5383 <p>The implementation is in two files, one is the tasksel menu entry
5384 description, and the other is the script used to extract the list of
5385 packages to install.  The first part is in
5386 <tt>/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc</tt> and look like
5387 this:</p>
5388
5389 <p><blockquote><pre>
5390 Task: isenkram
5391 Section: hardware
5392 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5393  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
5394  proposed.
5395 Test-new-install: mark show
5396 Relevance: 8
5397 Packages: for-current-hardware
5398 </pre></blockquote></p>
5399
5400 <p>The second part is in
5401 <tt>/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/for-current-hardware</tt> and look like
5402 this:</p>
5403
5404 <p><blockquote><pre>
5405 #!/bin/sh
5406 #
5407 (
5408     isenkram-lookup
5409     isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
5410 ) | sort -u
5411 </pre></blockquote></p>
5412
5413 <p>All in all, a very short and simple implementation making it
5414 trivial to install the hardware dependent package we all may want to
5415 have installed on our machines.  I've not been able to find a way to
5416 get tasksel to tell you exactly which packages it plan to install
5417 before doing the installation.  So if you are curious or careful,
5418 check the output from the isenkram-* command line tools first.</p>
5419
5420 <p>The information about which packages are handling which hardware is
5421 fetched either from the isenkram package itself in
5422 /usr/share/isenkram/, from git.debian.org or from the APT package
5423 database (using the Modaliases header).  The APT package database
5424 parsing have caused a nasty resource leak in the isenkram daemon (bugs
5425 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/719837">#719837</a> and
5426 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/730704">#730704</a>).  The cause is in
5427 the python-apt code (bug
5428 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/745487">#745487</a>), but using a
5429 workaround I was able to get rid of the file descriptor leak and
5430 reduce the memory leak from ~30 MiB per hardware detection down to
5431 around 2 MiB per hardware detection.  It should make the desktop
5432 daemon a lot more useful.  The fix is in version 0.7 uploaded to
5433 unstable today.</p>
5434
5435 <p>I believe the current way of mapping hardware to packages in
5436 Isenkram is is a good draft, but in the future I expect isenkram to
5437 use the AppStream data source for this.  A proposal for getting proper
5438 AppStream support into Debian is floating around as
5439 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a>, and
5440 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2014/Projects#SummerOfCode2014.2FProjects.2FAppStreamDEP11Implementation.AppStream.2FDEP-11_for_the_Debian_Archive">GSoC
5441 project</a> will take place this summer to improve the situation.  I
5442 look forward to seeing the result, and welcome patches for isenkram to
5443 start using the information when it is ready.</p>
5444
5445 <p>If you want your package to map to some specific hardware, either
5446 add a "Xb-Modaliases" header to your control file like I did in
5447 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">the pymissile
5448 package</a> or submit a bug report with the details to the isenkram
5449 package.  See also
5450 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">all my
5451 blog posts tagged isenkram</a> for details on the notation.  I expect
5452 the information will be migrated to AppStream eventually, but for the
5453 moment I got no better place to store it.</p>
5454
5455       </div>
5456       <div class="tags">
5457
5458
5459         Tags: <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>.
5460
5461
5462       </div>
5463     </div>
5464     <div class="padding"></div>
5465
5466     <div class="entry">
5467       <div class="title">
5468         <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>
5469       </div>
5470       <div class="date">
5471         15th April 2014
5472       </div>
5473       <div class="body">
5474         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
5475 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware to make
5476 it easy for non-technical people to host their data and communication
5477 at home, and being able to communicate with their friends and family
5478 encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It is still going strong, and
5479 today a major mile stone was reached.</p>
5480
5481 <p>Today, the last of the packages currently used by the project to
5482 created the system images were accepted into Debian Unstable.  It was
5483 the freedombox-setup package, which is used to configure the images
5484 during build and on the first boot.  Now all one need to get going is
5485 the build code from the freedom-maker git repository and packages from
5486 Debian.  And once the freedombox-setup package enter testing, we can
5487 build everything directly from Debian. :)</p>
5488
5489 <p>Some key packages used by Freedombox are
5490 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>,
5491 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/plinth">plinth</a>,
5492 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pagekite">pagekite</a>,
5493 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/tor">tor</a>,
5494 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>,
5495 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/owncloud">owncloud</a> and
5496 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/dnsmasq">dnsmasq</a>.  There
5497 are plans to integrate more packages into the setup.  User
5498 documentation is maintained on the Debian wiki.  Please
5499 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Manual/Jessie">check out
5500 the manual</a> and help us improve it.</p>
5501
5502 <p>To test for yourself and create boot images with the FreedomBox
5503 setup, run this on a Debian machine using a user with sudo rights to
5504 become root:</p>
5505
5506 <p><pre>
5507 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
5508   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
5509   u-boot-tools
5510 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
5511   freedom-maker
5512 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
5513 </pre></p>
5514
5515 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
5516 devices.  See the README in the freedom-maker git repo for more
5517 details on the build.  If you do not want all three images, trim the
5518 make line.  Note that the virtualbox-image target is not really
5519 virtualbox specific.  It create a x86 image usable in kvm, qemu,
5520 vmware and any other x86 virtual machine environment.  You might need
5521 the version of vmdebootstrap in Jessie to get the build working, as it
5522 include fixes for a race condition with kpartx.</p>
5523
5524 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
5525 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
5526 the preseed values:</p>
5527
5528 <p><pre>
5529 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
5530 </pre></p>
5531
5532 <p>I have not tested it myself the last few weeks, so I do not know if
5533 it still work.</p>
5534
5535 <p>If you wonder how to help, one task you could look at is using
5536 systemd as the boot system.  It will become the default for Linux in
5537 Jessie, so we need to make sure it is usable on the Freedombox.  I did
5538 a simple test a few weeks ago, and noticed dnsmasq failed to start
5539 during boot when using systemd.  I suspect there are other problems
5540 too. :) To detect problems, there is a test suite included, which can
5541 be run from the plinth web interface.</p>
5542
5543 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
5544 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
5545 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
5546 irc.debian.org)</a> and
5547 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
5548 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
5549
5550       </div>
5551       <div class="tags">
5552
5553
5554         Tags: <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>.
5555
5556
5557       </div>
5558     </div>
5559     <div class="padding"></div>
5560
5561     <div class="entry">
5562       <div class="title">
5563         <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>
5564       </div>
5565       <div class="date">
5566          9th April 2014
5567       </div>
5568       <div class="body">
5569         <p>For a while now, I have been looking for a sensible offsite backup
5570 solution for use at home.  My requirements are simple, it must be
5571 cheap and locally encrypted (in other words, I keep the encryption
5572 keys, the storage provider do not have access to my private files).
5573 One idea me and my friends had many years ago, before the cloud
5574 storage providers showed up, was to use Google mail as storage,
5575 writing a Linux block device storing blocks as emails in the mail
5576 service provided by Google, and thus get heaps of free space.  On top
5577 of this one can add encryption, RAID and volume management to have
5578 lots of (fairly slow, I admit that) cheap and encrypted storage.  But
5579 I never found time to implement such system.  But the last few weeks I
5580 have looked at a system called
5581 <a href="https://bitbucket.org/nikratio/s3ql/">S3QL</a>, a locally
5582 mounted network backed file system with the features I need.</p>
5583
5584 <p>S3QL is a fuse file system with a local cache and cloud storage,
5585 handling several different storage providers, any with Amazon S3,
5586 Google Drive or OpenStack API.  There are heaps of such storage
5587 providers.  S3QL can also use a local directory as storage, which
5588 combined with sshfs allow for file storage on any ssh server.  S3QL
5589 include support for encryption, compression, de-duplication, snapshots
5590 and immutable file systems, allowing me to mount the remote storage as
5591 a local mount point, look at and use the files as if they were local,
5592 while the content is stored in the cloud as well.  This allow me to
5593 have a backup that should survive fire.  The file system can not be
5594 shared between several machines at the same time, as only one can
5595 mount it at the time, but any machine with the encryption key and
5596 access to the storage service can mount it if it is unmounted.</p>
5597
5598 <p>It is simple to use.  I'm using it on Debian Wheezy, where the
5599 package is included already.  So to get started, run <tt>apt-get
5600 install s3ql</tt>.  Next, pick a storage provider.  I ended up picking
5601 Greenqloud, after reading their nice recipe on
5602 <a href="https://greenqloud.zendesk.com/entries/44611757-How-To-Use-S3QL-to-mount-a-StorageQloud-bucket-on-Debian-Wheezy">how
5603 to use S3QL with their Amazon S3 service</a>, because I trust the laws
5604 in Iceland more than those in USA when it come to keeping my personal
5605 data safe and private, and thus would rather spend money on a company
5606 in Iceland.  Another nice recipe is available from the article
5607 <a href="http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/Articles/HPC-Cloud-Storage">S3QL
5608 Filesystem for HPC Storage</a> by Jeff Layton in the HPC section of
5609 Admin magazine.  When the provider is picked, figure out how to get
5610 the API key needed to connect to the storage API.  With Greencloud,
5611 the key did not show up until I had added payment details to my
5612 account.</p>
5613
5614 <p>Armed with the API access details, it is time to create the file
5615 system.  First, create a new bucket in the cloud.  This bucket is the
5616 file system storage area.  I picked a bucket name reflecting the
5617 machine that was going to store data there, but any name will do.
5618 I'll refer to it as <tt>bucket-name</tt> below.  In addition, one need
5619 the API login and password, and a locally created password.  Store it
5620 all in ~root/.s3ql/authinfo2 like this:
5621
5622 <p><blockquote><pre>
5623 [s3c]
5624 storage-url: s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5625 backend-login: API-login
5626 backend-password: API-password
5627 fs-passphrase: local-password
5628 </pre></blockquote></p>
5629
5630 <p>I create my local passphrase using <tt>pwget 50</tt> or similar,
5631 but any sensible way to create a fairly random password should do it.
5632 Armed with these details, it is now time to run mkfs, entering the API
5633 details and password to create it:</p>
5634
5635 <p><blockquote><pre>
5636 # mkdir -m 700 /var/lib/s3ql-cache
5637 # mkfs.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5638   --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5639 Enter backend login:
5640 Enter backend password:
5641 Before using S3QL, make sure to read the user's guide, especially
5642 the 'Important Rules to Avoid Loosing Data' section.
5643 Enter encryption password:
5644 Confirm encryption password:
5645 Generating random encryption key...
5646 Creating metadata tables...
5647 Dumping metadata...
5648 ..objects..
5649 ..blocks..
5650 ..inodes..
5651 ..inode_blocks..
5652 ..symlink_targets..
5653 ..names..
5654 ..contents..
5655 ..ext_attributes..
5656 Compressing and uploading metadata...
5657 Wrote 0.00 MB of compressed metadata.
5658 # </pre></blockquote></p>
5659
5660 <p>The next step is mounting the file system to make the storage available.
5661
5662 <p><blockquote><pre>
5663 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5664   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
5665 Using 4 upload threads.
5666 Downloading and decompressing metadata...
5667 Reading metadata...
5668 ..objects..
5669 ..blocks..
5670 ..inodes..
5671 ..inode_blocks..
5672 ..symlink_targets..
5673 ..names..
5674 ..contents..
5675 ..ext_attributes..
5676 Mounting filesystem...
5677 # df -h /s3ql
5678 Filesystem                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
5679 s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name  1.0T     0  1.0T   0% /s3ql
5680 #
5681 </pre></blockquote></p>
5682
5683 <p>The file system is now ready for use.  I use rsync to store my
5684 backups in it, and as the metadata used by rsync is downloaded at
5685 mount time, no network traffic (and storage cost) is triggered by
5686 running rsync.  To unmount, one should not use the normal umount
5687 command, as this will not flush the cache to the cloud storage, but
5688 instead running the umount.s3ql command like this:
5689
5690 <p><blockquote><pre>
5691 # umount.s3ql /s3ql
5692 #
5693 </pre></blockquote></p>
5694
5695 <p>There is a fsck command available to check the file system and
5696 correct any problems detected.  This can be used if the local server
5697 crashes while the file system is mounted, to reset the "already
5698 mounted" flag.  This is what it look like when processing a working
5699 file system:</p>
5700
5701 <p><blockquote><pre>
5702 # fsck.s3ql --force --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
5703 Using cached metadata.
5704 File system seems clean, checking anyway.
5705 Checking DB integrity...
5706 Creating temporary extra indices...
5707 Checking lost+found...
5708 Checking cached objects...
5709 Checking names (refcounts)...
5710 Checking contents (names)...
5711 Checking contents (inodes)...
5712 Checking contents (parent inodes)...
5713 Checking objects (reference counts)...
5714 Checking objects (backend)...
5715 ..processed 5000 objects so far..
5716 ..processed 10000 objects so far..
5717 ..processed 15000 objects so far..
5718 Checking objects (sizes)...
5719 Checking blocks (referenced objects)...
5720 Checking blocks (refcounts)...
5721 Checking inode-block mapping (blocks)...
5722 Checking inode-block mapping (inodes)...
5723 Checking inodes (refcounts)...
5724 Checking inodes (sizes)...
5725 Checking extended attributes (names)...
5726 Checking extended attributes (inodes)...
5727 Checking symlinks (inodes)...
5728 Checking directory reachability...
5729 Checking unix conventions...
5730 Checking referential integrity...
5731 Dropping temporary indices...
5732 Backing up old metadata...
5733 Dumping metadata...
5734 ..objects..
5735 ..blocks..
5736 ..inodes..
5737 ..inode_blocks..
5738 ..symlink_targets..
5739 ..names..
5740 ..contents..
5741 ..ext_attributes..
5742 Compressing and uploading metadata...
5743 Wrote 0.89 MB of compressed metadata.
5744 #
5745 </pre></blockquote></p>
5746
5747 <p>Thanks to the cache, working on files that fit in the cache is very
5748 quick, about the same speed as local file access.  Uploading large
5749 amount of data is to me limited by the bandwidth out of and into my
5750 house.  Uploading 685 MiB with a 100 MiB cache gave me 305 kiB/s,
5751 which is very close to my upload speed, and downloading the same
5752 Debian installation ISO gave me 610 kiB/s, close to my download speed.
5753 Both were measured using <tt>dd</tt>.  So for me, the bottleneck is my
5754 network, not the file system code.  I do not know what a good cache
5755 size would be, but suspect that the cache should e larger than your
5756 working set.</p>
5757
5758 <p>I mentioned that only one machine can mount the file system at the
5759 time.  If another machine try, it is told that the file system is
5760 busy:</p>
5761
5762 <p><blockquote><pre>
5763 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
5764   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
5765 Using 8 upload threads.
5766 Backend reports that fs is still mounted elsewhere, aborting.
5767 #
5768 </pre></blockquote></p>
5769
5770 <p>The file content is uploaded when the cache is full, while the
5771 metadata is uploaded once every 24 hour by default.  To ensure the
5772 file system content is flushed to the cloud, one can either umount the
5773 file system, or ask S3QL to flush the cache and metadata using
5774 s3qlctrl:
5775
5776 <p><blockquote><pre>
5777 # s3qlctrl upload-meta /s3ql
5778 # s3qlctrl flushcache /s3ql
5779 #
5780 </pre></blockquote></p>
5781
5782 <p>If you are curious about how much space your data uses in the
5783 cloud, and how much compression and deduplication cut down on the
5784 storage usage, you can use s3qlstat on the mounted file system to get
5785 a report:</p>
5786
5787 <p><blockquote><pre>
5788 # s3qlstat /s3ql
5789 Directory entries:    9141
5790 Inodes:               9143
5791 Data blocks:          8851
5792 Total data size:      22049.38 MB
5793 After de-duplication: 21955.46 MB (99.57% of total)
5794 After compression:    21877.28 MB (99.22% of total, 99.64% of de-duplicated)
5795 Database size:        2.39 MB (uncompressed)
5796 (some values do not take into account not-yet-uploaded dirty blocks in cache)
5797 #
5798 </pre></blockquote></p>
5799
5800 <p>I mentioned earlier that there are several possible suppliers of
5801 storage.  I did not try to locate them all, but am aware of at least
5802 <a href="https://www.greenqloud.com/">Greenqloud</a>,
5803 <a href="http://drive.google.com/">Google Drive</a>,
5804 <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/">Amazon S3 web serivces</a>,
5805 <a href="http://www.rackspace.com/">Rackspace</a> and
5806 <a href="http://crowncloud.net/">Crowncloud</A>.  The latter even
5807 accept payment in Bitcoin.  Pick one that suit your need.  Some of
5808 them provide several GiB of free storage, but the prize models are
5809 quite different and you will have to figure out what suits you
5810 best.</p>
5811
5812 <p>While researching this blog post, I had a look at research papers
5813 and posters discussing the S3QL file system.  There are several, which
5814 told me that the file system is getting a critical check by the
5815 science community and increased my confidence in using it.  One nice
5816 poster is titled
5817 "<a href="http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/adtsc/publications/science_highlights_2013/docs/pg68_69.pdf">An
5818 Innovative Parallel Cloud Storage System using OpenStack’s SwiftObject
5819 Store and Transformative Parallel I/O Approach</a>" by Hsing-Bung
5820 Chen, Benjamin McClelland, David Sherrill, Alfred Torrez, Parks Fields
5821 and Pamela Smith.  Please  have a look.</p>
5822
5823 <p>Given my problems with different file systems earlier, I decided to
5824 check out the mounted S3QL file system to see if it would be usable as
5825 a home directory (in other word, that it provided POSIX semantics when
5826 it come to locking and umask handling etc).  Running
5827 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">my
5828 test code to check file system semantics</a>, I was happy to discover that
5829 no error was found.  So the file system can be used for home
5830 directories, if one chooses to do so.</p>
5831
5832 <p>If you do not want a locally file system, and want something that
5833 work without the Linux fuse file system, I would like to mention the
5834 <a href="http://www.tarsnap.com/">Tarsnap service</a>, which also
5835 provide locally encrypted backup using a command line client.  It have
5836 a nicer access control system, where one can split out read and write
5837 access, allowing some systems to write to the backup and others to
5838 only read from it.</p>
5839
5840 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
5841 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
5842 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
5843
5844       </div>
5845       <div class="tags">
5846
5847
5848         Tags: <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>.
5849
5850
5851       </div>
5852     </div>
5853     <div class="padding"></div>
5854
5855     <div class="entry">
5856       <div class="title">
5857         <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>
5858       </div>
5859       <div class="date">
5860         14th March 2014
5861       </div>
5862       <div class="body">
5863         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
5864 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware for
5865 making it easy for non-technical people to host their data and
5866 communication at home, and being able to communicate with their
5867 friends and family encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It has been
5868 going on for a while, and is slowly progressing towards a new test
5869 release (0.2).</p>
5870
5871 <p>And what day could be better than the Pi day to announce that the
5872 new version will provide "hard drive" / SD card / USB stick images for
5873 Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and VirtualBox (or any other virtualization
5874 system), and can also be installed using a Debian installer preseed
5875 file.  The Debian based Freedombox is now based on Debian Jessie,
5876 where most of the needed packages used are already present.  Only one,
5877 the freedombox-setup package, is missing.  To try to build your own
5878 boot image to test the current status, fetch the freedom-maker scripts
5879 and build using
5880 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/vmdebootstrap">vmdebootstrap</a>
5881 with a user with sudo access to become root:
5882
5883 <pre>
5884 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
5885   freedom-maker
5886 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
5887   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
5888   u-boot-tools
5889 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
5890 </pre>
5891
5892 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
5893 devices.  See the README for more details on the build. If you do not
5894 want all three images, trim the make line.  But note that thanks to <a
5895 href="https://bugs.debian.org/741407">a race condition in
5896 vmdebootstrap</a>, the build might fail without the patch to the
5897 kpartx call.</p>
5898
5899 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
5900 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
5901 the preseed values:</p>
5902
5903 <pre>
5904 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
5905 </pre>
5906
5907 <p>But note that due to <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/740673">a
5908 recently introduced bug in apt in Jessie</a>, the installer will
5909 currently hang while setting up APT sources.  Killing the
5910 '<tt>apt-cdrom ident</tt>' process when it hang a few times during the
5911 installation will get the installation going.  This affect all
5912 installations in Jessie, and I expect it will be fixed soon.</p>
5913
5914 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
5915 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
5916 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
5917 irc.debian.org)</a> and
5918 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
5919 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
5920
5921       </div>
5922       <div class="tags">
5923
5924
5925         Tags: <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>.
5926
5927
5928       </div>
5929     </div>
5930     <div class="padding"></div>
5931
5932     <div class="entry">
5933       <div class="title">
5934         <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>
5935       </div>
5936       <div class="date">
5937         22nd February 2014
5938       </div>
5939       <div class="body">
5940         <p>Many years ago, I wrote a GPL licensed version of the netgroup and
5941 innetgr tools, because I needed them in
5942 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>.  I called the project
5943 ng-utils, and it has served me well.  I placed the project under the
5944 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/">Hungry Programmer</a> umbrella, and it was maintained in our CVS
5945 repository.  But many years ago, the CVS repository was dropped (lost,
5946 not migrated to new hardware, not sure), and the project have lacked a
5947 proper home since then.</p>
5948
5949 <p>Last summer, I had a look at the package and made a new release
5950 fixing a irritating crash bug, but was unable to store the changes in
5951 a proper source control system.  I applied for a project on
5952 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/">Alioth</a>, but did not have time
5953 to follow up on it.  Until today. :)</p>
5954
5955 <p>After many hours of cleaning and migration, the ng-utils project
5956 now have a new home, and a git repository with the highlight of the
5957 history of the project.  I published all release tarballs and imported
5958 them into the git repository.  As the project is really stable and not
5959 expected to gain new features any time soon, I decided to make a new
5960 release and call it 1.0.  Visit the new project home on
5961 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/">https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/</a>
5962 if you want to check it out.  The new version is also uploaded into
5963 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/ng-utils.html">Debian Unstable</a>.</p>
5964
5965       </div>
5966       <div class="tags">
5967
5968
5969         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5970
5971
5972       </div>
5973     </div>
5974     <div class="padding"></div>
5975
5976     <div class="entry">
5977       <div class="title">
5978         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_sysvinit_from_experimental_in_Debian_Hurd.html">Testing sysvinit from experimental in Debian Hurd</a>
5979       </div>
5980       <div class="date">
5981          3rd February 2014
5982       </div>
5983       <div class="body">
5984         <p>A few days ago I decided to try to help the Hurd people to get
5985 their changes into sysvinit, to allow them to use the normal sysvinit
5986 boot system instead of their old one.  This follow up on the
5987 <a href="https://teythoon.cryptobitch.de//categories/gsoc.html">great
5988 Google Summer of Code work</a> done last summer by Justus Winter to
5989 get Debian on Hurd working more like Debian on Linux.  To get started,
5990 I downloaded a prebuilt hard disk image from
5991 <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>,
5992 and started it using virt-manager.</p>
5993
5994 <p>The first think I had to do after logging in (root without any
5995 password) was to get the network operational.  I followed
5996 <a href="https://www.debian.org/ports/hurd/hurd-install">the
5997 instructions on the Debian GNU/Hurd ports page</a> and ran these
5998 commands as root to get the machine to accept a IP address from the
5999 kvm internal DHCP server:</p>
6000
6001 <p><blockquote><pre>
6002 settrans -fgap /dev/netdde /hurd/netdde
6003 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[p]finet/ { print $2}')
6004 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[d]evnode/ { print $2}')
6005 dhclient /dev/eth0
6006 </pre></blockquote></p>
6007
6008 <p>After this, the machine had internet connectivity, and I could
6009 upgrade it and install the sysvinit packages from experimental and
6010 enable it as the default boot system in Hurd.</p>
6011
6012 <p>But before I did that, I set a password on the root user, as ssh is
6013 running on the machine it for ssh login to work a password need to be
6014 set.  Also, note that a bug somewhere in openssh on Hurd block
6015 compression from working.  Remember to turn that off on the client
6016 side.</p>
6017
6018 <p>Run these commands as root to upgrade and test the new sysvinit
6019 stuff:</p>
6020
6021 <p><blockquote><pre>
6022 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/experimental.list &lt;&lt;EOF
6023 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ experimental main
6024 EOF
6025 apt-get update
6026 apt-get dist-upgrade
6027 apt-get install -t experimental initscripts sysv-rc sysvinit \
6028     sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils
6029 update-alternatives --config runsystem
6030 </pre></blockquote></p>
6031
6032 <p>To reboot after switching boot system, you have to use
6033 <tt>reboot-hurd</tt> instead of just <tt>reboot</tt>, as there is not
6034 yet a sysvinit process able to receive the signals from the normal
6035 'reboot' command.  After switching to sysvinit as the boot system,
6036 upgrading every package and rebooting, the network come up with DHCP
6037 after boot as it should, and the settrans/pkill hack mentioned at the
6038 start is no longer needed.  But for some strange reason, there are no
6039 longer any login prompt in the virtual console, so I logged in using
6040 ssh instead.
6041
6042 <p>Note that there are some race conditions in Hurd making the boot
6043 fail some times.  No idea what the cause is, but hope the Hurd porters
6044 figure it out.  At least Justus said on IRC (#debian-hurd on
6045 irc.debian.org) that they are aware of the problem.  A way to reduce
6046 the impact is to upgrade to the Hurd packages built by Justus by
6047 adding this repository to the machine:</p>
6048
6049 <p><blockquote><pre>
6050 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/hurd-ci.list &lt;&lt;EOF
6051 deb http://darnassus.sceen.net/~teythoon/hurd-ci/ sid main
6052 EOF
6053 </pre></blockquote></p>
6054
6055 <p>At the moment the prebuilt virtual machine get some packages from
6056 http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian, because some of the packages in
6057 unstable do not yet include the required patches that are lingering in
6058 BTS.  This is the completely list of "unofficial" packages installed:</p>
6059
6060 <p><blockquote><pre>
6061 # aptitude search '?narrow(?version(CURRENT),?origin(Debian Ports))'
6062 i   emacs                   - GNU Emacs editor (metapackage)
6063 i   gdb                     - GNU Debugger
6064 i   hurd-recommended        - Miscellaneous translators
6065 i   isc-dhcp-client         - ISC DHCP client
6066 i   isc-dhcp-common         - common files used by all the isc-dhcp* packages
6067 i   libc-bin                - Embedded GNU C Library: Binaries
6068 i   libc-dev-bin            - Embedded GNU C Library: Development binaries
6069 i   libc0.3                 - Embedded GNU C Library: Shared libraries
6070 i A libc0.3-dbg             - Embedded GNU C Library: detached debugging symbols
6071 i   libc0.3-dev             - Embedded GNU C Library: Development Libraries and Hea
6072 i   multiarch-support       - Transitional package to ensure multiarch compatibilit
6073 i A x11-common              - X Window System (X.Org) infrastructure
6074 i   xorg                    - X.Org X Window System
6075 i A xserver-xorg            - X.Org X server
6076 i A xserver-xorg-input-all  - X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
6077 #
6078 </pre></blockquote></p>
6079
6080 <p>All in all, testing hurd has been an interesting experience. :)
6081 X.org did not work out of the box and I never took the time to follow
6082 the porters instructions to fix it.  This time I was interested in the
6083 command line stuff.<p>
6084
6085       </div>
6086       <div class="tags">
6087
6088
6089         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>.
6090
6091
6092       </div>
6093     </div>
6094     <div class="padding"></div>
6095
6096     <div class="entry">
6097       <div class="title">
6098         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html">New chrpath release 0.16</a>
6099       </div>
6100       <div class="date">
6101         14th January 2014
6102       </div>
6103       <div class="body">
6104         <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to
6105 find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code
6106 analysis.  It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very
6107 useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of
6108 the source.  The company behind it provide
6109 <a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as
6110 a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are
6111 already checked.  A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at
6112 the Coverity system, and discovered that the
6113 <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and
6114 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a>
6115 projects I am involved with was already registered.  But these are
6116 fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to
6117 check, and decided to <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request
6118 checking of the chrpath project</a>.  It was
6119 added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects.  Six of
6120 these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an
6121 error.  Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction
6122 of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it
6123 is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in
6124 the future end up in a library.  Having fixed all defects and added
6125 <a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a
6126 mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to
6127 publish a new release.  These are the release notes:</p>
6128
6129 <p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p>
6130
6131 <ul>
6132
6133   <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li>
6134   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li>
6135   <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li>
6136
6137 </ul>
6138
6139 <p>You can
6140 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
6141 new version 0.16 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
6142 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
6143 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
6144 include a test suite check.</p>
6145
6146       </div>
6147       <div class="tags">
6148
6149
6150         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>.
6151
6152
6153       </div>
6154     </div>
6155     <div class="padding"></div>
6156
6157     <div class="entry">
6158       <div class="title">
6159         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html">New chrpath release 0.15</a>
6160       </div>
6161       <div class="date">
6162         24th November 2013
6163       </div>
6164       <div class="body">
6165         <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that
6166 development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my
6167 acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath,
6168 the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already
6169 compiled ELF programs.  The update was triggered by the persistence of
6170 Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get
6171 support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he
6172 is working on.  I checked the
6173 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>,
6174 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and
6175 <a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a>
6176 packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from
6177 OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes.
6178 These are the release notes:</p>
6179
6180 <p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p>
6181
6182 <ul>
6183
6184   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work
6185    with newer architectures.  Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads
6186    up.</li>
6187
6188   <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li>
6189
6190   <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and
6191    Matthias Klose.</li>
6192
6193   <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by
6194    Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li>
6195
6196   <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in
6197    .dynamic is a NULL terminated string.  Based on patch found in
6198    Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li>
6199
6200 </ul>
6201
6202 <p>You can
6203 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
6204 new version 0.15 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
6205 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
6206 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
6207 include a testsuite check.</p>
6208
6209       </div>
6210       <div class="tags">
6211
6212
6213         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>.
6214
6215
6216       </div>
6217     </div>
6218     <div class="padding"></div>
6219
6220     <div class="entry">
6221       <div class="title">
6222         <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>
6223       </div>
6224       <div class="date">
6225          2nd November 2013
6226       </div>
6227       <div class="body">
6228         <p>If one of the points of switching to a new init system in Debian is
6229 <a href="http://thomas.goirand.fr/blog/?p=147">to get rid of huge
6230 init.d scripts</a>, I doubt we need to switch away from sysvinit and
6231 init.d scripts at all.  Here is an example init.d script, ie a rewrite
6232 of /etc/init.d/rsyslog:</p>
6233
6234 <p><pre>
6235 #!/lib/init/init-d-script
6236 ### BEGIN INIT INFO
6237 # Provides:          rsyslog
6238 # Required-Start:    $remote_fs $time
6239 # Required-Stop:     umountnfs $time
6240 # X-Stop-After:      sendsigs
6241 # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
6242 # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
6243 # Short-Description: enhanced syslogd
6244 # Description:       Rsyslog is an enhanced multi-threaded syslogd.
6245 #                    It is quite compatible to stock sysklogd and can be
6246 #                    used as a drop-in replacement.
6247 ### END INIT INFO
6248 DESC="enhanced syslogd"
6249 DAEMON=/usr/sbin/rsyslogd
6250 </pre></p>
6251
6252 <p>Pretty minimalistic to me... For the record, the original sysv-rc
6253 script was 137 lines, and the above is just 15 lines, most of it meta
6254 info/comments.</p>
6255
6256 <p>How to do this, you ask?  Well, one create a new script
6257 /lib/init/init-d-script looking something like this:
6258
6259 <p><pre>
6260 #!/bin/sh
6261
6262 # Define LSB log_* functions.
6263 # Depend on lsb-base (>= 3.2-14) to ensure that this file is present
6264 # and status_of_proc is working.
6265 . /lib/lsb/init-functions
6266
6267 #
6268 # Function that starts the daemon/service
6269
6270 #
6271 do_start()
6272 {
6273         # Return
6274         #   0 if daemon has been started
6275         #   1 if daemon was already running
6276         #   2 if daemon could not be started
6277         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON --test > /dev/null \
6278                 || return 1
6279         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON -- \
6280                 $DAEMON_ARGS \
6281                 || return 2
6282         # Add code here, if necessary, that waits for the process to be ready
6283         # to handle requests from services started subsequently which depend
6284         # on this one.  As a last resort, sleep for some time.
6285 }
6286
6287 #
6288 # Function that stops the daemon/service
6289 #
6290 do_stop()
6291 {
6292         # Return
6293         #   0 if daemon has been stopped
6294         #   1 if daemon was already stopped
6295         #   2 if daemon could not be stopped
6296         #   other if a failure occurred
6297         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --retry=TERM/30/KILL/5 --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
6298         RETVAL="$?"
6299         [ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2
6300         # Wait for children to finish too if this is a daemon that forks
6301         # and if the daemon is only ever run from this initscript.
6302         # If the above conditions are not satisfied then add some other code
6303         # that waits for the process to drop all resources that could be
6304         # needed by services started subsequently.  A last resort is to
6305         # sleep for some time.
6306         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --retry=0/30/KILL/5 --exec $DAEMON
6307         [ "$?" = 2 ] && return 2
6308         # Many daemons don't delete their pidfiles when they exit.
6309         rm -f $PIDFILE
6310         return "$RETVAL"
6311 }
6312
6313 #
6314 # Function that sends a SIGHUP to the daemon/service
6315 #
6316 do_reload() {
6317         #
6318         # If the daemon can reload its configuration without
6319         # restarting (for example, when it is sent a SIGHUP),
6320         # then implement that here.
6321         #
6322         start-stop-daemon --stop --signal 1 --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
6323         return 0
6324 }
6325
6326 SCRIPTNAME=$1
6327 scriptbasename="$(basename $1)"
6328 echo "SN: $scriptbasename"
6329 if [ "$scriptbasename" != "init-d-library" ] ; then
6330     script="$1"
6331     shift
6332     . $script
6333 else
6334     exit 0
6335 fi
6336
6337 NAME=$(basename $DAEMON)
6338 PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
6339
6340 # Exit if the package is not installed
6341 #[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0
6342
6343 # Read configuration variable file if it is present
6344 [ -r /etc/default/$NAME ] && . /etc/default/$NAME
6345
6346 # Load the VERBOSE setting and other rcS variables
6347 . /lib/init/vars.sh
6348
6349 case "$1" in
6350   start)
6351         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
6352         do_start
6353         case "$?" in
6354                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
6355                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
6356         esac
6357         ;;
6358   stop)
6359         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
6360         do_stop
6361         case "$?" in
6362                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
6363                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
6364         esac
6365         ;;
6366   status)
6367         status_of_proc "$DAEMON" "$NAME" && exit 0 || exit $?
6368         ;;
6369   #reload|force-reload)
6370         #
6371         # If do_reload() is not implemented then leave this commented out
6372         # and leave 'force-reload' as an alias for 'restart'.
6373         #
6374         #log_daemon_msg "Reloading $DESC" "$NAME"
6375         #do_reload
6376         #log_end_msg $?
6377         #;;
6378   restart|force-reload)
6379         #
6380         # If the "reload" option is implemented then remove the
6381         # 'force-reload' alias
6382         #
6383         log_daemon_msg "Restarting $DESC" "$NAME"
6384         do_stop
6385         case "$?" in
6386           0|1)
6387                 do_start
6388                 case "$?" in
6389                         0) log_end_msg 0 ;;
6390                         1) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Old process is still running
6391                         *) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Failed to start
6392                 esac
6393                 ;;
6394           *)
6395                 # Failed to stop
6396                 log_end_msg 1
6397                 ;;
6398         esac
6399         ;;
6400   *)
6401         echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|status|restart|force-reload}" >&2
6402         exit 3
6403         ;;
6404 esac
6405
6406 :
6407 </pre></p>
6408
6409 <p>It is based on /etc/init.d/skeleton, and could be improved quite a
6410 lot.  I did not really polish the approach, so it might not always
6411 work out of the box, but you get the idea.  I did not try very hard to
6412 optimize it nor make it more robust either.</p>
6413
6414 <p>A better argument for switching init system in Debian than reducing
6415 the size of init scripts (which is a good thing to do anyway), is to
6416 get boot system that is able to handle the kernel events sensibly and
6417 robustly, and do not depend on the boot to run sequentially.  The boot
6418 and the kernel have not behaved sequentially in years.</p>
6419
6420       </div>
6421       <div class="tags">
6422
6423
6424         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>.
6425
6426
6427       </div>
6428     </div>
6429     <div class="padding"></div>
6430
6431     <div class="entry">
6432       <div class="title">
6433         <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>
6434       </div>
6435       <div class="date">
6436          1st November 2013
6437       </div>
6438       <div class="body">
6439         <p><a href="http://www.spice-space.org/">The SPICE protocol</a> for
6440 remote display access is the preferred solution with oVirt and RedHat
6441 Enterprise Virtualization, and I was sad to discover the other day
6442 that the browser plugin needed to use these systems seamlessly was
6443 missing in Debian.  The <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/668284">request
6444 for a package</a> was from 2012-04-10 with no progress since
6445 2013-04-01, so I decided to wrap up a package based on the great work
6446 from Cajus Pollmeier and put it in a collab-maint maintained git
6447 repository to get a package I could use.  I would very much like
6448 others to help me maintain the package (or just take over, I do not
6449 mind), but as no-one had volunteered so far, I just uploaded it to
6450 NEW.  I hope it will be available in Debian in a few days.</p>
6451
6452 <p>The source is now available from
6453 <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>
6454
6455       </div>
6456       <div class="tags">
6457
6458
6459         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6460
6461
6462       </div>
6463     </div>
6464     <div class="padding"></div>
6465
6466     <div class="entry">
6467       <div class="title">
6468         <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>
6469       </div>
6470       <div class="date">
6471         27th October 2013
6472       </div>
6473       <div class="body">
6474         <p>The
6475 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/v/vmdebootstrap.html">vmdebootstrap</a>
6476 program is a a very nice system to create virtual machine images.  It
6477 create a image file, add a partition table, mount it and run
6478 debootstrap in the mounted directory to create a Debian system on a
6479 stick.  Yesterday, I decided to try to teach it how to make images for
6480 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi</a>, as part
6481 of a plan to simplify the build system for
6482 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the FreedomBox
6483 project</a>.  The FreedomBox project already uses vmdebootstrap for
6484 the virtualbox images, but its current build system made multistrap
6485 based system for Dreamplug images, and it is lacking support for
6486 Raspberry Pi.</p>
6487
6488 <p>Armed with the knowledge on how to build "foreign" (aka non-native
6489 architecture) chroots for Raspberry Pi, I dived into the vmdebootstrap
6490 code and adjusted it to be able to build armel images on my amd64
6491 Debian laptop.  I ended up giving vmdebootstrap five new options,
6492 allowing me to replicate the image creation process I use to make
6493 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">Debian
6494 Jessie based mesh node images for the Raspberry Pi</a>.  First, the
6495 <tt>--foreign /path/to/binfm_handler</tt> option tell vmdebootstrap to
6496 call debootstrap with --foreign and to copy the handler into the
6497 generated chroot before running the second stage.  This allow
6498 vmdebootstrap to create armel images on an amd64 host.  Next I added
6499 two new options <tt>--bootsize size</tt> and <tt>--boottype
6500 fstype</tt> to teach it to create a separate /boot/ partition with the
6501 given file system type, allowing me to create an image with a vfat
6502 partition for the /boot/ stuff.  I also added a <tt>--variant
6503 variant</tt> option to allow me to create smaller images without the
6504 Debian base system packages installed.  Finally, I added an option
6505 <tt>--no-extlinux</tt> to tell vmdebootstrap to not install extlinux
6506 as a boot loader.  It is not needed on the Raspberry Pi and probably
6507 most other non-x86 architectures.  The changes were accepted by the
6508 upstream author of vmdebootstrap yesterday and today, and is now
6509 available from
6510 <a href="http://git.liw.fi/cgi-bin/cgit/cgit.cgi/vmdebootstrap/">the
6511 upstream project page</a>.</p>
6512
6513 <p>To use it to build a Raspberry Pi image using Debian Jessie, first
6514 create a small script (the customize script) to add the non-free
6515 binary blob needed to boot the Raspberry Pi and the APT source
6516 list:</p>
6517
6518 <p><pre>
6519 #!/bin/sh
6520 set -e # Exit on first error
6521 rootdir="$1"
6522 cd "$rootdir"
6523 cat &lt;&lt;EOF > etc/apt/sources.list
6524 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
6525 EOF
6526 # Install non-free binary blob needed to boot Raspberry Pi.  This
6527 # install a kernel somewhere too.
6528 wget https://raw.github.com/Hexxeh/rpi-update/master/rpi-update \
6529     -O $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
6530 chmod a+x $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
6531 mkdir -p $rootdir/lib/modules
6532 touch $rootdir/boot/start.elf
6533 chroot $rootdir rpi-update
6534 </pre></p>
6535
6536 <p>Next, fetch the latest vmdebootstrap script and call it like this
6537 to build the image:</p>
6538
6539 <pre>
6540 sudo ./vmdebootstrap \
6541     --variant minbase \
6542     --arch armel \
6543     --distribution jessie \
6544     --mirror http://http.debian.net/debian \
6545     --image test.img \
6546     --size 600M \
6547     --bootsize 64M \
6548     --boottype vfat \
6549     --log-level debug \
6550     --verbose \
6551     --no-kernel \
6552     --no-extlinux \
6553     --root-password raspberry \
6554     --hostname raspberrypi \
6555     --foreign /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static \
6556     --customize `pwd`/customize \
6557     --package netbase \
6558     --package git-core \
6559     --package binutils \
6560     --package ca-certificates \
6561     --package wget \
6562     --package kmod
6563 </pre></p>
6564
6565 <p>The list of packages being installed are the ones needed by
6566 rpi-update to make the image bootable on the Raspberry Pi, with the
6567 exception of netbase, which is needed by debootstrap to find
6568 /etc/hosts with the minbase variant.  I really wish there was a way to
6569 set up an Raspberry Pi using only packages in the Debian archive, but
6570 that is not possible as far as I know, because it boots from the GPU
6571 using a non-free binary blob.</p>
6572
6573 <p>The build host need debootstrap, kpartx and qemu-user-static and
6574 probably a few others installed.  I have not checked the complete
6575 build dependency list.</p>
6576
6577 <p>The resulting image will not use the hardware floating point unit
6578 on the Raspberry PI, because the armel architecture in Debian is not
6579 optimized for that use.  So the images created will be a bit slower
6580 than <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/">Raspbian</a> based images.</p>
6581
6582       </div>
6583       <div class="tags">
6584
6585
6586         Tags: <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>.
6587
6588
6589       </div>
6590     </div>
6591     <div class="padding"></div>
6592
6593     <div class="entry">
6594       <div class="title">
6595         <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>
6596       </div>
6597       <div class="date">
6598         15th October 2013
6599       </div>
6600       <div class="body">
6601         <p>The last few days I came across a few good causes that should get
6602 wider attention.  I recommend signing and donating to each one of
6603 these. :)</p>
6604
6605 <p>Via <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2013/18/">Debian
6606 Project News for 2013-10-14</a> I came across the Outreach Program for
6607 Women program which is a Google Summer of Code like initiative to get
6608 more women involved in free software.  One debian sponsor has offered
6609 to match <a href="http://debian.ch/opw2013">any donation done to Debian
6610 earmarked</a> for this initiative.  I donated a few minutes ago, and
6611 hope you will to. :)</p>
6612
6613 <p>And the Electronic Frontier Foundation just announced plans to
6614 create <a href="https://supporters.eff.org/donate/nsa-videos">video
6615 documentaries about the excessive spying</a> on every Internet user that
6616 take place these days, and their need to fund the work.  I've already
6617 donated.  Are you next?</p>
6618
6619 <p>For my Norwegian audience, the organisation Studentenes og
6620 Akademikernes Internasjonale Hjelpefond is collecting signatures for a
6621 statement under the heading
6622 <a href="http://saih.no/Bloggers_United/">Bloggers United for Open
6623 Access</a> for those of us asking for more focus on open access in the
6624 Norwegian government.  So far 499 signatures.  I hope you will sign it
6625 too.</p>
6626
6627       </div>
6628       <div class="tags">
6629
6630
6631         Tags: <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>.
6632
6633
6634       </div>
6635     </div>
6636     <div class="padding"></div>
6637
6638     <div class="entry">
6639       <div class="title">
6640         <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>
6641       </div>
6642       <div class="date">
6643         27th September 2013
6644       </div>
6645       <div class="body">
6646         <p>The <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox
6647 project</a> have been going on for a while, and have presented the
6648 vision, ideas and solution several places.  Here is a little
6649 collection of videos of talks and presentation of the project.</p>
6650
6651 <ul>
6652
6653 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukvUz5taxvA">FreedomBox -
6654 2,5 minute marketing film</a> (Youtube)</li>
6655
6656 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzW25QTVWsE">Eben Moglen
6657 discusses the Freedombox on CBS news 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
6658
6659 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae8SZbxfE0g">Eben Moglen -
6660 Freedom in the Cloud - Software Freedom, Privacy and and Security for
6661 Web 2.0 and Cloud computing at ISOC-NY Public Meeting 2010</a>
6662 (Youtube)</li>
6663
6664 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNaIji_3xBE">Fosdem 2011
6665 Keynote by Eben Moglen presenting the Freedombox</a> (Youtube)</li>
6666
6667 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bDDUyJSQ9s">Presentation of
6668 the Freedombox by James Vasile at Elevate in Gratz 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
6669
6670 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQTmnk27g9s"> Freedombox -
6671 Discovery, Identity, and Trust by Nick Daly at Freedombox Hackfest New
6672 York City in 2012</a> (Youtube)</li>
6673
6674 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbSB4Ba7Ck">Introduction
6675 to the Freedombox at Freedombox Hackfest New York City in 2012</a>
6676 (Youtube)</li>
6677
6678 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-P2Jaeg0aQ">Freedom, Out
6679 of the Box! by Bdale Garbee at linux.conf.au Ballarat, 2012</a> (Youtube) </li>
6680
6681 <li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/freedombox/">Freedombox
6682 1.0 by Eben Moglen and Bdale Garbee at Fosdem 2013</a> (FOSDEM) </li>
6683
6684 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LpYX2zVYg">What is the
6685 FreedomBox today by Bdale Garbee at Debconf13 in Vaumarcus
6686 2013</a> (Youtube)</li>
6687
6688 </ul>
6689
6690 <p>A larger list is available from
6691 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/TalksAndPresentations">the
6692 Freedombox Wiki</a>.</p>
6693
6694 <p>On other news, I am happy to report that Freedombox based on Debian
6695 Jessie is coming along quite well, and soon both Owncloud and using
6696 Tor should be available for testers of the Freedombox solution. :) In
6697 a few weeks I hope everything needed to test it is included in Debian.
6698 The withsqlite package is already in Debian, and the plinth package is
6699 pending in NEW.  The third and vital part of that puzzle is the
6700 metapackage/setup framework, which is still pending an upload.  Join
6701 us on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC
6702 (#freedombox on irc.debian.org)</a> and
6703 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6704 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6705
6706       </div>
6707       <div class="tags">
6708
6709
6710         Tags: <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>.
6711
6712
6713       </div>
6714     </div>
6715     <div class="padding"></div>
6716
6717     <div class="entry">
6718       <div class="title">
6719         <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>
6720       </div>
6721       <div class="date">
6722         10th September 2013
6723       </div>
6724       <div class="body">
6725         <p>I was introduced to the
6726 <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox project</a>
6727 in 2010, when Eben Moglen presented his vision about serving the need
6728 of non-technical people to keep their personal information private and
6729 within the legal protection of their own homes.  The idea is to give
6730 people back the power over their network and machines, and return
6731 Internet back to its intended peer-to-peer architecture.  Instead of
6732 depending on a central service, the Freedombox will give everyone
6733 control over their own basic infrastructure.</p>
6734
6735 <p>I've intended to join the effort since then, but other tasks have
6736 taken priority.  But this summers nasty news about the misuse of trust
6737 and privilege exercised by the "western" intelligence gathering
6738 communities increased my eagerness to contribute to a point where I
6739 actually started working on the project a while back.</p>
6740
6741 <p>The <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/freedombox/">initial
6742 Debian initiative</a> based on the vision from Eben Moglen, is to
6743 create a simple and cheap Debian based appliance that anyone can hook
6744 up in their home and get access to secure and private services and
6745 communication.  The initial deployment platform have been the
6746 <a href="http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-dreamplugdetails.aspx">Dreamplug</a>,
6747 which is a piece of hardware I do not own.  So to be able to test what
6748 the current Freedombox setup look like, I had to come up with a way to install
6749 it on some hardware I do have access to.  I have rewritten the
6750 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedom-maker">freedom-maker</a>
6751 image build framework to use .deb packages instead of only copying
6752 setup into the boot images, and thanks to this rewrite I am able to
6753 set up any machine supported by Debian Wheezy as a Freedombox, using
6754 the previously mentioned deb (and a few support debs for packages
6755 missing in Debian).</p>
6756
6757 <p>The current Freedombox setup consist of a set of bootstrapping
6758 scripts
6759 (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>),
6760 and a administrative web interface
6761 (<a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/Plinth">plinth</a> + exmachina +
6762 withsqlite), as well as a privacy enhancing proxy based on
6763 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>
6764 (freedombox-privoxy).  There is also a web/javascript based XMPP
6765 client (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/jwchat">jwchat</a>)
6766 trying (unsuccessfully so far) to talk to the XMPP server
6767 (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/ejabberd">ejabberd</a>).  The
6768 web interface is pluggable, and the goal is to use it to enable OpenID
6769 services, mesh network connectivity, use of TOR, etc, etc.  Not much of
6770 this is really working yet, see
6771 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedombox-todos/blob/master/TODO">the
6772 project TODO</a> for links to GIT repositories.  Most of the code is
6773 on github at the moment.  The HTTP proxy is operational out of the
6774 box, and the admin web interface can be used to add/remove plinth
6775 users.  I've not been able to do anything else with it so far, but
6776 know there are several branches spread around github and other places
6777 with lots of half baked features.</p>
6778
6779 <p>Anyway, if you want to have a look at the current state, the
6780 following recipes should work to give you a test machine to poke
6781 at.</p>
6782
6783 <p><strong>Debian Wheezy amd64</strong></p>
6784
6785 <ol>
6786
6787 <li>Fetch normal Debian Wheezy installation ISO.</li>
6788 <li>Boot from it, either as CD or USB stick.</li>
6789 <li><p>Press [tab] on the boot prompt and add this as a boot argument
6790 to the Debian installer:<p>
6791 <pre>url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat</a></pre></li>
6792
6793 <li>Answer the few language/region/password questions and pick disk to
6794 install on.</li>
6795
6796 <li>When the installation is finished and the machine have rebooted a
6797 few times, your Freedombox is ready for testing.</li>
6798
6799 </ol>
6800
6801 <p><strong>Raspberry Pi Raspbian</strong></p>
6802
6803 <ol>
6804
6805 <li>Fetch a Raspbian SD card image, create SD card.</li>
6806 <li>Boot from SD card, extend file system to fill the card completely.</li>
6807 <li><p>Log in and add this to /etc/sources.list:</p>
6808 <pre>
6809 deb <a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox</a> wheezy main
6810 </pre></li>
6811 <li><p>Run this as root:</p>
6812 <pre>
6813 wget -O - http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/BE1A583D.asc | \
6814    apt-key add -
6815 apt-get update
6816 apt-get install freedombox-setup
6817 /usr/lib/freedombox/setup
6818 </pre></li>
6819 <li>Reboot into your freshly created Freedombox.</li>
6820
6821 </ol>
6822
6823 <p>You can test it on other architectures too, but because the
6824 freedombox-privoxy package is binary, it will only work as intended on
6825 the architectures where I have had time to build the binary and put it
6826 in my APT repository.  But do not let this stop you.  It is only a
6827 short "<tt>apt-get source -b freedombox-privoxy</tt>" away. :)</p>
6828
6829 <p>Note that by default Freedombox is a DHCP server on the
6830 192.168.1.0/24 subnet, so if this is your subnet be careful and turn
6831 off the DHCP server by running "<tt>update-rc.d isc-dhcp-server
6832 disable</tt>" as root.</p>
6833
6834 <p>Please let me know if this works for you, or if you have any
6835 problems.  We gather on the IRC channel
6836 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">#freedombox</a> on
6837 irc.debian.org and the
6838 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">project
6839 mailing list</a>.</p>
6840
6841 <p>Once you get your freedombox operational, you can visit
6842 <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/</tt> to see the state of the plint
6843 welcome screen (dead end - do not be surprised if you are unable to
6844 get past it), and next visit <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/help/</tt>
6845 to look at the rest of plinth.  The default user is 'admin' and the
6846 default password is 'secret'.</p>
6847
6848       </div>
6849       <div class="tags">
6850
6851
6852         Tags: <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>.
6853
6854
6855       </div>
6856     </div>
6857     <div class="padding"></div>
6858
6859     <div class="entry">
6860       <div class="title">
6861         <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>
6862       </div>
6863       <div class="date">
6864         18th August 2013
6865       </div>
6866       <div class="body">
6867         <p>Earlier, I reported about
6868 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">my
6869 problems using an Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB disk</a>.  Friday I was
6870 told by IBM that the original disk should be thrown away.  And as
6871 there no longer was a problem if I bricked the firmware, I decided
6872 today to try to install Intel firmware to replace the Lenovo firmware
6873 currently on the disk.</p>
6874
6875 <p>I searched the Intel site for firmware, and found
6876 <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>
6877 (aka Intel SATA Solid-State Drive Firmware Update Tool) which
6878 according to the site should contain the latest firmware for SSD
6879 disks.  I inserted the broken disk in one of my spare laptops and
6880 booted the ISO from a USB stick.  The disk was recognized, but the
6881 program claimed the newest firmware already were installed and refused
6882 to insert any Intel firmware.  So no change, and the disk is still
6883 unable to handle write load. :( I guess the only way to get them
6884 working would be if Lenovo releases new firmware.  No idea how likely
6885 that is.  Anyway, just blogging about this test for completeness.  I
6886 got a working Samsung disk, and see no point in spending more time on
6887 the broken disks.</p>
6888
6889       </div>
6890       <div class="tags">
6891
6892
6893         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6894
6895
6896       </div>
6897     </div>
6898     <div class="padding"></div>
6899
6900     <div class="entry">
6901       <div class="title">
6902         <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>
6903       </div>
6904       <div class="date">
6905         17th July 2013
6906       </div>
6907       <div class="body">
6908         <p>Today I switched to
6909 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
6910 new laptop</a>.  I've previously written about the problems I had with
6911 my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
6912 <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
6913 GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
6914 sustained writes.  My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
6915 trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
6916 identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
6917 disk instead to fix it once and for all.  The Samsung disk survived
6918 the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
6919 random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
6920 decided to trust it with my data.  I have installed it as a Debian Edu
6921 Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
6922 server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
6923 station from now on.</p>
6924
6925 <p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
6926 Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
6927 performance and increase life time of the disk.  The Linux kernel and
6928 user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
6929 environment.  To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
6930 package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning.  The
6931 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
6932 for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
6933 is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
6934 package.  If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
6935 will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
6936 file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
6937
6938 <p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
6939 set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD.  It is adjusted to my use case,
6940 where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
6941 addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
6942 top of this again.  See the README file in the package source for the
6943 references I used to pick the settings.  At the moment these
6944 parameters are tuned:</p>
6945
6946 <ul>
6947
6948 <li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
6949     (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
6950
6951 <li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
6952     this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
6953     0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
6954
6955 <li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
6956     systems.</li>
6957
6958 <li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
6959     /etc/fstab.</li>
6960
6961 <li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
6962
6963 <li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
6964     cron.daily).</li>
6965
6966 <li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
6967     to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
6968
6969 </ul>
6970
6971 <p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
6972 the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
6973 little gain.  My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
6974 those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
6975 computer.  I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
6976 from getting the data on the disk (see
6977 <a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
6978 Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
6979 right thing to do.</p>
6980
6981 <p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
6982 it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
6983 indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
6984
6985 <p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
6986 and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
6987 file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
6988 instead of during my work.</p>
6989
6990 <p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
6991 this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
6992
6993 <p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning.  I expect
6994 iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
6995 have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
6996
6997 <p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
6998 there.</p>
6999
7000 <p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
7001 as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
7002 disk.  It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
7003 the Lenovo firmware.  But I have not tried and did not want to do so
7004 without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
7005 disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
7006 back.</p>
7007
7008       </div>
7009       <div class="tags">
7010
7011
7012         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7013
7014
7015       </div>
7016     </div>
7017     <div class="padding"></div>
7018
7019     <div class="entry">
7020       <div class="title">
7021         <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>
7022       </div>
7023       <div class="date">
7024         10th July 2013
7025       </div>
7026       <div class="body">
7027         <p>A few days ago, I wrote about
7028 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
7029 problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
7030 was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
7031 sustained write.  My supplier is in contact with
7032 <a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
7033 replacement disk to try to fix the problem.  They decided to send an
7034 identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
7035
7036 <p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
7037 Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it.  The new disk have the
7038 same firmware version as the original.  This time my hope raised
7039 slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
7040 die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
7041 going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%.  But around 60%, the disk
7042 died again and I was back on square one.  I still do not have a new
7043 laptop with a disk I can trust.  I can not live with a disk that might
7044 lock up when I download a new
7045 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
7046 other large files.  I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
7047 the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
7048
7049 <p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
7050 11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
7051 LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
7052 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
7053 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
7054 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
7055
7056 <p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
7057 11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
7058 LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
7059 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
7060 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
7061 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
7062
7063 <p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
7064 SA, date and WNPP values.  Mentioning all the details here in case
7065 someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
7066 failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
7067 exist).</p>
7068
7069       </div>
7070       <div class="tags">
7071
7072
7073         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7074
7075
7076       </div>
7077     </div>
7078     <div class="padding"></div>
7079
7080     <div class="entry">
7081       <div class="title">
7082         <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>
7083       </div>
7084       <div class="date">
7085          9th July 2013
7086       </div>
7087       <div class="body">
7088         <p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
7089 Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
7090 party in Oslo.  It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
7091 member assosiation NUUG</a> and
7092 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
7093 project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
7094 Bitraf</a>.</p>
7095
7096 <p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening.  Everyone is
7097 welcome, and there is no fee to participate.  There is on the other
7098 hand limited space, and only room for 30 people.  Please put your name
7099 on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
7100 wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
7101
7102       </div>
7103       <div class="tags">
7104
7105
7106         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>.
7107
7108
7109       </div>
7110     </div>
7111     <div class="padding"></div>
7112
7113     <div class="entry">
7114       <div class="title">
7115         <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>
7116       </div>
7117       <div class="date">
7118          5th July 2013
7119       </div>
7120       <div class="body">
7121         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
7122 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
7123 for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>.  Unfortunately I did not have much
7124 time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
7125 will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived.  I
7126 ended up picking a
7127 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
7128 with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
7129 a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly.  But my
7130 second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful.  More
7131 on that below.</p>
7132
7133 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
7134 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
7135 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
7136 feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
7137 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
7138 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
7139 to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
7140 disks from my search parameters.  I also asked around among friends to
7141 get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
7142
7143 <p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
7144 X41.  I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
7145 significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
7146 hand a lot more to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly
7147 good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
7148 I will get used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
7149 needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
7150
7151 <p>Turning off the touch pad was simple.  All it took was a quick
7152 visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
7153
7154 <p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop.  The 180 GB SSD disk
7155 lock up during load.  And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
7156 with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
7157 I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
7158 reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
7159 default in Ubuntu).  And the bug with is already known.  It was
7160 reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
7161 report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
7162 Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD).  It is also reported to the Linux
7163 kernel developers as
7164 <a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
7165 report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
7166 (SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
7167 Lenovo forums, both for
7168 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
7169 2012-11-10</a> and for
7170 <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
7171 03-20-2013</a>.  The problem do not only affect installation.  The
7172 reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
7173 on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
7174 problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
7175 There is even a
7176 <a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
7177 available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
7178 minutes by writing to a file.</p>
7179
7180 <p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
7181 contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
7182 requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
7183 firmware.  Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
7184 Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i).  I
7185 hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
7186 fixed. :)</p>
7187
7188       </div>
7189       <div class="tags">
7190
7191
7192         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7193
7194
7195       </div>
7196     </div>
7197     <div class="padding"></div>
7198
7199     <div class="entry">
7200       <div class="title">
7201         <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>
7202       </div>
7203       <div class="date">
7204          4th July 2013
7205       </div>
7206       <div class="body">
7207         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
7208 trusty old Thinkpad X41.  Unfortunately I did not have much time to
7209 spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived.  I ended up
7210 picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
7211 X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu
7212 Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly.  As I write
7213 this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
7214 with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
7215 with an expencive door stop.</p>
7216
7217 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
7218 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
7219 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
7220 feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
7221 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
7222 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
7223 to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
7224
7225 <p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
7226 wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
7227 to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly good and the
7228 individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
7229 used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
7230 new laptop now. :)</p>
7231
7232 <p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
7233
7234       </div>
7235       <div class="tags">
7236
7237
7238         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7239
7240
7241       </div>
7242     </div>
7243     <div class="padding"></div>
7244
7245     <div class="entry">
7246       <div class="title">
7247         <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>
7248       </div>
7249       <div class="date">
7250         25th June 2013
7251       </div>
7252       <div class="body">
7253         <p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
7254 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
7255 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
7256 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
7257 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
7258 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
7259 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
7260 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
7261 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
7262 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
7263 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
7264
7265 <p><pre>
7266 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
7267 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
7268 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
7269 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
7270 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
7271 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
7272 firmware-ipw2x00
7273 firmware-ipw2x00
7274 Preconfiguring packages ...
7275 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
7276 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
7277 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
7278 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
7279 #
7280 </pre></p>
7281
7282 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
7283 printed instead:</p>
7284
7285 <p><pre>
7286 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
7287 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
7288 #
7289 </pre></p>
7290
7291 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
7292 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
7293
7294 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
7295 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
7296 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
7297 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
7298 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
7299 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
7300 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
7301 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
7302 machine.</p>
7303
7304 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
7305 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
7306 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
7307 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
7308 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
7309 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
7310
7311       </div>
7312       <div class="tags">
7313
7314
7315         Tags: <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>.
7316
7317
7318       </div>
7319     </div>
7320     <div class="padding"></div>
7321
7322     <div class="entry">
7323       <div class="title">
7324         <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>
7325       </div>
7326       <div class="date">
7327         11th June 2013
7328       </div>
7329       <div class="body">
7330         <p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
7331 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
7332 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
7333 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
7334 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
7335 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
7336 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
7337 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
7338 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
7339 i915 driver used by the
7340 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
7341 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
7342
7343 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
7344 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
7345 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
7346 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
7347 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
7348
7349 <pre>
7350 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
7351 update-initramfs -u -k all
7352 </pre>
7353
7354 <p>Since March 2012 there is
7355 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
7356 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
7357 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
7358 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
7359 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
7360 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
7361 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
7362 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
7363 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
7364 number.</p>
7365
7366 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
7367 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
7368
7369 <p><pre>
7370 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
7371     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
7372     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
7373  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
7374  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
7375     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
7376  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
7377     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
7378  Latency: 0
7379  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
7380  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
7381  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
7382  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
7383  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
7384  Capabilities: <access denied>
7385  Kernel driver in use: i915
7386 </pre></p>
7387
7388 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
7389
7390 <p><pre>
7391 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
7392        ...
7393         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
7394         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
7395        ...
7396 }
7397 </pre></p>
7398
7399 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
7400 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
7401 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
7402 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
7403 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
7404 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
7405 yet shown up in
7406 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
7407 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
7408 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
7409 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
7410 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
7411 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
7412
7413 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
7414 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
7415 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
7416 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
7417 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
7418 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
7419 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
7420 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
7421 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
7422 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
7423 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
7424 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
7425
7426 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
7427 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
7428 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
7429 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
7430 backlight.</p>
7431
7432       </div>
7433       <div class="tags">
7434
7435
7436         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7437
7438
7439       </div>
7440     </div>
7441     <div class="padding"></div>
7442
7443     <div class="entry">
7444       <div class="title">
7445         <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>
7446       </div>
7447       <div class="date">
7448         27th May 2013
7449       </div>
7450       <div class="body">
7451         <p>Two days ago, I asked
7452 <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
7453 I could install Linux on a Packard Bell EasyNote LV computer
7454 preinstalled with Windows 8</a>.  I found a solution, but am horrified
7455 with the obstacles put in the way of Linux users on a laptop with UEFI
7456 and Windows 8.</p>
7457
7458 <p>I never found out if the cause of my problems were the use of UEFI
7459 secure booting or fast boot.  I suspect fast boot was the problem,
7460 causing the firmware to boot directly from HD without considering any
7461 key presses and alternative devices, but do not know UEFI settings
7462 enough to tell.</p>
7463
7464 <p>There is no way to install Linux on the machine in question without
7465 opening the box and disconnecting the hard drive!  This is as far as I
7466 can tell, the only way to get access to the firmware setup menu
7467 without accepting the Windows 8 license agreement.  I am told (and
7468 found description on how to) that it is possible to configure the
7469 firmware setup once booted into Windows 8.  But as I believe the terms
7470 of that agreement are completely unacceptable, accepting the license
7471 was never an alternative.  I do not enter agreements I do not intend
7472 to follow.</p>
7473
7474 <p>I feared I had to return the laptops and ask for a refund, and
7475 waste many hours on this, but luckily there was a way to get it to
7476 work.  But I would not recommend it to anyone planning to run Linux on
7477 it, and I have become sceptical to Windows 8 certified laptops.  Is
7478 this the way Linux will be forced out of the market place, by making
7479 it close to impossible for "normal" users to install Linux without
7480 accepting the Microsoft Windows license terms?  Or at least not
7481 without risking to loose the warranty?</p>
7482
7483 <p>I've updated the
7484 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Linux Laptop
7485 wiki page for Packard Bell EasyNote LV</a>, to ensure the next person
7486 do not have to struggle as much as I did to get Linux into the
7487 machine.</p>
7488
7489 <p>Thanks to Bob Rosbag, Florian Weimer, Philipp Kern, Ben Hutching,
7490 Michael Tokarev and others for feedback and ideas.</p>
7491
7492       </div>
7493       <div class="tags">
7494
7495
7496         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7497
7498
7499       </div>
7500     </div>
7501     <div class="padding"></div>
7502
7503     <div class="entry">
7504       <div class="title">
7505         <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>
7506       </div>
7507       <div class="date">
7508         25th May 2013
7509       </div>
7510       <div class="body">
7511         <p>I've run into quite a problem the last few days.  I bought three
7512 new laptops for my parents and a few others.  I bought Packard Bell
7513 Easynote LV to run Kubuntu on and use as their home computer.  But I
7514 am completely unable to figure out how to install Linux on it.  The
7515 computer is preinstalled with Windows 8, and I suspect it uses UEFI
7516 instead of a BIOS to boot.</p>
7517
7518 <p>The problem is that I am unable to get it to PXE boot, and unable
7519 to get it to boot the Linux installer from my USB stick.  I have yet
7520 to try the DVD install, and still hope it will work.  when I turn on
7521 the computer, there is no information on what buttons to press to get
7522 the normal boot menu.  I expect to get some boot menu to select PXE or
7523 USB stick booting.  When booting, it first ask for the language to
7524 use, then for some regional settings, and finally if I will accept the
7525 Windows 8 terms of use.  As these terms are completely unacceptable to
7526 me, I have no other choice but to turn off the computer and try again
7527 to get it to boot the Linux installer.</p>
7528
7529 <p>I have gathered my findings so far on a Linlap page about the
7530 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
7531 EasyNote LV</a> model.  If you have any idea how to get Linux
7532 installed on this machine, please get in touch or update that wiki
7533 page.  If I can't find a way to install Linux, I will have to return
7534 the laptop to the seller and find another machine for my parents.</p>
7535
7536 <p>I wonder, is this the way Linux will be forced out of the market
7537 using UEFI and "secure boot" by making it impossible to install Linux
7538 on new Laptops?</p>
7539
7540       </div>
7541       <div class="tags">
7542
7543
7544         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7545
7546
7547       </div>
7548     </div>
7549     <div class="padding"></div>
7550
7551     <div class="entry">
7552       <div class="title">
7553         <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>
7554       </div>
7555       <div class="date">
7556         17th May 2013
7557       </div>
7558       <div class="body">
7559         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is
7560 an operating system based on Debian intended for use in schools.  It
7561 contain a turn-key solution for the computer network provided to
7562 pupils in the primary schools.  It provide both the central server,
7563 network boot servers and desktop environments with heaps of
7564 educational software.  The project was founded almost 12 years ago,
7565 2001-07-02.  If you want to support the project, which is in need for
7566 cash to fund developer gatherings and other project related activity,
7567 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">please
7568 donate some money</a>.
7569
7570 <p>A topic that come up again and again on the Debian Edu mailing
7571 lists and elsewhere, is the question on how to transform a Debian or
7572 Ubuntu installation into a Debian Edu installation.  It isn't very
7573 hard, and last week I wrote a script to replicate the steps done by
7574 the Debian Edu installer.</p>
7575
7576 <p>The script,
7577 <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/>
7578 in the debian-edu-config package, will go through these six steps and
7579 transform an existing Debian Wheezy or Ubuntu (untested) installation
7580 into a Debian Edu Workstation:</p>
7581
7582 <ol>
7583
7584 <li>Add skolelinux related APT sources.</li>
7585 <li>Create /etc/debian-edu/config with the wanted configuration.</li>
7586 <li>Install debian-edu-install to load preseeding values and pull in
7587     our configuration.</li>
7588 <li>Preseed debconf database with profile setup in
7589     /etc/debian-edu/config, and run tasksel to install packages
7590     according to the profile specified in the config above,
7591     overriding some of the Debian automation machinery.</li>
7592 <li>Run debian-edu-cfengine-D installation to configure everything
7593     that could not be done using preseeding.</li>
7594 <li>Ask for a reboot to enable all the configuration changes.</li>
7595
7596 </ol>
7597
7598 <p>There are some steps in the Debian Edu installation that can not be
7599 replicated like this.  Disk partitioning and LVM setup, for example.
7600 So this script just assume there is enough disk space to install all
7601 the needed packages.</p>
7602
7603 <p>The script was created to help a Debian Edu student working on
7604 setting up <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org">Raspberry Pi</a> as a
7605 Debian Edu client, and using it he can take the existing
7606 <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/FrontPage‎">Raspbian</a> installation and
7607 transform it into a fully functioning Debian Edu Workstation (or
7608 Roaming Workstation, or whatever :).</p>
7609
7610 <p>The default setting in the script is to create a KDE Workstation.
7611 If a LXDE based Roaming workstation is wanted instead, modify the
7612 PROFILE and DESKTOP values at the top to look like this instead:</p>
7613
7614 <p><pre>
7615 PROFILE="Roaming-Workstation"
7616 DESKTOP="lxde"
7617 </pre></p>
7618
7619 <p>The script could even become useful to set up Debian Edu servers in
7620 the cloud, by starting with a virtual Debian installation at some
7621 virtual hosting service and setting up all the services on first
7622 boot.</p>
7623
7624       </div>
7625       <div class="tags">
7626
7627
7628         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>.
7629
7630
7631       </div>
7632     </div>
7633     <div class="padding"></div>
7634
7635     <div class="entry">
7636       <div class="title">
7637         <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>
7638       </div>
7639       <div class="date">
7640         11th May 2013
7641       </div>
7642       <div class="body">
7643         <P>In January,
7644 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
7645 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
7646 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
7647 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
7648 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
7649 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
7650 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
7651 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
7652 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
7653 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
7654 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
7655 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
7656
7657 <p><table>
7658 <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>
7659 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
7660 <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>
7661 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
7662 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
7663 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
7664 <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>
7665 <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>
7666 <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>
7667 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
7668 </table></p>
7669
7670 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
7671 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
7672 available in experimental.</p>
7673
7674 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
7675 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
7676 for LEGO designers.</p>
7677
7678       </div>
7679       <div class="tags">
7680
7681
7682         Tags: <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>.
7683
7684
7685       </div>
7686     </div>
7687     <div class="padding"></div>
7688
7689     <div class="entry">
7690       <div class="title">
7691         <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>
7692       </div>
7693       <div class="date">
7694          5th May 2013
7695       </div>
7696       <div class="body">
7697         <p>When I woke up this morning, I was very happy to see that the
7698 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130504">release announcement
7699 for Debian Wheezy</a> was waiting in my mail box.  This is a great
7700 Debian release, and I expect to move my machines at home over to it fairly
7701 soon.</p>
7702
7703 <p>The new debian release contain heaps of new stuff, and one program
7704 in particular make me very happy to see included.  The
7705 <a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">Scratch</a> program, made famous by
7706 the <a href="http://www.code.org/">Teach kids code</a> movement, is
7707 included for the first time.  Alongside similar programs like
7708 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/kturtle/">kturtle</a> and
7709 <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/Turtle_Art">turtleart</a>,
7710 it allow for visual programming where syntax errors can not happen,
7711 and a friendly programming environment for learning to control the
7712 computer.  Scratch will also be included in the next release of Debian
7713 Edu.</a>
7714
7715 <p>And now that Wheezy is wrapped up, we can wrap up the next Debian
7716 Edu/Skolelinux release too.  The
7717 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/04/msg00132.html">first
7718 alpha release</a> went out last week, and the next should soon
7719 follow.<p>
7720
7721       </div>
7722       <div class="tags">
7723
7724
7725         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>.
7726
7727
7728       </div>
7729     </div>
7730     <div class="padding"></div>
7731
7732     <div class="entry">
7733       <div class="title">
7734         <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>
7735       </div>
7736       <div class="date">
7737          3rd April 2013
7738       </div>
7739       <div class="body">
7740         <p>Today the <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram
7741 package</a> finally made it into the archive, after lingering in NEW
7742 for many months.  I uploaded it to the Debian experimental suite
7743 2013-01-27, and today it was accepted into the archive.</p>
7744
7745 <p>Isenkram is a system for suggesting to users what packages to
7746 install to work with a pluggable hardware device.  The suggestion pop
7747 up when the device is plugged in.  For example if a Lego Mindstorm NXT
7748 is inserted, it will suggest to install the program needed to program
7749 the NXT controller.  Give it a go, and report bugs and suggestions to
7750 BTS. :)</p>
7751
7752       </div>
7753       <div class="tags">
7754
7755
7756         Tags: <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>.
7757
7758
7759       </div>
7760     </div>
7761     <div class="padding"></div>
7762
7763     <div class="entry">
7764       <div class="title">
7765         <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>
7766       </div>
7767       <div class="date">
7768          2nd February 2013
7769       </div>
7770       <div class="body">
7771         <p>My
7772 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
7773 bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
7774 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
7775 Debian was waiting in NEW.  It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
7776 2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then.  It was
7777 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
7778 version too.</p>
7779
7780 <p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
7781 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
7782 architectures.  For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
7783 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
7784 architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
7785 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
7786 no-one have been able to propose a fix.  If you got an idea what is
7787 failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
7788
7789 <p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
7790 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
7791 if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
7792 #696715</a>).  So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
7793 it. :)</p>
7794
7795 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
7796 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
7797 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
7798
7799       </div>
7800       <div class="tags">
7801
7802
7803         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>.
7804
7805
7806       </div>
7807     </div>
7808     <div class="padding"></div>
7809
7810     <div class="entry">
7811       <div class="title">
7812         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a>
7813       </div>
7814       <div class="date">
7815         22nd January 2013
7816       </div>
7817       <div class="body">
7818         <p>Yesterday, I
7819 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
7820 for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
7821 pluggable hardware devices, which I
7822 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
7823 out to create</a> earlier this month.  Several valuable testers showed
7824 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
7825 people.  But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
7826 for this project.  Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
7827 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name.  In the
7828 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
7829 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
7830 repository in Debian.  The new name?  It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
7831 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
7832
7833 <pre>
7834 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
7835 cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
7836 </pre>
7837
7838 <p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet.  If you
7839 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
7840 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
7841 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
7842
7843 <p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
7844 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc.  Typical hardware
7845 stuff, in other words.  I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
7846 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
7847 word.</p>
7848
7849 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
7850 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
7851 process.</p>
7852
7853 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
7854 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
7855
7856       </div>
7857       <div class="tags">
7858
7859
7860         Tags: <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>.
7861
7862
7863       </div>
7864     </div>
7865     <div class="padding"></div>
7866
7867     <div class="entry">
7868       <div class="title">
7869         <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>
7870       </div>
7871       <div class="date">
7872         21st January 2013
7873       </div>
7874       <div class="body">
7875         <p>Early this month I set out to try to
7876 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
7877 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>.  Now my
7878 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience.  To test
7879 it, fetch the
7880 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
7881 from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
7882 package.  You might have to log out and in again activate the
7883 autostart script.</p>
7884
7885 <p>The design is simple:</p>
7886
7887 <ul>
7888
7889 <li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
7890 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
7891
7892 <li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
7893 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
7894 initially did.</li>
7895
7896 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
7897 the APT database, a database
7898 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
7899 via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
7900
7901 <li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
7902 isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
7903 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
7904 package or packages.</li>
7905
7906 <li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
7907 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
7908
7909 <li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
7910 package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
7911
7912 </ul>
7913
7914 <p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system.  Here
7915 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action.  First the
7916 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
7917 approve all the dependencies.  Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
7918
7919 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
7920 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
7921 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
7922 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
7923 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
7924
7925 <p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
7926 is already useful.  The database of hardware to package mappings also
7927 need more work.  It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
7928 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
7929 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
7930 method.  I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
7931 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
7932 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
7933
7934 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
7935 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
7936 '<tt>svn checkout
7937 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
7938 hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'.  If you lack debuild, install the
7939 devscripts package.</p>
7940
7941 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
7942 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
7943 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository.  See
7944 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
7945 instructions</a> for details.</p>
7946
7947       </div>
7948       <div class="tags">
7949
7950
7951         Tags: <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>.
7952
7953
7954       </div>
7955     </div>
7956     <div class="padding"></div>
7957
7958     <div class="entry">
7959       <div class="title">
7960         <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>
7961       </div>
7962       <div class="date">
7963         19th January 2013
7964       </div>
7965       <div class="body">
7966         <p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died.  It died quietly and
7967 suddenly in bed.  With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
7968 black.  The power button was no longer able to turn it on.  It was a
7969 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had.  Better than both
7970 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S.  Far better than the
7971 Compaq I had before that.  Now I need to find a replacement.  To keep
7972 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
7973 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
7974 not a durable solution.
7975
7976 <p>My laptop needs are fairly modest.  This is my wishlist from when I
7977 got a new one more than 10 years ago.  It still holds true.:)</p>
7978
7979 <ul>
7980
7981 <li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
7982   than A4).</li>
7983 <li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
7984 <li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
7985 <li>Long battery life time.  Preferable a week.</li>
7986 <li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
7987 <li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
7988 <li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
7989 <li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
7990 <li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
7991 size).</li>
7992 <li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
7993   X.org packages.</li>
7994 <li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
7995   the time).
7996
7997 </ul>
7998
7999 <p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
8000 list.  The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
8001 last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
8002 at other features to choose my laptop.  But are there still made as
8003 robust laptops as my X41?  The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
8004 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
8005 Lenovo took over.  But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
8006 still be useful.</p>
8007
8008 <p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
8009 external keyboard?  I'll have to check the
8010 <a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
8011 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
8012 of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
8013 Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
8014
8015       </div>
8016       <div class="tags">
8017
8018
8019         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8020
8021
8022       </div>
8023     </div>
8024     <div class="padding"></div>
8025
8026     <div class="entry">
8027       <div class="title">
8028         <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>
8029       </div>
8030       <div class="date">
8031         18th January 2013
8032       </div>
8033       <div class="body">
8034         <p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
8035 install to get support for a given MIME type.  Thanks to
8036 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
8037 done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
8038 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
8039 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
8040 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
8041
8042 <pre>
8043 #!/usr/bin/python
8044 import sys
8045 import apt
8046 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
8047     cache = apt.Cache()
8048     cache.open(None)
8049     thepkgs = []
8050     for pkg in cache:
8051         version = pkg.candidate
8052         if version is None:
8053             version = pkg.installed
8054         if version is None:
8055             continue
8056         record = version.record
8057         if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
8058             continue
8059         mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
8060         for t in mime_types:
8061             t = t.rstrip().strip()
8062             if t == mimetype:
8063                 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
8064     return thepkgs
8065 mimetype = "audio/ogg"
8066 if 1 < len(sys.argv):
8067     mimetype = sys.argv[1]
8068 print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
8069 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
8070     print "  %s" %pkg
8071 </pre>
8072
8073 <p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
8074
8075 <pre>
8076 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
8077 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
8078   gecko-mediaplayer
8079 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
8080 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
8081   browser-plugin-gnash
8082 %
8083 </pre>
8084
8085 <p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
8086 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
8087 packages.  It would be great if Debian supported such feature too.  Is
8088 anyone working on adding it?</p>
8089
8090 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
8091 request for icweasel support for this feature is
8092 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
8093 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today).  Lack
8094 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
8095 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
8096
8097       </div>
8098       <div class="tags">
8099
8100
8101         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8102
8103
8104       </div>
8105     </div>
8106     <div class="padding"></div>
8107
8108     <div class="entry">
8109       <div class="title">
8110         <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>
8111       </div>
8112       <div class="date">
8113         16th January 2013
8114       </div>
8115       <div class="body">
8116         <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
8117 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
8118 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
8119 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
8120 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing.  With such
8121 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
8122 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
8123 downloaded by the browser.</p>
8124
8125 <p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
8126 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
8127 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there.  The result
8128 can be found on the
8129 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
8130 site</a>.  Using the collected information, it become possible to
8131 answer the question in the title.  Here are the 20 most supported MIME
8132 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
8133 The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
8134
8135 <p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
8136
8137 <pre>
8138   count MIME type
8139   ----- -----------------------
8140      32 text/plain
8141      30 audio/mpeg
8142      29 image/png
8143      28 image/jpeg
8144      27 application/ogg
8145      26 audio/x-mp3
8146      25 image/tiff
8147      25 image/gif
8148      22 image/bmp
8149      22 audio/x-wav
8150      20 audio/x-flac
8151      19 audio/x-mpegurl
8152      18 video/x-ms-asf
8153      18 audio/x-musepack
8154      18 audio/x-mpeg
8155      18 application/x-ogg
8156      17 video/mpeg
8157      17 audio/x-scpls
8158      17 audio/ogg
8159      16 video/x-ms-wmv
8160 </pre>
8161
8162 <p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
8163
8164 <pre>
8165   count MIME type
8166   ----- -----------------------
8167      33 text/plain
8168      32 image/png
8169      32 image/jpeg
8170      29 audio/mpeg
8171      27 image/gif
8172      26 image/tiff
8173      26 application/ogg
8174      25 audio/x-mp3
8175      22 image/bmp
8176      21 audio/x-wav
8177      19 audio/x-mpegurl
8178      19 audio/x-mpeg
8179      18 video/mpeg
8180      18 audio/x-scpls
8181      18 audio/x-flac
8182      18 application/x-ogg
8183      17 video/x-ms-asf
8184      17 text/html
8185      17 audio/x-musepack
8186      16 image/x-xbitmap
8187 </pre>
8188
8189 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
8190
8191 <pre>
8192   count MIME type
8193   ----- -----------------------
8194      31 text/plain
8195      31 image/png
8196      31 image/jpeg
8197      29 audio/mpeg
8198      28 application/ogg
8199      27 image/gif
8200      26 image/tiff
8201      26 audio/x-mp3
8202      23 audio/x-wav
8203      22 image/bmp
8204      21 audio/x-flac
8205      20 audio/x-mpegurl
8206      19 audio/x-mpeg
8207      18 video/x-ms-asf
8208      18 video/mpeg
8209      18 audio/x-scpls
8210      18 application/x-ogg
8211      17 audio/x-musepack
8212      16 video/x-ms-wmv
8213      16 video/x-msvideo
8214 </pre>
8215
8216 <p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
8217 information mentioned in DEP-11.  I have not yet had time to look at
8218 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
8219 issues.</p>
8220
8221 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
8222 discovering a typo in my script.</p>
8223
8224       </div>
8225       <div class="tags">
8226
8227
8228         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8229
8230
8231       </div>
8232     </div>
8233     <div class="padding"></div>
8234
8235     <div class="entry">
8236       <div class="title">
8237         <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>
8238       </div>
8239       <div class="date">
8240         15th January 2013
8241       </div>
8242       <div class="body">
8243         <p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
8244 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
8245 values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
8246 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
8247 dongle support in Debian</a>.  Using this knowledge, I have tested how
8248 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
8249 to hardware.  This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
8250 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
8251 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
8252 packages.</p>
8253
8254 <p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
8255 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
8256 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
8257 modalias.</p>
8258
8259 <p><blockquote>
8260 Package: package-name
8261 <br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
8262 </blockquote></p>
8263
8264 <p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
8265 for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
8266
8267 <p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
8268 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
8269
8270 <p><blockquote>
8271 Package: cheese
8272 <br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
8273 </blockquote></p>
8274
8275 <p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
8276 CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
8277
8278 <p><blockquote>
8279 Package: pcmciautils
8280 <br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
8281 </blockquote></p>
8282
8283 <p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
8284 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
8285
8286 <p><blockquote>
8287 Package: colorhug-client
8288 <br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
8289 </blockquote></p>
8290
8291 <p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
8292 file in the Debian archive.  Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
8293 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
8294
8295 <p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
8296 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
8297 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
8298 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
8299 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information.  I've
8300 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
8301 is working as it should with my prototype.  It even made it to Ubuntu
8302 Raring.</p>
8303
8304 <p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
8305 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
8306 implementation of the lookup code.  The idea is to create files for
8307 each modalias and let the shell do the matching.  Please check out and
8308 try the
8309 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
8310 shell script.  It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
8311 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
8312 repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
8313
8314 <p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
8315 install yubikey-personalization:</p>
8316
8317 <p><blockquote>
8318 % ./hw-support-lookup
8319 <br>yubikey-personalization
8320 <br>%
8321 </blockquote></p>
8322
8323 <p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
8324 propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
8325
8326 <p><blockquote>
8327 % ./hw-support-lookup
8328 <br>pcmciautils
8329 <br>%
8330 </blockquote></p>
8331
8332 <p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
8333 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
8334 database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
8335
8336 <p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
8337 packages and hardware.  One source would be to look at packages with
8338 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
8339 extract their modalias information.  Another would be to look at
8340 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
8341 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
8342 generate a modalias matching rule.  I have not tested any of these to
8343 see if it work.</p>
8344
8345 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
8346 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
8347 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
8348 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
8349
8350       </div>
8351       <div class="tags">
8352
8353
8354         Tags: <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>.
8355
8356
8357       </div>
8358     </div>
8359     <div class="padding"></div>
8360
8361     <div class="entry">
8362       <div class="title">
8363         <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>
8364       </div>
8365       <div class="date">
8366         14th January 2013
8367       </div>
8368       <div class="body">
8369         <p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
8370 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
8371 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
8372 to document the details.  Here are my findings so far, also available
8373 in
8374 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
8375 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
8376
8377 <p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
8378
8379 <p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
8380 values stands for.  It is in part based on information from
8381 &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> &gt;,
8382 &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;,
8383 &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
8384 &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;.
8385
8386 <p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
8387 this shell script:</p>
8388
8389 <pre>
8390 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
8391 </pre>
8392
8393 <p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
8394 using modinfo:</p>
8395
8396 <pre>
8397 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
8398 alias:          serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
8399 alias:          serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
8400 %
8401 </pre>
8402
8403 <p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
8404
8405 <p>A typical PCI entry can look like this.  This is an Intel Host
8406 Bridge memory controller:</p>
8407
8408 <p><blockquote>
8409 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
8410 </blockquote></p>
8411
8412 <p>This represent these values:</p>
8413
8414 <pre>
8415  v   00008086  (vendor)
8416  d   00002770  (device)
8417  sv  00001028  (subvendor)
8418  sd  000001AD  (subdevice)
8419  bc  06        (bus class)
8420  sc  00        (bus subclass)
8421  i   00        (interface)
8422 </pre>
8423
8424 <p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
8425 -n' as 8086:2770.  The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
8426 0600.  The 0600 class is a host bridge.  Other useful bus values are
8427 0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
8428
8429 <p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
8430 means.</p>
8431
8432 <p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
8433
8434 <p>Some typical USB entries can look like this.  This is an internal
8435 USB hub in a laptop:</p>
8436
8437 <p><blockquote>
8438 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
8439 </blockquote></p>
8440
8441 <p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
8442
8443 <pre>
8444  v    1D6B  (device vendor)
8445  p    0001  (device product)
8446  d    0206  (bcddevice)
8447  dc     09  (device class)
8448  dsc    00  (device subclass)
8449  dp     00  (device protocol)
8450  ic     09  (interface class)
8451  isc    00  (interface subclass)
8452  ip     00  (interface protocol)
8453 </pre>
8454
8455 <p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub.  Some times the relevant
8456 class is in the interface class section.  For a simple USB web camera,
8457 these alias entries show up:</p>
8458
8459 <p><blockquote>
8460 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
8461 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
8462 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
8463 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
8464 </blockquote></p>
8465
8466 <p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
8467 camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
8468 microphone).  Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
8469
8470 <p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
8471
8472 <p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff.  This is an IR
8473 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
8474
8475 <p><blockquote>
8476 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
8477 </blockquote></p>
8478
8479 <p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
8480
8481 <p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
8482
8483 <p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
8484 and model.  This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
8485 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
8486
8487 <p><blockquote>
8488 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
8489 </blockquote></p>
8490
8491 <p>The values present are</p>
8492
8493 <pre>
8494  bvn  IBM            (BIOS vendor)
8495  bvr  1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
8496  bd   06/15/2005     (BIOS date)
8497  svn  IBM            (system vendor)
8498  pn   2371H4G        (product name)
8499  pvr  ThinkPadX40    (product version)
8500  rvn  IBM            (board vendor)
8501  rn   2371H4G        (board name)
8502  rvr  NotAvailable   (board version)
8503  cvn  IBM            (chassis vendor)
8504  ct   10             (chassis type)
8505  cvr  NotAvailable   (chassis version)
8506 </pre>
8507
8508 <p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook.  Other interesting values can be
8509 found in the dmidecode source:</p>
8510
8511 <pre>
8512   3 Desktop
8513   4 Low Profile Desktop
8514   5 Pizza Box
8515   6 Mini Tower
8516   7 Tower
8517   8 Portable
8518   9 Laptop
8519  10 Notebook
8520  11 Hand Held
8521  12 Docking Station
8522  13 All In One
8523  14 Sub Notebook
8524  15 Space-saving
8525  16 Lunch Box
8526  17 Main Server Chassis
8527  18 Expansion Chassis
8528  19 Sub Chassis
8529  20 Bus Expansion Chassis
8530  21 Peripheral Chassis
8531  22 RAID Chassis
8532  23 Rack Mount Chassis
8533  24 Sealed-case PC
8534  25 Multi-system
8535  26 CompactPCI
8536  27 AdvancedTCA
8537  28 Blade
8538  29 Blade Enclosing
8539 </pre>
8540
8541 <p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
8542 table.  For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
8543 claim it is a desktop.</p>
8544
8545 <p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
8546
8547 <p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs.  One example is from my
8548 test machine:</p>
8549
8550 <p><blockquote>
8551 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
8552 </blockquote></p>
8553
8554 <p>The values present are</p>
8555
8556 <pre>
8557   ty  01  (type)
8558   pr  00  (prototype)
8559   id  00  (id)
8560   ex  00  (extra)
8561 </pre>
8562
8563 <p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver.  I am not sure what
8564 the valid values are.</p>
8565
8566 <p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
8567
8568 <p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
8569 file2alias.c.  There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
8570 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
8571 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
8572 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro.  I did not spend time documenting all of
8573 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
8574 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
8575
8576 <p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
8577
8578 <p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
8579 one can use the following shell script:</p>
8580
8581 <pre>
8582   for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
8583     echo "$id" ; \
8584     /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/  /' ; \
8585   done
8586 </pre>
8587
8588 <p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
8589 list is very long on my test machine):</p>
8590
8591 <pre>
8592   acpi:ACPI0003:
8593     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
8594   acpi:device:
8595   FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
8596   acpi:IBM0068:
8597     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
8598     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
8599     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
8600     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
8601   acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
8602     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
8603     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
8604     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
8605   [...]
8606 </pre>
8607
8608 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
8609 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
8610 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
8611 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
8612
8613 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
8614 "find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
8615 in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
8616
8617       </div>
8618       <div class="tags">
8619
8620
8621         Tags: <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>.
8622
8623
8624       </div>
8625     </div>
8626     <div class="padding"></div>
8627
8628     <div class="entry">
8629       <div class="title">
8630         <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>
8631       </div>
8632       <div class="date">
8633         10th January 2013
8634       </div>
8635       <div class="body">
8636         <p>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
8637 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
8638 Launcher and updated the Debian package
8639 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">pymissile</a> to make
8640 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in.  I
8641 also added a "Modaliases" header to test it in the Debian archive and
8642 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
8643 plug in his rocket launcher.  In the process I moved the source to a
8644 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
8645 contribute.  <a href="http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/">Upstream</a>
8646 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
8647 years of relative silence.  The new git repository is not listed in
8648 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
8649 bit more before I upload the new version.  If you want to check out
8650 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
8651 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git">gitweb
8652 view</a> or use "<tt>git clone
8653 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git</tt>".</p>
8654
8655       </div>
8656       <div class="tags">
8657
8658
8659         Tags: <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>.
8660
8661
8662       </div>
8663     </div>
8664     <div class="padding"></div>
8665
8666     <div class="entry">
8667       <div class="title">
8668         <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>
8669       </div>
8670       <div class="date">
8671          9th January 2013
8672       </div>
8673       <div class="body">
8674         <p>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
8675 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
8676 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
8677 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
8678 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
8679 machine.  Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
8680 Linux distribution.  When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
8681 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
8682 I need to talk to it.  When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
8683 yubikey-personalization package.  The information required to do this
8684 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.</p>
8685
8686 <p>Some years ago, I proposed to
8687 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg01206.html">use
8688 the discover subsystem to implement this</a>.  The idea is fairly
8689 simple:
8690
8691 <ul>
8692
8693 <li>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
8694   starting when a user log in.</li>
8695
8696 <li>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
8697   hardware is inserted into the computer.</li>
8698
8699 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
8700   database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
8701   packages.</li>
8702
8703 <li>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
8704   package, and make it easy to install it.</li>
8705
8706 </ul>
8707
8708 <p>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
8709 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
8710 discover database to find packages and
8711 <a href="http://www.packagekit.org/">PackageKit</a> to install
8712 packages.</p>
8713
8714 <p>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
8715 draft package is now checked into
8716 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
8717 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>.  In the process, I updated the
8718 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html">discover-data</a>
8719 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
8720 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
8721 2.2013.01.09 to unstable.  I also discovered that the current
8722 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html">discover</a>
8723 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
8724 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present.  I ported it to use
8725 libusb as a fall back option to get it working.  The fixed package
8726 version 2.1.2-6 is now in experimental (didn't upload it to unstable
8727 because of the freeze).</p>
8728
8729 <p>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
8730 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
8731 inserted):</p>
8732
8733 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-09-hw-autoinstall.png"></p>
8734
8735 <p>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
8736 install the proposed packages by pressing the "Please install
8737 program(s)" button should to be implemented.</p>
8738
8739 <p>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
8740 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
8741 from hardware to Debian packages.  Check if 'discover-pkginstall -l'
8742 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
8743 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
8744 reportbug if it isn't.  Or, if you know of a better way to provide
8745 such mapping, please let me know.</p>
8746
8747 <p>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
8748 should be considered before it is ready for production use.  Is dbus
8749 the correct way to detect new hardware?  At the moment I look for HAL
8750 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
8751 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop.  Are there better events to use?
8752 How should the user be notified?  Is the desktop notification
8753 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
8754 popup instead?  How should packages be installed?  When should they
8755 not be installed?</p>
8756
8757 <p>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
8758 please send me an email. :)</p>
8759
8760       </div>
8761       <div class="tags">
8762
8763
8764         Tags: <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>.
8765
8766
8767       </div>
8768     </div>
8769     <div class="padding"></div>
8770
8771     <div class="entry">
8772       <div class="title">
8773         <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>
8774       </div>
8775       <div class="date">
8776          2nd January 2013
8777       </div>
8778       <div class="body">
8779         <p>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
8780 <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx">LEGO Mindstorm
8781 NXT</a>.  My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
8782 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
8783 already in Debian Squeeze.  If Debian support for LEGO is something
8784 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
8785 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> (server
8786 irc.debian.org).  There is a lot that could be done to improve the
8787 Debian support for LEGO designers.  For example both CAD software
8788 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)</p>
8789
8790 <p>Update 2012-01-03: A
8791 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">project page</a>
8792 including links to Lego related packages is now available.</p>
8793
8794       </div>
8795       <div class="tags">
8796
8797
8798         Tags: <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>.
8799
8800
8801       </div>
8802     </div>
8803     <div class="padding"></div>
8804
8805     <div class="entry">
8806       <div class="title">
8807         <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>
8808       </div>
8809       <div class="date">
8810         25th December 2012
8811       </div>
8812       <div class="body">
8813         <p>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
8814 year!  I hope next year will prove to be a good year.</p>
8815
8816 <p><a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">Bitcoin</a>, the digital
8817 decentralised "currency" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
8818 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
8819 experiment.  And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
8820 <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> is about to improve a bit.
8821 The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">new debian source
8822 package</a> (version 0.7.2-2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
8823 in <a href="http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW queue</A>
8824 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
8825 name.</p>
8826
8827 <p>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
8828 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
8829 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:</p>
8830
8831 <blockquote><pre>
8832 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
8833 cd bitcoin
8834 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
8835 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
8836 </pre></blockquote>
8837
8838 <p>You might have to install some build dependencies as well.  The
8839 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
8840 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment.  Note that the
8841 client will download the complete set of bitcoin "blocks", which need
8842 around 5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment.  Make sure your
8843 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
8844 all the blocks.  The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
8845 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
8846 not be able to get all the features out of the client.</p>
8847
8848 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
8849 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
8850 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8851
8852       </div>
8853       <div class="tags">
8854
8855
8856         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>.
8857
8858
8859       </div>
8860     </div>
8861     <div class="padding"></div>
8862
8863     <div class="entry">
8864       <div class="title">
8865         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html">A word on bitcoin support in Debian</a>
8866       </div>
8867       <div class="date">
8868         21st December 2012
8869       </div>
8870       <div class="body">
8871         <p>It has been a while since I wrote about
8872 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>, the decentralised
8873 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
8874 have been busy elsewhere.  But two days ago, I started looking at the
8875 state of <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin in
8876 Debian</a> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet.  The package
8877 is now maintained by a
8878 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/">team of
8879 people</a>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team.  We
8880 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
8881 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
8882 Wheezy.  It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
8883 backports).  The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
8884 it from entering testing.  To try to help the team and improve the
8885 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
8886 reports.  I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
8887 Corallo in a
8888 <a href="https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin">PPA for
8889 Ubuntu</a>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
8890 Debian package.</p>
8891
8892 <p>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
8893 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
8894 improve the package.  It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
8895 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
8896 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
8897 setup.  As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
8898 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-20121217/000041.html">a
8899 patch to backport</a> the latest version.  Jonas is going to look at
8900 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
8901 new version to unstable.
8902
8903 <p>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
8904 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system.  I
8905 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
8906 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
8907 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
8908 transactions to Wikileaks.  But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
8909 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
8910 they sell products and services.  Improving the bitcoin support in
8911 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
8912 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
8913 pay with bitcoin is still not very good.  The bitcoin: URI is a step
8914 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
8915 use.  Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
8916 quick transaction.  I believe there are other clients available, but
8917 have not tested them.</p>
8918
8919 <p>My
8920 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">experiment
8921 with bitcoins</a> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
8922 I received 20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
8923 years ago, as can be
8924 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">seen
8925 on the blockexplorer service</a>.  Thank you everyone for your
8926 donation.  The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
8927 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
8928 number of users have gone up since then.  If you use bitcoin and want
8929 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
8930 the same address as last time,
8931 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8932
8933       </div>
8934       <div class="tags">
8935
8936
8937         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>.
8938
8939
8940       </div>
8941     </div>
8942     <div class="padding"></div>
8943
8944     <div class="entry">
8945       <div class="title">
8946         <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>
8947       </div>
8948       <div class="date">
8949          7th September 2012
8950       </div>
8951       <div class="body">
8952         <p>As I
8953 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">mentioned
8954 this summer</a>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
8955 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
8956 <a href="https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook">Gitorious
8957 repository for the project</a>.</p>
8958
8959 <p>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
8960 to the HTML version.  To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
8961 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
8962 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.</p>
8963
8964 <p>Want to sing?  You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
8965 PostScript formats at
8966 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's Computer
8967 Science Songbook</a>.</p>
8968
8969       </div>
8970       <div class="tags">
8971
8972
8973         Tags: <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>.
8974
8975
8976       </div>
8977     </div>
8978     <div class="padding"></div>
8979
8980     <div class="entry">
8981       <div class="title">
8982         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gratulerer_med_19__rsdagen__Debian_.html">Gratulerer med 19-årsdagen, Debian!</a>
8983       </div>
8984       <div class="date">
8985         16th August 2012
8986       </div>
8987       <div class="body">
8988         <p>I dag fyller
8989 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120813">Debian-prosjektet 19
8990 år</a>.  Jeg har fulgt det de siste 12 årene, og er veldig glad for å kunne
8991 si gratulerer med dagen, Debian!</p>
8992
8993       </div>
8994       <div class="tags">
8995
8996
8997         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>.
8998
8999
9000       </div>
9001     </div>
9002     <div class="padding"></div>
9003
9004     <div class="entry">
9005       <div class="title">
9006         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Song book for Computer Scientists</a>
9007       </div>
9008       <div class="date">
9009         24th June 2012
9010       </div>
9011       <div class="body">
9012         <p>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
9013 <a href="http://www.uit.no/">University of Tromsø</a>, I started
9014 collecting computer related songs for use at parties.  The original
9015 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
9016 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
9017 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format.  I have
9018 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
9019 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
9020 help me extend and update the book.  If anyone is volunteering to help
9021 me with this, send me an email.  Also let me know if there are songs
9022 missing in my book.</p>
9023
9024 <p>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
9025 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
9026 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
9027 Especially now that <a href="http://debconf12.debconf.org/">Debconf
9028 12</a> is about to start (and I am not going).  Want to sing?  Check
9029 out <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's
9030 Computer Science Songbook</a>.
9031
9032       </div>
9033       <div class="tags">
9034
9035
9036         Tags: <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>.
9037
9038
9039       </div>
9040     </div>
9041     <div class="padding"></div>
9042
9043     <div class="entry">
9044       <div class="title">
9045         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html">Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge</a>
9046       </div>
9047       <div class="date">
9048         21st November 2011
9049       </div>
9050       <div class="body">
9051         <p>At work we have heaps of servers.  I believe the total count is
9052 around 1000 at the moment.  To be able to get help from the vendors
9053 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
9054 up to date.  If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the
9055 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
9056 firmware is upgraded.  So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
9057 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
9058 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
9059 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
9060 the tools to do so.</p>
9061
9062 <p>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
9063 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got.  Most of
9064 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
9065 so far.  This blog post is about the Dell part.</P>
9066
9067 <p>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
9068 <a href="ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz">an XML file</a>
9069 with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing
9070 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
9071 site I can find it.  Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
9072 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
9073 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
9074 be activated on the first reboot.</p>
9075
9076 <p>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
9077 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
9078 servers at a site?  Please get in touch and lets share resources.</p>
9079
9080 <p><pre>
9081 #!/usr/bin/perl
9082 use strict;
9083 use warnings;
9084 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
9085 BEGIN {
9086     # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
9087     my %rhelmodules = (
9088         'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
9089         );
9090     for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
9091         eval "use $module;";
9092         if ($@) {
9093             my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
9094             system("yum install -y $pkg");
9095             eval "use $module;";
9096         }
9097     }
9098 }
9099 my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
9100
9101 upgrade_dell();
9102
9103 exit 0;
9104
9105 sub run_firmware_script {
9106     my ($opts, $script) = @_;
9107     unless ($script) {
9108         print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
9109         exit 1
9110     }
9111     print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
9112
9113     if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
9114         print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
9115     } else {
9116         print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
9117     }
9118 }
9119
9120 sub run_firmware_scripts {
9121     my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
9122     # Run firmware packages
9123     for my $dir (@dirs) {
9124         print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
9125         opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
9126         while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
9127             next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
9128             run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
9129         }
9130         closedir $dh;
9131     }
9132 }
9133
9134 sub download {
9135     my $url = shift;
9136     print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
9137     system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
9138 }
9139
9140 sub upgrade_dell {
9141     my @dirs;
9142     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
9143     chomp $product;
9144
9145     if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
9146
9147         # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
9148         system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
9149
9150         my $tmpdir = tempdir(
9151             CLEANUP => 1
9152             );
9153         chdir($tmpdir);
9154         fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
9155         system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
9156         my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
9157         # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
9158         my $fwopts = "-q";
9159         if (@paths) {
9160             for my $url (@paths) {
9161                 fetch_dell_fw($url);
9162             }
9163             run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
9164         } else {
9165             print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
9166             print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
9167         }
9168         chdir('/');
9169     } else {
9170         print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
9171         print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
9172     }
9173 }
9174
9175 sub fetch_dell_fw {
9176     my $path = shift;
9177     my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
9178     download($url);
9179 }
9180
9181 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
9182 # firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
9183 # machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
9184 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
9185     my $filename = shift;
9186
9187     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
9188     chomp $product;
9189     my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
9190
9191     print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
9192
9193     my $xml = XMLin($filename);
9194     my @paths;
9195     for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
9196         my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
9197         my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
9198         my $oscode;
9199         if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
9200             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
9201         } else {
9202             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
9203         }
9204         if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
9205         {
9206             @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
9207         }
9208     }
9209     for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
9210         my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
9211
9212         # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
9213         next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
9214
9215         my $cpath = $component->{path};
9216         for my $path (@paths) {
9217             if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
9218                 push(@paths, $cpath);
9219             }
9220         }
9221     }
9222     return @paths;
9223 }
9224 </pre>
9225
9226 <p>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
9227 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking.  Anyone know a
9228 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers?  At the
9229 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
9230 outdated.</p>
9231
9232       </div>
9233       <div class="tags">
9234
9235
9236         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9237
9238
9239       </div>
9240     </div>
9241     <div class="padding"></div>
9242
9243     <div class="entry">
9244       <div class="title">
9245         <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>
9246       </div>
9247       <div class="date">
9248          4th August 2011
9249       </div>
9250       <div class="body">
9251         <p>Wouter Verhelst have some
9252 <a href="http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot">interesting
9253 comments and opinions</a> on my blog post on
9254 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">the
9255 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian</a> and my blog post about
9256 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">the
9257 default KDE desktop in Debian</a>.  I only have time to address one
9258 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
9259 misunderstanding he bring forward:</p>
9260
9261 <p><blockquote>
9262 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
9263 single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line;
9264 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
9265 </blockquote></p>
9266
9267 <p>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
9268 and booting into runlevel 1 is the same.  I am not surprised he
9269 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
9270 thing to believe.  But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
9271 runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user
9272 mode.  I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
9273 hard to explain.</p>
9274
9275 <p>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
9276 "<tt>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin</tt>".  This means the only thing that is
9277 executed in single user mode is sulogin.  Single user mode is a boot
9278 state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
9279 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
9280 enters the single user state.  When switching to runlevel 1, the state
9281 is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1
9282 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
9283 runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
9284 1.  It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the
9285 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
9286 mode).</p>
9287
9288 <p>This summary might make it clearer.  When booting for the first
9289 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
9290 "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  When booting into
9291 runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc
9292 S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  A problem show up when
9293 trying to continue after visiting single user mode.  Not all services
9294 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
9295 unpredicatble state.  This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
9296 after visiting single user mode.</p>
9297
9298 <p>A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of
9299 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/.  When switching from say runlevel 2
9300 to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
9301 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
9302 started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels
9303 2-5.  I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
9304 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not <strong>required</strong> to get a
9305 functioning single user mode during boot.</p>
9306
9307 <p>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
9308 and discovered this problem a few years ago.  I suspect it originates
9309 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.</p>
9310
9311       </div>
9312       <div class="tags">
9313
9314
9315         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>.
9316
9317
9318       </div>
9319     </div>
9320     <div class="padding"></div>
9321
9322     <div class="entry">
9323       <div class="title">
9324         <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>
9325       </div>
9326       <div class="date">
9327         30th July 2011
9328       </div>
9329       <div class="body">
9330         <p>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
9331 are started from /etc/rcS.d/.  In fact, there is a bite more of them
9332 than make sense, and this causes a few problems.  What kind of
9333 problems, you might ask.  There are at least two problems.  The first
9334 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
9335 runlevel 1.  One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
9336 the expected state.  The other is that single user boot will sometimes
9337 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
9338 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
9339 machine from a problem in that subsystem.  A minor additional point is
9340 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
9341 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
9342 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.</p>
9343
9344 <p>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/.  In short, only the
9345 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
9346 presented during a single user boot should go there.  Everything else
9347 should go into the numeric runlevels.  This means things like
9348 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
9349 the numeric runlevels.  Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d
9350 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
9351 out.  Do your package have one of them?  Please help us make single
9352 user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.</p>
9353
9354 <p>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
9355 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
9356 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
9357 is presented.</p>
9358
9359 <p>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound.  To keep
9360 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
9361 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
9362 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
9363 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
9364 moved first.  This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
9365 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
9366 the system state correct.  This will require some coordination when it
9367 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
9368 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
9369 on them.  Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
9370 package, while others are still left to do.  I wish I had time to work
9371 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
9372 find time to push this forward.</p>
9373
9374       </div>
9375       <div class="tags">
9376
9377
9378         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>.
9379
9380
9381       </div>
9382     </div>
9383     <div class="padding"></div>
9384
9385     <div class="entry">
9386       <div class="title">
9387         <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>
9388       </div>
9389       <div class="date">
9390         29th July 2011
9391       </div>
9392       <div class="body">
9393         <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
9394 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
9395 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
9396 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
9397 issues.</p>
9398
9399 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
9400 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
9401 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
9402
9403 <ol>
9404
9405 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
9406 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
9407 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
9408 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
9409 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
9410 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
9411 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
9412 Debian.</li>
9413
9414 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
9415 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
9416 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
9417 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
9418 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
9419 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
9420 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
9421 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
9422 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
9423 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
9424 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
9425 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
9426 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
9427
9428 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
9429 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
9430 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
9431 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
9432 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
9433 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
9434 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
9435 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
9436 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
9437 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
9438
9439 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
9440 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
9441 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
9442 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
9443 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
9444 latter behaviour.</li>
9445
9446 </ol>
9447
9448 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
9449 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
9450 it do not matter much.</p>
9451
9452 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
9453 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
9454 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>
9455
9456       </div>
9457       <div class="tags">
9458
9459
9460         Tags: <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>.
9461
9462
9463       </div>
9464     </div>
9465     <div class="padding"></div>
9466
9467     <div class="entry">
9468       <div class="title">
9469         <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>
9470       </div>
9471       <div class="date">
9472         26th July 2011
9473       </div>
9474       <div class="body">
9475         <p>The Norwegian <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</A>
9476 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
9477 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10
9478 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
9479 security support for a few years.</p>
9480
9481 <p>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
9482 that are missing in Debian at the moment.  It would be great if these
9483 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
9484 their own <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com">FixMyStreet</a> clone
9485 in their own country using only Debian packages.  The list of modules
9486 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group
9487 will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
9488 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
9489 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
9490 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
9491 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
9492 easier in the future.</p>
9493
9494 <p>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
9495 installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name'
9496 and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package.  But this leave me
9497 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
9498 do not have time for.</p>
9499
9500       </div>
9501       <div class="tags">
9502
9503
9504         Tags: <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>.
9505
9506
9507       </div>
9508     </div>
9509     <div class="padding"></div>
9510
9511     <div class="entry">
9512       <div class="title">
9513         <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>
9514       </div>
9515       <div class="date">
9516          3rd April 2011
9517       </div>
9518       <div class="body">
9519         <p>Here is a small update for my English readers.  Most of my blog
9520 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
9521 update in English.</p>
9522
9523 <p>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
9524 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
9525 of the British service
9526 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> up and running,
9527 and it has been running for a month now.  The entire project has been
9528 organised by me and two others.  Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
9529 to fund the development work.  In January I drafted a contract with
9530 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> on what to develop,
9531 and in February the development took place.  Most of it involved
9532 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
9533 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
9534 running in any country by now.  The Norwegian
9535 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is using
9536 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> as the map
9537 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
9538 support for this had to be added/fixed.</p>
9539
9540 <p>The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend
9541 polishing the system before we announced it March 7th.  The system is
9542 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000
9543 problem reports in a few weeks.  Soon we hope to announce the Android
9544 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
9545 public infrastructure.</p>
9546
9547 <p>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
9548 such service?</p>
9549
9550       </div>
9551       <div class="tags">
9552
9553
9554         Tags: <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>.
9555
9556
9557       </div>
9558     </div>
9559     <div class="padding"></div>
9560
9561     <div class="entry">
9562       <div class="title">
9563         <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>
9564       </div>
9565       <div class="date">
9566         28th January 2011
9567       </div>
9568       <div class="body">
9569         <p>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
9570 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo.  My idea is that
9571 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
9572 available on the Internet, and check our locally
9573 maintained/distributed software against this information.  It should
9574 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten.  The
9575 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
9576 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
9577 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
9578 out which security holes were present in our free software
9579 collection.</p>
9580
9581 <p>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
9582 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
9583 consistent way across data sources.  I considered several ways to do
9584 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
9585 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
9586 existing naming scheme.  And it seem like I am not the first one to
9587 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
9588 solution.  Enter the <a href="http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html">Common
9589 Platform Enumeration</a> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
9590 software, hardware and other platform components.  The CPE ids are
9591 mapped to CVEs in the <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/">National
9592 Vulnerability Database</a>, allowing me to look up know security
9593 issues for any CPE name.  With this in place, all I need to do is to
9594 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
9595 This is fairly trivial (I google for 'cve cpe $package' and check the
9596 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).</p>
9597
9598 <p>To give you an example.  The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
9599 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip.  If the old version 1.3.3 was the package to
9600 check out, one could look up
9601 <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
9602 in NVD</a> and get a list of 6 security holes with public CVE entries.
9603 The most recent one is
9604 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-0001">CVE-2010-0001</a>,
9605 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
9606 list of affected versions is provided.</p>
9607
9608 <p>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
9609 for offline processing of issues.  Using this dump, I've written a
9610 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
9611 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs.  One give it CPEs
9612 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
9613 security issues out.</p>
9614
9615 <p>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
9616 information need to be high.  For that to happen, I believe as many as
9617 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database.  I notice
9618 RHEL is providing
9619 <a href="https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt">a
9620 map from CVE to CPE</a>, indicating that they are using the CPE
9621 information.  I'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.</p>
9622
9623 <p>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
9624 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
9625 the CVE database in NVD.  The result look fairly good, but there are
9626 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
9627 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
9628 Debian believe are affected by a CVE).  Hope to find time to improve
9629 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
9630 someone maintaining it.  So far my three emails with questions and
9631 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
9632 established soon.</p>
9633
9634 <p>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
9635 mapping.  It would be useful to know which packages in for example
9636 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
9637 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
9638 for their packages.</p>
9639
9640       </div>
9641       <div class="tags">
9642
9643
9644         Tags: <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>.
9645
9646
9647       </div>
9648     </div>
9649     <div class="padding"></div>
9650
9651     <div class="entry">
9652       <div class="title">
9653         <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>
9654       </div>
9655       <div class="date">
9656         23rd January 2011
9657       </div>
9658       <div class="body">
9659         <p>In the
9660 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data">discover-data</a>
9661 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
9662 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
9663 information.  One part of this script that I find very useful when
9664 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
9665 to the PCI device it claims.  It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
9666 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with.  To see
9667 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
9668 <tt>/usr/share/bug/discover-data 3>&1</tt>.  The relevant output on
9669 one of my machines like this:</p>
9670
9671 <pre>
9672 loaded modules:
9673 10de:03eb i2c_nforce2
9674 10de:03f1 ohci_hcd
9675 10de:03f2 ehci_hcd
9676 10de:03f0 snd_hda_intel
9677 10de:03ec pata_amd
9678 10de:03f6 sata_nv
9679 1022:1103 k8temp
9680 109e:036e bttv
9681 109e:0878 snd_bt87x
9682 11ab:4364 sky2
9683 </pre>
9684
9685 <p>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
9686 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor 3:</p>
9687
9688 <pre>
9689 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
9690     echo loaded pci modules:
9691     (
9692         cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
9693         for address in * ; do
9694             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
9695                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
9696                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
9697                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
9698                     id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $3}'`
9699                     echo "$id $module"
9700                 fi
9701             fi
9702         done
9703     )
9704     echo
9705 fi
9706 </pre>
9707
9708 <p>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
9709 mappings:</p>
9710
9711 <pre>
9712 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
9713     echo loaded usb modules:
9714     (
9715         cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
9716         for address in * ; do
9717             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
9718                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
9719                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
9720                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
9721                     id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $6}')
9722                     if [ "$id" ] ; then
9723                         echo "$id $module"
9724                     fi
9725                 fi
9726             fi
9727         done
9728     )
9729     echo
9730 fi
9731 </pre>
9732
9733 <p>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
9734 well.</p>
9735
9736       </div>
9737       <div class="tags">
9738
9739
9740         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9741
9742
9743       </div>
9744     </div>
9745     <div class="padding"></div>
9746
9747     <div class="entry">
9748       <div class="title">
9749         <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>
9750       </div>
9751       <div class="date">
9752         22nd December 2010
9753       </div>
9754       <div class="body">
9755         <p>The last few days I have spent at work here at the <a
9756 href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> testing if the new
9757 batch of computers will work with Linux.  Every year for the last few
9758 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
9759 computers, and this year HP won the bid.  Two different desktops and
9760 five different laptops are on the list this year.  We in the UNIX
9761 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
9762 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
9763 university.</p>
9764
9765 <p>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
9766 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well.  To test, I PXE
9767 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
9768 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware.  When
9769 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
9770 on.  If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
9771 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
9772 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.</p>
9773
9774 <p>Anyway, to get to the point of this post.  Here is the simple tests
9775 I perform on a new model.</p>
9776
9777 <ul>
9778
9779 <li>Is PXE installation working?  I'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
9780 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment.  If I feel like it, I also test with
9781 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.</li>
9782
9783 <li>Is X.org working?  If the graphical login screen show up after
9784 installation, X.org is working.</li>
9785
9786 <li>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working?  Running glxgears (in
9787 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
9788 reported by the program.</li>
9789
9790 <li>Is sound working?  With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
9791 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful.  If there
9792 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
9793 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound.  I
9794 normally test this by playing
9795 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20101012-chef/ ">a HTML5
9796 video</a> in Firefox/Iceweasel.</li>
9797
9798 <li>Is the USB subsystem working?  I test this by plugging in a USB
9799 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
9800
9801 <li>Is the CD/DVD player working?  I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
9802 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
9803
9804 <li>Is any built in camera working?  Test using cheese, and see if a
9805 picture from the v4l device show up.</li>
9806
9807 <li>Is bluetooth working?  Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
9808 any bluetooth devices are discovered.  In my office, I normally see a
9809 few.</li>
9810
9811 <li>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working.  I have
9812 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
9813 notice this.</li>
9814
9815 <li>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working?  I'm testing if the
9816 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
9817 resume.</li>
9818
9819 <li>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
9820 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
9821 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc?  The set of buttons differ from
9822 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
9823 not.</li>
9824
9825 <li>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
9826 acceleration sensors etc.  I rarely test these, as I do not know how
9827 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
9828 existence.</li>
9829
9830 </ul>
9831
9832 <p>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
9833 for the HP machines I am testing.  I'm not done yet, so I will report
9834 the test results later.  For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work
9835 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
9836 and audio fail on RHEL6.  Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p.  As you
9837 can see, I have most machines left to test.  One interesting
9838 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
9839 RHEL6 with glxgears.  No idea why.</p>
9840
9841       </div>
9842       <div class="tags">
9843
9844
9845         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>.
9846
9847
9848       </div>
9849     </div>
9850     <div class="padding"></div>
9851
9852     <div class="entry">
9853       <div class="title">
9854         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html">Some thoughts on BitCoins</a>
9855       </div>
9856       <div class="date">
9857         11th December 2010
9858       </div>
9859       <div class="body">
9860         <p>As I continue to explore
9861 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>, I've starting to wonder
9862 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
9863 and regulations here in Norway.  Here are some random notes.</p>
9864
9865 <p>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
9866 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
9867 is known to everyone.  This means that if a BitCoin address has been
9868 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
9869 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
9870 that address.  There is even a web service to look at the details for
9871 all transactions.  There I can see that my address
9872 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a>
9873 have received 16.06 Bitcoin, the
9874 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3</a>
9875 address of Simon Phipps have received 181.97 BitCoin and the address
9876 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt</A>
9877 of EFF have received 2447.38 BitCoins so far.  Thank you to each and
9878 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
9879 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
9880 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
9881 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction.  I'm told
9882 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
9883 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
9884 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.</p>
9885
9886 <p>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
9887 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
9888 without declaring it.  There are money laundering, tax and accounting
9889 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
9890 If the Skolelinux foundation
9891 (<a href="http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">SLX
9892 Debian Labs</a>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
9893 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
9894 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
9895 not, should everything or nothing be declared?  What exchange rate
9896 should be used when calculating taxes?  Would receivers have to pay
9897 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
9898 BitCoin?  I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.</p>
9899
9900 <p>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
9901 accepted by a lot of users.  It must be possible to get easy access to
9902 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
9903 easy to spend it.  At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
9904 access to, but there are very few places to spend it.  I am not really
9905 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
9906 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins.  I
9907 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
9908 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
9909 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
9910 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular.  I'm sure they
9911 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
9912 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
9913 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
9914 currencies.</p>
9915
9916 <p>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
9917 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
9918 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
9919 to see which one get the next lump of cash).  The "winner" get 50
9920 BitCoin when this happen.  Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
9921 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
9922 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
9923 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the 50
9924 BitCoins.  Check out
9925 <a href="http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/">BitCoin Pool</a>
9926 if this sounds interesting.  I have not had time to try to set up a
9927 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
9928 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
9929 yet.</p>
9930
9931 <p>Update 2010-12-15: Found an <a
9932 href="http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi">interesting
9933 criticism</a> of bitcoin.  Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
9934 it was interesting to read.  The arguments presented seem to be
9935 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.</p>
9936
9937       </div>
9938       <div class="tags">
9939
9940
9941         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>.
9942
9943
9944       </div>
9945     </div>
9946     <div class="padding"></div>
9947
9948     <div class="entry">
9949       <div class="title">
9950         <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>
9951       </div>
9952       <div class="date">
9953         10th December 2010
9954       </div>
9955       <div class="body">
9956         <p>With this weeks lawless
9957 <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/06/wikileaks/index.html">governmental
9958 attacks</a> on Wikileak and
9959 <a href="http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/2010/12/06/war_on_speech">free
9960 speech</a>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
9961 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
9962 A blog post from
9963 <a href="http://webmink.com/2010/12/06/now-accepting-bitcoin/">Simon
9964 Phipps on bitcoin</a> reminded me about a project that a friend of
9965 mine mentioned earlier.  I decided to follow Simon's example, and get
9966 involved with <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>.  I got
9967 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
9968 some bitcoins to get started.  I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
9969 for helping me remember BitCoin.</p>
9970
9971 <p>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder?  It is a digital
9972 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
9973 networks.  It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
9974 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
9975 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions.  The
9976 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets 2.9
9977 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
9978 line client builds just fine.  Hopefully Jonas
9979 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/578157">will get the package into
9980 Debian</a> soon.</p>
9981
9982 <p>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
9983 There are <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/trade">companies accepting
9984 bitcoins</a> when selling services and goods, and there are even
9985 currency "stock" markets where the exchange rate is decided.  There
9986 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising.  If you
9987 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
9988 you can even get
9989 <a href="https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/">some for free</a> (0.05
9990 bitcoin at the time of writing).  Use
9991 <a href="http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/">BitcoinWatch</a> to keep an eye
9992 on the current exchange rates.</p>
9993
9994 <p>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
9995 machines.  If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
9996 donations to the address
9997 <b>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</b>.  Thank you!</p>
9998
9999       </div>
10000       <div class="tags">
10001
10002
10003         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>.
10004
10005
10006       </div>
10007     </div>
10008     <div class="padding"></div>
10009
10010     <div class="entry">
10011       <div class="title">
10012         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html">Why isn't Debian Edu using VLC?</a>
10013       </div>
10014       <div class="date">
10015         27th November 2010
10016       </div>
10017       <div class="body">
10018         <p>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
10019 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
10020 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
10021 to play a video file or stream.  Only if VLC fail will I drag out
10022 gmplayer to see if it can do better.  The reason is mostly the failure
10023 model and trust.  When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
10024 reporting the problem.  When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
10025 just hangs.  The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.<p>
10026
10027 <p>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
10028 mplayer in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
10029 Edu/Skolelinux</a>.  The reason is simple.  We need a good browser
10030 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
10031 not very good.  For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
10032 is no way for the user to pause the video.  Also, when I
10033 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">last
10034 tested the browser plugins</a> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
10035 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked.  If
10036 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
10037 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.</P>
10038
10039 <p>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
10040 annoying.  The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
10041 keyboard shortcuts.  When the player is in full screen mode, its
10042 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
10043 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode.  I
10044 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
10045 window mode.  Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
10046 the current video.  It is very nice when playing short videos from the
10047 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
10048 what is going on.</p>
10049
10050       </div>
10051       <div class="tags">
10052
10053
10054         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>.
10055
10056
10057       </div>
10058     </div>
10059     <div class="padding"></div>
10060
10061     <div class="entry">
10062       <div class="title">
10063         <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>
10064       </div>
10065       <div class="date">
10066         22nd November 2010
10067       </div>
10068       <div class="body">
10069         <p>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
10070 upgrade testing of the
10071 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
10072 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a> to do <tt>apt-get autoremove</tt> when using apt-get.
10073 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
10074 can now present the updated result from today:</p>
10075
10076 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
10077
10078 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10079
10080 <blockquote><p>
10081   apache2.2-bin
10082   aptdaemon
10083   baobab
10084   binfmt-support
10085   browser-plugin-gnash
10086   cheese-common
10087   cli-common
10088   cups-pk-helper
10089   dmz-cursor-theme
10090   empathy
10091   empathy-common
10092   freedesktop-sound-theme
10093   freeglut3
10094   gconf-defaults-service
10095   gdm-themes
10096   gedit-plugins
10097   geoclue
10098   geoclue-hostip
10099   geoclue-localnet
10100   geoclue-manual
10101   geoclue-yahoo
10102   gnash
10103   gnash-common
10104   gnome
10105   gnome-backgrounds
10106   gnome-cards-data
10107   gnome-codec-install
10108   gnome-core
10109   gnome-desktop-environment
10110   gnome-disk-utility
10111   gnome-screenshot
10112   gnome-search-tool
10113   gnome-session-canberra
10114   gnome-system-log
10115   gnome-themes-extras
10116   gnome-themes-more
10117   gnome-user-share
10118   gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
10119   gstreamer0.10-tools
10120   gtk2-engines
10121   gtk2-engines-pixbuf
10122   gtk2-engines-smooth
10123   hamster-applet
10124   libapache2-mod-dnssd
10125   libapr1
10126   libaprutil1
10127   libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
10128   libaprutil1-ldap
10129   libart2.0-cil
10130   libboost-date-time1.42.0
10131   libboost-python1.42.0
10132   libboost-thread1.42.0
10133   libchamplain-0.4-0
10134   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0
10135   libcheese-gtk18
10136   libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
10137   libcryptui0
10138   libdiscid0
10139   libelf1
10140   libepc-1.0-2
10141   libepc-common
10142   libepc-ui-1.0-2
10143   libfreerdp-plugins-standard
10144   libfreerdp0
10145   libgconf2.0-cil
10146   libgdata-common
10147   libgdata7
10148   libgdu-gtk0
10149   libgee2
10150   libgeoclue0
10151   libgexiv2-0
10152   libgif4
10153   libglade2.0-cil
10154   libglib2.0-cil
10155   libgmime2.4-cil
10156   libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
10157   libgnome2.24-cil
10158   libgnomepanel2.24-cil
10159   libgpod-common
10160   libgpod4
10161   libgtk2.0-cil
10162   libgtkglext1
10163   libgtksourceview2.0-common
10164   libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
10165   libmono-addins0.2-cil
10166   libmono-cairo2.0-cil
10167   libmono-corlib2.0-cil
10168   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
10169   libmono-posix2.0-cil
10170   libmono-security2.0-cil
10171   libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
10172   libmono-system2.0-cil
10173   libmtp8
10174   libmusicbrainz3-6
10175   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
10176   libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
10177   libopal3.6.8
10178   libpolkit-gtk-1-0
10179   libpt2.6.7
10180   libpython2.6
10181   librpm1
10182   librpmio1
10183   libsdl1.2debian
10184   libsrtp0
10185   libssh-4
10186   libtelepathy-farsight0
10187   libtelepathy-glib0
10188   libtidy-0.99-0
10189   media-player-info
10190   mesa-utils
10191   mono-2.0-gac
10192   mono-gac
10193   mono-runtime
10194   nautilus-sendto
10195   nautilus-sendto-empathy
10196   p7zip-full
10197   pkg-config
10198   python-aptdaemon
10199   python-aptdaemon-gtk
10200   python-axiom
10201   python-beautifulsoup
10202   python-bugbuddy
10203   python-clientform
10204   python-coherence
10205   python-configobj
10206   python-crypto
10207   python-cupshelpers
10208   python-elementtree
10209   python-epsilon
10210   python-evolution
10211   python-feedparser
10212   python-gdata
10213   python-gdbm
10214   python-gst0.10
10215   python-gtkglext1
10216   python-gtksourceview2
10217   python-httplib2
10218   python-louie
10219   python-mako
10220   python-markupsafe
10221   python-mechanize
10222   python-nevow
10223   python-notify
10224   python-opengl
10225   python-openssl
10226   python-pam
10227   python-pkg-resources
10228   python-pyasn1
10229   python-pysqlite2
10230   python-rdflib
10231   python-serial
10232   python-tagpy
10233   python-twisted-bin
10234   python-twisted-conch
10235   python-twisted-core
10236   python-twisted-web
10237   python-utidylib
10238   python-webkit
10239   python-xdg
10240   python-zope.interface
10241   remmina
10242   remmina-plugin-data
10243   remmina-plugin-rdp
10244   remmina-plugin-vnc
10245   rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
10246   rhythmbox-plugins
10247   rpm-common
10248   rpm2cpio
10249   seahorse-plugins
10250   shotwell
10251   software-center
10252   system-config-printer-udev
10253   telepathy-gabble
10254   telepathy-mission-control-5
10255   telepathy-salut
10256   tomboy
10257   totem
10258   totem-coherence
10259   totem-mozilla
10260   totem-plugins
10261   transmission-common
10262   xdg-user-dirs
10263   xdg-user-dirs-gtk
10264   xserver-xephyr
10265 </p></blockquote>
10266
10267 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10268
10269 <blockquote><p>
10270   cheese
10271   ekiga
10272   eog
10273   epiphany-extensions
10274   evolution-exchange
10275   fast-user-switch-applet
10276   file-roller
10277   gcalctool
10278   gconf-editor
10279   gdm
10280   gedit
10281   gedit-common
10282   gnome-games
10283   gnome-games-data
10284   gnome-nettool
10285   gnome-system-tools
10286   gnome-themes
10287   gnuchess
10288   gucharmap
10289   guile-1.8-libs
10290   libavahi-ui0
10291   libdmx1
10292   libgalago3
10293   libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
10294   libgtksourceview2.0-0
10295   liblircclient0
10296   libsdl1.2debian-alsa
10297   libspeexdsp1
10298   libsvga1
10299   rhythmbox
10300   seahorse
10301   sound-juicer
10302   system-config-printer
10303   totem-common
10304   transmission-gtk
10305   vinagre
10306   vino
10307 </p></blockquote>
10308
10309 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10310
10311 <blockquote><p>
10312   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
10313 </p></blockquote>
10314
10315 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10316
10317 <blockquote><p>
10318 [nothing]
10319 </p></blockquote>
10320
10321 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
10322
10323 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10324
10325 <blockquote><p>
10326   ksmserver
10327 </p></blockquote>
10328
10329 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10330
10331 <blockquote><p>
10332   kwin
10333   network-manager-kde
10334 </p></blockquote>
10335
10336 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10337
10338 <blockquote><p>
10339   arts
10340   dolphin
10341   freespacenotifier
10342   google-gadgets-gst
10343   google-gadgets-xul
10344   kappfinder
10345   kcalc
10346   kcharselect
10347   kde-core
10348   kde-plasma-desktop
10349   kde-standard
10350   kde-window-manager
10351   kdeartwork
10352   kdeartwork-emoticons
10353   kdeartwork-style
10354   kdeartwork-theme-icon
10355   kdebase
10356   kdebase-apps
10357   kdebase-workspace
10358   kdebase-workspace-bin
10359   kdebase-workspace-data
10360   kdeeject
10361   kdelibs
10362   kdeplasma-addons
10363   kdeutils
10364   kdewallpapers
10365   kdf
10366   kfloppy
10367   kgpg
10368   khelpcenter4
10369   kinfocenter
10370   konq-plugins-l10n
10371   konqueror-nsplugins
10372   kscreensaver
10373   kscreensaver-xsavers
10374   ktimer
10375   kwrite
10376   libgle3
10377   libkde4-ruby1.8
10378   libkonq5
10379   libkonq5-templates
10380   libnetpbm10
10381   libplasma-ruby
10382   libplasma-ruby1.8
10383   libqt4-ruby1.8
10384   marble-data
10385   marble-plugins
10386   netpbm
10387   nuvola-icon-theme
10388   plasma-dataengines-workspace
10389   plasma-desktop
10390   plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
10391   plasma-runners-addons
10392   plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
10393   plasma-scriptengine-python
10394   plasma-scriptengine-qedje
10395   plasma-scriptengine-ruby
10396   plasma-scriptengine-webkit
10397   plasma-scriptengines
10398   plasma-wallpapers-addons
10399   plasma-widget-folderview
10400   plasma-widget-networkmanagement
10401   ruby
10402   sweeper
10403   update-notifier-kde
10404   xscreensaver-data-extra
10405   xscreensaver-gl
10406   xscreensaver-gl-extra
10407   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
10408 </p></blockquote>
10409
10410 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10411
10412 <blockquote><p>
10413   ark
10414   google-gadgets-common
10415   google-gadgets-qt
10416   htdig
10417   kate
10418   kdebase-bin
10419   kdebase-data
10420   kdepasswd
10421   kfind
10422   klipper
10423   konq-plugins
10424   konqueror
10425   ksysguard
10426   ksysguardd
10427   libarchive1
10428   libcln6
10429   libeet1
10430   libeina-svn-06
10431   libggadget-1.0-0b
10432   libggadget-qt-1.0-0b
10433   libgps19
10434   libkdecorations4
10435   libkephal4
10436   libkonq4
10437   libkonqsidebarplugin4a
10438   libkscreensaver5
10439   libksgrd4
10440   libksignalplotter4
10441   libkunitconversion4
10442   libkwineffects1a
10443   libmarblewidget4
10444   libntrack-qt4-1
10445   libntrack0
10446   libplasma-geolocation-interface4
10447   libplasmaclock4a
10448   libplasmagenericshell4
10449   libprocesscore4a
10450   libprocessui4a
10451   libqalculate5
10452   libqedje0a
10453   libqtruby4shared2
10454   libqzion0a
10455   libruby1.8
10456   libscim8c2a
10457   libsmokekdecore4-3
10458   libsmokekdeui4-3
10459   libsmokekfile3
10460   libsmokekhtml3
10461   libsmokekio3
10462   libsmokeknewstuff2-3
10463   libsmokeknewstuff3-3
10464   libsmokekparts3
10465   libsmokektexteditor3
10466   libsmokekutils3
10467   libsmokenepomuk3
10468   libsmokephonon3
10469   libsmokeplasma3
10470   libsmokeqtcore4-3
10471   libsmokeqtdbus4-3
10472   libsmokeqtgui4-3
10473   libsmokeqtnetwork4-3
10474   libsmokeqtopengl4-3
10475   libsmokeqtscript4-3
10476   libsmokeqtsql4-3
10477   libsmokeqtsvg4-3
10478   libsmokeqttest4-3
10479   libsmokeqtuitools4-3
10480   libsmokeqtwebkit4-3
10481   libsmokeqtxml4-3
10482   libsmokesolid3
10483   libsmokesoprano3
10484   libtaskmanager4a
10485   libtidy-0.99-0
10486   libweather-ion4a
10487   libxklavier16
10488   libxxf86misc1
10489   okteta
10490   oxygencursors
10491   plasma-dataengines-addons
10492   plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
10493   plasma-widget-lancelot
10494   plasma-widgets-addons
10495   plasma-widgets-workspace
10496   polkit-kde-1
10497   ruby1.8
10498   systemsettings
10499   update-notifier-common
10500 </p></blockquote>
10501
10502 <p>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
10503 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
10504 differences.  I have no idea what packages should be installed after
10505 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.</p>
10506
10507       </div>
10508       <div class="tags">
10509
10510
10511         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>.
10512
10513
10514       </div>
10515     </div>
10516     <div class="padding"></div>
10517
10518     <div class="entry">
10519       <div class="title">
10520         <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>
10521       </div>
10522       <div class="date">
10523         22nd November 2010
10524       </div>
10525       <div class="body">
10526         <p>Most of the computers in use by the
10527 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project</a>
10528 are virtual machines.  And they have been Xen machines running on a
10529 fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
10530 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge 2950 host machine.  This was a
10531 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
10532 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
10533 know is not supported by KVM.  So to migrate, we had to convert
10534 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.</p>
10535
10536 <p>I found
10537 <a href="http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM">a
10538 nice recipe</a> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
10539 migration.  It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
10540 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
10541 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data.  I NFS mounted the
10542 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.</p>
10543
10544 <pre>
10545 #!/bin/sh
10546
10547 # Based on
10548 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
10549
10550 set -e
10551 set -x
10552
10553 if [ -z "$1" ] ; then
10554     echo "Usage: $0 &lt;hostname&gt;"
10555     exit 1
10556 else
10557     host="$1"
10558 fi
10559
10560 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
10561     echo "error: unable to find LVM volume for $host"
10562     exit 1
10563 fi
10564
10565 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs.  not sure why.
10566 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
10567 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
10568 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
10569
10570 img=$host.img
10571 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
10572 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
10573
10574 parted $img mklabel msdos
10575 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap 0 $disksize
10576 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
10577 parted $img set 1 boot on
10578
10579 modprobe dm-mod
10580 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
10581 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
10582
10583 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=1M
10584 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
10585 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
10586
10587 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
10588 losetup -d /dev/loop0
10589 </pre>
10590
10591 <p>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
10592 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.</p>
10593
10594 <p>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
10595 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and
10596 set up grub to boot from the disk image.  After this, the KVM machines
10597 seem to work just fine.</p>
10598
10599       </div>
10600       <div class="tags">
10601
10602
10603         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>.
10604
10605
10606       </div>
10607     </div>
10608     <div class="padding"></div>
10609
10610     <div class="entry">
10611       <div class="title">
10612         <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>
10613       </div>
10614       <div class="date">
10615         20th November 2010
10616       </div>
10617       <div class="body">
10618         <p>I'm still running upgrade testing of the
10619 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
10620 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
10621 status.  Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.</p>
10622
10623 <p>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
10624 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
10625 can see if anything should be changed.</p>
10626
10627 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
10628
10629 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10630
10631 <blockquote><p>
10632   apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
10633   browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-4.3 cups-pk-helper
10634   dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
10635   freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
10636   gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
10637   geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
10638   gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
10639   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
10640   gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
10641   gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
10642   gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
10643   gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
10644   gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
10645   libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
10646   libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-0 libboost-date-time1.42.0
10647   libboost-python1.42.0 libboost-thread1.42.0 libchamplain-0.4-0
10648   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
10649   libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-1.0-2
10650   libepc-common libepc-ui-1.0-2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
10651   libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
10652   libgdl-1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-0 libgif4
10653   libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
10654   libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
10655   libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
10656   libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
10657   libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
10658   libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
10659   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
10660   libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
10661   libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-6
10662   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6.8
10663   libpolkit-gtk-1-0 libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
10664   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
10665   libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-4
10666   libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-0.99-0
10667   libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
10668   mono-2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
10669   nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
10670   openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-4suite-xml
10671   python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
10672   python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
10673   python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
10674   python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
10675   python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
10676   python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
10677   python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
10678   python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
10679   python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
10680   python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
10681   python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
10682   python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
10683   python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
10684   remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
10685   rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
10686   software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
10687   telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-5 telepathy-salut tomboy
10688   totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
10689   transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
10690   zip
10691 </p></blockquote>
10692
10693 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
10694
10695 <blockquote><p>
10696   arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
10697   epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
10698   fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
10699   gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
10700   gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
10701   gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
10702   guile-1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
10703   libavahi-ui0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7
10704   libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
10705   libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1
10706   libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3 libfaad0 libgadu3
10707   libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
10708   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
10709   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
10710   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
10711   libgtkhtml2-0 libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgtksourceview2.0-0
10712   libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
10713   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
10714   libmagick++10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
10715   libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
10716   libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpisock9
10717   libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8
10718   libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
10719   libspeexdsp1 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libsvga1
10720   libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
10721   libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
10722   libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
10723   sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
10724   totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
10725 </p></blockquote>
10726
10727 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10728
10729 <blockquote><p>
10730   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
10731 </p></blockquote>
10732
10733 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10734
10735 <blockquote><p>
10736 [nothing]
10737 </p></blockquote>
10738
10739 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
10740
10741 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10742
10743 <blockquote><p>
10744   autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-4.3 dcoprss
10745   edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
10746   ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
10747   gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
10748   kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
10749   kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
10750   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
10751   kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
10752   kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
10753   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
10754   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
10755   kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
10756   killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
10757   kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
10758   ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42.0
10759   libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
10760   libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
10761   libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
10762   libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
10763   libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
10764   libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
10765   libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
10766   libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
10767   libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
10768   lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
10769   openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
10770   parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
10771   pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
10772   speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
10773   ttf-sazanami-gothic
10774 </p></blockquote>
10775
10776 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10777
10778 <blockquote><p>
10779   amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
10780   dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
10781   kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
10782   kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
10783   keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
10784   kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
10785   kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
10786   klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
10787   kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
10788   kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
10789   kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
10790   ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
10791   ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
10792   kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
10793   kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
10794   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
10795   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2
10796   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
10797   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
10798   libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0 libicu38
10799   libiec61883-0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
10800   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
10801   libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
10802   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
10803   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
10804   libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
10805   libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
10806   libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 librss1 libsensors3
10807   libsmbios2 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90
10808   libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
10809   mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
10810   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
10811   ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
10812 </p></blockquote>
10813
10814 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10815
10816 <blockquote><p>
10817   dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
10818   kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
10819   kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
10820   kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
10821   netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
10822   xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl 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   kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
10830 </p></blockquote>
10831
10832       </div>
10833       <div class="tags">
10834
10835
10836         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10837
10838
10839       </div>
10840     </div>
10841     <div class="padding"></div>
10842
10843     <div class="entry">
10844       <div class="title">
10845         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html">Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd</a>
10846       </div>
10847       <div class="date">
10848         20th November 2010
10849       </div>
10850       <div class="body">
10851         <p>Answering
10852 <a href="http://www.listware.net/201011/gnash-dev/67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html">the
10853 call from the Gnash project</a> for
10854 <a href="http://www.gnashdev.org:8010">buildbot</a> slaves to test the
10855 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
10856 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
10857 Debian/Squeeze.  I hope this can help the developers in getting new
10858 releases out more often.</p>
10859
10860 <p>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
10861 I have considered setting up a <a
10862 href="http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/">Debian/kfreebsd</a>
10863 machine as well.  I have also considered using the kfreebsd
10864 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the 5
10865 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video.  Because of this, I
10866 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
10867 kfreebsd.  Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
10868 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
10869 screen at random locations).  Have not gotten very far with the
10870 testing.  Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
10871 fatal problem.  Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
10872 useful as a file server for NUUG.  Will try to find time to set up a
10873 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.</p>
10874
10875       </div>
10876       <div class="tags">
10877
10878
10879         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>.
10880
10881
10882       </div>
10883     </div>
10884     <div class="padding"></div>
10885
10886     <div class="entry">
10887       <div class="title">
10888         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html">Debian in 3D</a>
10889       </div>
10890       <div class="date">
10891          9th November 2010
10892       </div>
10893       <div class="body">
10894         <p><img src="http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/23/e0/c4/f9/2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg"></p>
10895
10896 <p>3D printing is just great.  I just came across this Debian logo in
10897 3D linked in from
10898 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2010/11/09/participatory-branding/">the
10899 thingiverse blog</a>.</p>
10900
10901       </div>
10902       <div class="tags">
10903
10904
10905         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>.
10906
10907
10908       </div>
10909     </div>
10910     <div class="padding"></div>
10911
10912     <div class="entry">
10913       <div class="title">
10914         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html">Software updates 2010-10-24</a>
10915       </div>
10916       <div class="date">
10917         24th October 2010
10918       </div>
10919       <div class="body">
10920         <p>Some updates.</p>
10921
10922 <p>My <a href="http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">gnash pledge</a> to
10923 raise money for the project is going well.  The lower limit of 10
10924 signers was reached in 24 hours, and so far 13 people have signed it.
10925 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
10926 how far we can get before the time limit of December 24 is reached.
10927 :)</p>
10928
10929 <p>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
10930 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
10931 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
10932 It is called
10933 <a href="http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html">kcov</a>,
10934 and can be used using <tt>kcov &lt;directory&gt; &lt;binary&gt;</tt>.
10935 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
10936 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
10937 libglib2.0-dev.  Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
10938 solvable.  I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.</p>
10939
10940 <p>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for <a
10941 href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2010/10/msg00002.html">a
10942 new alpha release of Debian Edu</a>, and just published the second
10943 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
10944 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>
10945 release.  Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
10946 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
10947 client servers and diskless workstations.  A nice touch added
10948 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
10949 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.</p>
10950
10951       </div>
10952       <div class="tags">
10953
10954
10955         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>.
10956
10957
10958       </div>
10959     </div>
10960     <div class="padding"></div>
10961
10962     <div class="entry">
10963       <div class="title">
10964         <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>
10965       </div>
10966       <div class="date">
10967          4th September 2010
10968       </div>
10969       <div class="body">
10970         <p>In the <a href="http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote">Debian
10971 popularity-contest numbers</a>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
10972 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian.  The sixth
10973 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla.  This is a clear indication that
10974 working flash is important for Debian users.  Around 10 percent of the
10975 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
10976 installed.</p>
10977
10978 <p>In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008
10979 («<a href="http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile&do=view&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf">Skolelinux
10980 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
10981 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs</a>»), one of the most important problems
10982 schools experienced with <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
10983 Edu/Skolelinux</a> was the lack of working Flash.  A lot of educational
10984 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
10985 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
10986 good reason to stay with Windows.</p>
10987
10988 <p>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
10989 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
10990 everything you told him but could work fairly well.  This was a
10991 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
10992 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
10993 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
10994 example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
10995 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
10996 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
10997 pages they want to visit.</p>
10998
10999 <p>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
11000 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
11001 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
11002 Video to working out of the box.  For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
11003 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
11004 the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
11005 unstable.  The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7.
11006 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
11007 release team have not had time to reply to it yet.  I hope they agree
11008 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
11009 accept the new package into Squeeze.</p>
11010
11011       </div>
11012       <div class="tags">
11013
11014
11015         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>.
11016
11017
11018       </div>
11019     </div>
11020     <div class="padding"></div>
11021
11022     <div class="entry">
11023       <div class="title">
11024         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html">Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery</a>
11025       </div>
11026       <div class="date">
11027         27th July 2010
11028       </div>
11029       <div class="body">
11030         <p>I discovered this while doing
11031 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">automated
11032 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze</a>.  A few packages
11033 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
11034 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
11035 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.</p>
11036
11037 <p>An example is from todays
11038 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt">upgrade
11039 of KDE using aptitude</a>.  In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
11040 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade.  The cause is simple.  If a
11041 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
11042 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
11043 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
11044 because its dependencies are unavailable.</p>
11045
11046 <p>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:</p>
11047
11048 <blockquote><pre>
11049 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
11050  perl-modules depends on perl (>= 5.10.1-1); however:
11051   Version of perl on system is 5.10.0-19lenny2.
11052 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
11053  dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
11054 </pre></blockquote>
11055
11056 <p>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
11057 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/527917">reported as a bug</a>, and will
11058 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
11059 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
11060 failures.  Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
11061 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
11062 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
11063 of dependency loops.</p>
11064
11065 <p>Thanks to
11066 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/06/msg00116.html">the
11067 tireless effort by Bill Allombert</a>, the number of circular
11068 dependencies
11069 <a href="http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html">left in Debian
11070 is dropping</a>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)</p>
11071
11072 <p>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
11073 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590605">update-notifier</a> and
11074 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590604">different behaviour</a> between
11075 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
11076 dependency.  Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
11077 it.</p>
11078
11079       </div>
11080       <div class="tags">
11081
11082
11083         Tags: <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>.
11084
11085
11086       </div>
11087     </div>
11088     <div class="padding"></div>
11089
11090     <div class="entry">
11091       <div class="title">
11092         <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>
11093       </div>
11094       <div class="date">
11095         17th July 2010
11096       </div>
11097       <div class="body">
11098         <p>This is a
11099 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">followup</a>
11100 on my
11101 <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
11102 work</a> on
11103 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">merging
11104 all</a> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.</p>
11105
11106 <p>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
11107 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
11108 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server.  The two
11109 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.</p>
11110
11111 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
11112 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
11113 on a Debian Edu main-server.  Here is a summary.
11114
11115 <p><strong>powerdns</strong></p>
11116
11117 <a href="http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend">Clues
11118 on how to</a> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
11119 the web.
11120
11121 <p>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
11122 One "strict" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
11123 using the same LDAP objects, and a "tree" mode where the forward and
11124 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
11125 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
11126 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.</p>
11127
11128 <p>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
11129 base, and uses a "base" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
11130 "dc=tjener,dc=intern," to the base with a filter for
11131 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" for the forward entry and
11132 "dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa," with a filter for
11133 "(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)" for the reverse entry.  For
11134 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
11135 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
11136 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
11137 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
11138 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
11139 spfrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entries it is looking for
11140 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
11141 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
11142 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  The equivalent
11143 ldapsearch commands could look like this:</p>
11144
11145 <blockquote><pre>
11146 ldapsearch -h ldap \
11147   -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
11148   -s base -x '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
11149   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
11150   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
11151   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
11152   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
11153
11154 ldapsearch -h ldap \
11155   -b dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
11156   -s base -x '(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)'
11157   dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
11158   hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
11159   srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
11160 </pre></blockquote>
11161
11162 <p>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
11163 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
11164 example LDAP objects used there.  In addition to these objects, the
11165 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11166 also exist.</p>
11167
11168 <blockquote><pre>
11169 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11170 objectclass: top
11171 objectclass: dnsdomain
11172 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11173 dc: tjener
11174 arecord: 10.0.2.2
11175 associateddomain: tjener.intern
11176
11177 dn: dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11178 objectclass: top
11179 objectclass: dnsdomain2
11180 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11181 dc: 2
11182 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
11183 associateddomain: 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
11184 </pre></blockquote>
11185
11186 <p>In strict mode, the server behaves differently.  When looking for
11187 forward DNS entries, it is doing a "subtree" scoped search with the
11188 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
11189 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
11190 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
11191 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
11192 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entires it also do a
11193 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is "(arecord=10.0.2.2)"
11194 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
11195 modifytimestamp.  In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
11196 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
11197 instead.</p>
11198
11199 <p>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
11200 like this:</p>
11201
11202 <blockquote><pre>
11203 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
11204   '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
11205   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
11206   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
11207   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
11208   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
11209
11210 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
11211   '(arecord=10.0.2.2)' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
11212 </pre></blockquote>
11213
11214 <p>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
11215 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
11216 reverse lookups.</p>
11217
11218 <p>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
11219 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
11220 need to generate a DNS reply.  This make it able to work with any
11221 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.</p>
11222
11223 <p>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC 1274) and
11224 dnsdomain2 schemas.  The latter is used for reverse entries like
11225 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.</p>
11226
11227 <p>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
11228 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
11229 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain).  The use
11230 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
11231 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.</p>
11232
11233 <p>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
11234 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
11235 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
11236 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
11237 (zonename and relativedomainname).</p>
11238
11239 <p>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
11240 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
11241 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
11242 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
11243 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
11244 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):</p>
11245
11246 <blockquote><pre>
11247 objectclass ( some-oid NAME 'dnsDomainAux'
11248     SUP top
11249     AUXILIARY
11250     MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
11251           DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
11252           TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
11253           NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
11254           A6Record $ DNAMERecord
11255     ))
11256 </pre></blockquote>
11257
11258 <p>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
11259 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
11260 all the attributes PowerDNS wants.  I've sent an email to the PowerDNS
11261 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
11262 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
11263 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.</p>
11264
11265 <p><strong>ISC dhcp</strong></p>
11266
11267 <p>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
11268 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want.  This
11269 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
11270 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
11271 what is needed without having to read the source code.</p>
11272
11273 <p>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
11274 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
11275 stored.  These are the relevant entries from
11276 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:</p>
11277
11278 <blockquote><pre>
11279 ldap-base-dn "dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no";
11280 ldap-dhcp-server-cn "dhcp";
11281 </pre></blockquote>
11282
11283 <p>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
11284 configuration it need.  The cn "dhcp" is located using the given LDAP
11285 base and the filter "(&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))".  The
11286 search result is this entry:</p>
11287
11288 <blockquote><pre>
11289 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11290 cn: dhcp
11291 objectClass: top
11292 objectClass: dhcpServer
11293 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11294 </pre></blockquote>
11295
11296 <p>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
11297 subtree with DHCP configuration.  The DHCP configuration subtree base
11298 is located using a base scope search with base "cn=DHCP
11299 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" and filter
11300 "(&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))".
11301 The search result is this entry:</p>
11302
11303 <blockquote><pre>
11304 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11305 cn: DHCP Config
11306 objectClass: top
11307 objectClass: dhcpService
11308 objectClass: dhcpOptions
11309 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11310 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
11311 dhcpStatements: authoritative
11312 dhcpOption: smtp-server code 69 = array of ip-address
11313 dhcpOption: www-server code 72 = array of ip-address
11314 dhcpOption: wpad-url code 252 = text
11315 </pre></blockquote>
11316
11317 <p>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time.  When
11318 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
11319 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
11320 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
11321 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost.  These provide options
11322 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc.  Leaving out the
11323 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
11324 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
11325 related computer objects.</p>
11326
11327 <p>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
11328 of the client (00:00:00:00:00:00 in this example), using a subtree
11329 scoped search with "cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" as
11330 the base and "(&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
11331 00:00:00:00:00:00))" as the filter.  This is what a host object look
11332 like:</p>
11333
11334 <blockquote><pre>
11335 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11336 cn: hostname
11337 objectClass: top
11338 objectClass: dhcpHost
11339 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11340 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
11341 </pre></blockquote>
11342
11343 <p>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
11344 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
11345 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure.  On the
11346 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
11347 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries.  The latter should make
11348 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
11349 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
11350 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
11351 structural object class.
11352
11353 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
11354
11355 <p>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
11356 to which LDAP schemas to use.  While its "tree" mode is rigid when it
11357 come to the the LDAP structure, the "strict" mode is very flexible,
11358 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
11359 in the configuration.</p>
11360
11361 <p>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
11362 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
11363 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
11364 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
11365 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
11366 structure.</p>
11367
11368 <p>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
11369 this might work for Debian Edu:</p>
11370
11371 <blockquote><pre>
11372 ou=services
11373   cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
11374     cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
11375     cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
11376       cn=10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
11377         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
11378     cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
11379       cn=192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
11380         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
11381     ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
11382       cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
11383 </pre></blockquote>
11384
11385 <P>This is not tested yet.  If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
11386 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
11387 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
11388 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.</p>
11389
11390 <p>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
11391 like this:</p>
11392
11393 <blockquote><pre>
11394 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11395 dc: hostname
11396 objectClass: top
11397 objectClass: dhcpHost
11398 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11399 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
11400 associateddomain: hostname.intern
11401 arecord: 10.11.12.13
11402 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11403 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
11404 </pre></blockquote>
11405
11406 </p>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
11407 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
11408 auxiliary object class.</p>
11409
11410       </div>
11411       <div class="tags">
11412
11413
11414         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>.
11415
11416
11417       </div>
11418     </div>
11419     <div class="padding"></div>
11420
11421     <div class="entry">
11422       <div class="title">
11423         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects</a>
11424       </div>
11425       <div class="date">
11426         14th July 2010
11427       </div>
11428       <div class="body">
11429         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
11430 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
11431 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
11432 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
11433 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.</p>
11434
11435 <p>I've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
11436 information finally found a solution that seem to work.</p>
11437
11438 <p>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
11439 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry.  If
11440 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
11441 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
11442 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
11443 to a slave DNS server.</p>
11444
11445 <p>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
11446 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
11447 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
11448 I've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
11449 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup.  It
11450 seem to work.</p>
11451
11452 <p>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
11453 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
11454 an earlier email.  The combined LDAP object will look something like
11455 this:</p>
11456
11457 <blockquote><pre>
11458   dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11459   cn: hostname
11460   objectClass: dhcphost
11461   objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11462   objectclass: dnsdomainaux
11463   associateddomain: hostname.intern
11464   arecord: 10.11.12.13
11465   dhcphwaddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11466   dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
11467   ldapconfigsound: Y
11468 </pre></blockquote>
11469
11470 <p>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
11471 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
11472 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress.  LTSP will use
11473 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.</p>
11474
11475 <p>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
11476 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
11477 outside the "DHCP Config" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
11478 that.  If I can't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
11479 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
11480 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
11481 content.  I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
11482 might be a good place to put it.</p>
11483
11484 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11485 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11486
11487       </div>
11488       <div class="tags">
11489
11490
11491         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>.
11492
11493
11494       </div>
11495     </div>
11496     <div class="padding"></div>
11497
11498     <div class="entry">
11499       <div class="title">
11500         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html">Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP</a>
11501       </div>
11502       <div class="date">
11503         11th July 2010
11504       </div>
11505       <div class="body">
11506         <p>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
11507 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
11508 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
11509 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.</p>
11510
11511 <p>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
11512 to get configuration from LDAP.  The idea is to look up the MAC
11513 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
11514 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
11515 LTSP clients.</p>
11516
11517 <p>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
11518 in a "computer" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
11519 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.</p>
11520
11521 <p>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
11522 this approach.  A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
11523 need to be written.  Comments, suggestions, etc?</p>
11524
11525 <blockquote><pre>
11526 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
11527 #
11528 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
11529 #
11530 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
11531 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
11532 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
11533 #
11534 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
11535 # existence of attribute names.
11536 #
11537 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
11538 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
11539 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
11540 #
11541 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
11542 # configuration settings.  Something like this should work:
11543 #
11544 # objectclass ( 1.1.2.2 NAME 'ltspClientAux'
11545 #     SUP top
11546 #     AUXILIARY
11547 #     MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
11548
11549 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
11550 if [ "$LDAPSERVER" ] ; then
11551     LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
11552     for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk '{print $5}'|sort -u) ; do
11553         filter="(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))"
11554         ldapsearch -h "$LDAPSERVER" -b "$LDAPBASE" -v -x "$filter" | \
11555             grep '^ltspConfig' | while read attr value ; do
11556             # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
11557             attr=$(echo $attr | sed 's/^ltspConfig//i' | tr a-z A-Z)
11558             # bass value on to clients
11559             eval "$attr=$value; export $attr"
11560         done
11561     done
11562 fi
11563 </pre></blockquote>
11564
11565 <p>I'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
11566 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
11567 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
11568 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
11569 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)</p>
11570
11571 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11572 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11573
11574 <p>Update 2010-07-17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
11575 configuration in LDAP that was created around year 2000 by
11576 <a href="http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html">PC
11577 Xperience, Inc., 2000</a>.  I found its
11578 <a href="http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/">files</a> on a
11579 personal home page over at redhat.com.</p>
11580
11581       </div>
11582       <div class="tags">
11583
11584
11585         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>.
11586
11587
11588       </div>
11589     </div>
11590     <div class="padding"></div>
11591
11592     <div class="entry">
11593       <div class="title">
11594         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
11595       </div>
11596       <div class="date">
11597          9th July 2010
11598       </div>
11599       <div class="body">
11600         <p>Since
11601 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">my
11602 last post</a> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
11603 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma.  The java application
11604 <a href="http://jxplorer.org/">jXplorer</a> is claimed to be capable of
11605 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
11606 authenticate using Kerberos.  I have only tested the Kerberos
11607 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
11608 LDAP with my test user yet.  It is
11609 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html">available in
11610 Debian</a> testing and unstable at the moment.  The only problem I
11611 have with it is how it handle errors.  If something go wrong, its
11612 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
11613 and remove the failing query.  Nothing big, but very annoying.</p>
11614
11615       </div>
11616       <div class="tags">
11617
11618
11619         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>.
11620
11621
11622       </div>
11623     </div>
11624     <div class="padding"></div>
11625
11626     <div class="entry">
11627       <div class="title">
11628         <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>
11629       </div>
11630       <div class="date">
11631          3rd July 2010
11632       </div>
11633       <div class="body">
11634         <p>Here is a short update on my <a
11635 href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">my
11636 Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing</a>.  Here is a summary of the
11637 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude.  I'm
11638 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
11639 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
11640 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> and
11641 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585716">#585716</a>).</p>
11642
11643 <p>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
11644 complete list of the installed packages.  Based on this I see these
11645 differences when I did a test run today.  As usual, I do not really
11646 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
11647 publish the difference.</p>
11648
11649 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
11650
11651 <blockquote><p>
11652   at-spi cpp-4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
11653   libatspi1.0-0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-1-common
11654   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
11655   libgtksourceview-common libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
11656   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
11657   libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
11658   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
11659   python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
11660 </p></blockquote>
11661
11662 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
11663
11664 <blockquote><p>
11665   bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
11666   gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
11667   libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-50
11668   libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
11669   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9
11670   libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3
11671   libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
11672   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
11673   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11674   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
11675   libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
11676   libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++10
11677   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
11678   libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5
11679   libparted1.8-10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
11680   libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
11681   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1
11682   libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
11683   libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
11684   mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
11685 </p></blockquote>
11686
11687 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
11688
11689 <blockquote><p>
11690   gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
11691   python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
11692   xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11693   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11694   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
11695   xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
11696   xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
11697   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11698   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11699   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11700   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11701   xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
11702   xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
11703   xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
11704   xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
11705   xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
11706   xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
11707   xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
11708   xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
11709   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
11710   xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
11711 </p></blockquote>
11712
11713 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
11714
11715 <blockquote><p>
11716   deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
11717   xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
11718   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
11719 </p></blockquote>
11720
11721 <p>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
11722 <a href="http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120">changed
11723 in git</a> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
11724 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
11725 the difference somewhat.
11726
11727       </div>
11728       <div class="tags">
11729
11730
11731         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>.
11732
11733
11734       </div>
11735     </div>
11736     <div class="padding"></div>
11737
11738     <div class="entry">
11739       <div class="title">
11740         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
11741       </div>
11742       <div class="date">
11743         28th June 2010
11744       </div>
11745       <div class="body">
11746         <p>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
11747 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
11748 tool to browse the LDAP tree.  The only one I was able to find in
11749 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
11750 <a href="http://luma.sourceforge.net/">LUMA</a>, which has proved to
11751 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
11752 populated by default in Skolelinux.  Thanks to it, I have been able to
11753 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
11754 objects.  It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze.  If you
11755 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)</p>
11756
11757 <p>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
11758 the BTS yet.  There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
11759 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
11760 Debian submenu in KDE.  I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
11761 released.</p>
11762
11763 <p>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet.  I would
11764 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
11765 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet.  So in the mean time, I use
11766 <a href="http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/">ldapvi</a> for that.</p>
11767
11768 <p>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
11769 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11770
11771 <p>Update 2010-06-29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
11772 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html">gq</a> package as a
11773 useful GUI alternative.  It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
11774 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze.  Unless that
11775 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.</p>
11776
11777       </div>
11778       <div class="tags">
11779
11780
11781         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>.
11782
11783
11784       </div>
11785     </div>
11786     <div class="padding"></div>
11787
11788     <div class="entry">
11789       <div class="title">
11790         <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>
11791       </div>
11792       <div class="date">
11793         24th June 2010
11794       </div>
11795       <div class="body">
11796         <p>A while back, I
11797 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
11798 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
11799 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
11800 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
11801
11802 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
11803 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
11804 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
11805 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
11806
11807 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
11808 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
11809 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
11810 Debian Edu.</p>
11811
11812 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
11813 the
11814 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
11815 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
11816 available today from IETF.</p>
11817
11818 <pre>
11819 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
11820 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
11821 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
11822  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
11823         NAME 'dhcpHost'
11824         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
11825 -       SUP top
11826 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
11827         MUST cn
11828         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
11829         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
11830 </pre>
11831
11832 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
11833 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
11834 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
11835
11836 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
11837 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
11838
11839       </div>
11840       <div class="tags">
11841
11842
11843         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>.
11844
11845
11846       </div>
11847     </div>
11848     <div class="padding"></div>
11849
11850     <div class="entry">
11851       <div class="title">
11852         <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>
11853       </div>
11854       <div class="date">
11855         16th June 2010
11856       </div>
11857       <div class="body">
11858         <p>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
11859 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run.  Until now,
11860 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
11861 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
11862 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
11863 this:
11864
11865 <blockquote><pre>
11866 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11867 tasksel --new-install
11868 </pre></blockquote>
11869
11870 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
11871 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
11872 any output what so ever.
11873
11874 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
11875 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
11876 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
11877 happen.  Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
11878 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
11879 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run.  I ended up using
11880 code like this:
11881
11882 <blockquote><pre>
11883 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11884 cmd="$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed 's/debconf-apt-progress -- //')"
11885 $cmd
11886 </pre></blockquote>
11887
11888 <p>The content of $cmd is typically something like "<tt>aptitude -q
11889 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
11890 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
11891 ~pimportant</tt>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
11892 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
11893 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
11894 installation.</p>
11895
11896 <p>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
11897 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
11898 like this.</p>
11899
11900       </div>
11901       <div class="tags">
11902
11903
11904         Tags: <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>.
11905
11906
11907       </div>
11908     </div>
11909     <div class="padding"></div>
11910
11911     <div class="entry">
11912       <div class="title">
11913         <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>
11914       </div>
11915       <div class="date">
11916         13th June 2010
11917       </div>
11918       <div class="body">
11919         <p>My
11920 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">testing
11921 of Debian upgrades</a> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've
11922 finally made the upgrade logs available from
11923 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/</a>.
11924 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
11925 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting.  This time
11926 I will only focus on their removal plans.</p>
11927
11928 <p>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
11929 to remove 72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze.  The
11930 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
11931 xserver-xorg-video* drivers.  Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
11932 sure why.  When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove 129
11933 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
11934 longer needed.  Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
11935 I do not know.  Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?</p>
11936
11937 <p>For KDE, apt-get want to remove 82 packages, among them kdebase
11938 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
11939 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove 192 packages, none which are
11940 too surprising.</p>
11941
11942 <p>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
11943 and avoided, and perhaps others as well.  Here are the complete list
11944 of planned removals.  The complete logs is available from the URL
11945 above.  Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
11946 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
11947 conffile questions.  No idea why.  I worked around it by using
11948 '<tt>echo >> /proc/<em>pidofdpkg</em>/fd/0</tt>' to tell dpkg to
11949 continue.</p>
11950
11951 <p><b>apt-get gnome 72</b>
11952 <br>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
11953   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
11954   iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-1-0
11955   libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
11956   nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
11957   serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
11958   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
11959   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
11960   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
11961   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
11962   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
11963   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
11964   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
11965   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
11966   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
11967   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
11968   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
11969   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
11970   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
11971   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
11972   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
11973   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
11974   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
11975   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
11976   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
11977   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
11978   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
11979   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9
11980   xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support</p>
11981
11982 <p><b>aptitude gnome 129</b>
11983
11984 <br>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
11985   djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
11986   gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
11987   gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
11988   libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
11989   libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
11990   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20
11991   libeel2-data libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libfaad0 libgail-common
11992   libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libgdl-1-0 libgdl-1-common
11993   libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0
11994   libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11995   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
11996   libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
11997   libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6
11998   libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++10
11999   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
12000   libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2
12001   libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10
12002   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-8
12003   libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8 libssh2-1
12004   libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
12005   libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
12006   libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
12007   libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
12008   openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
12009   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
12010   python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
12011   python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
12012   swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
12013   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12014   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
12015   zip</p>
12016
12017 <p><b>apt-get kde 82</b>
12018
12019 <br>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
12020   kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
12021   kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
12022   kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
12023   kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
12024   libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
12025   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
12026   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
12027   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
12028   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
12029   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
12030   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
12031   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
12032   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
12033   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12034   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
12035   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
12036   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
12037   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
12038   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
12039   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
12040   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
12041   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
12042   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
12043   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
12044   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
12045   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
12046   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9</p>
12047
12048 <p><b>aptitude kde 192</b>
12049 <br>bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
12050   djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
12051   ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
12052   kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
12053   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
12054   kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
12055   kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
12056   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
12057   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
12058   kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
12059   kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
12060   klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
12061   kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
12062   krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
12063   ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
12064   kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
12065   kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
12066   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
12067   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
12068   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
12069   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
12070   libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0
12071   libicu38 libiec61883-0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
12072   libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
12073   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
12074   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
12075   libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
12076   libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 libsmbios2
12077   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
12078   libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
12079   libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
12080   openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
12081   superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
12082   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
12083   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12084   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
12085   xulrunner-1.9</p>
12086
12087
12088       </div>
12089       <div class="tags">
12090
12091
12092         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>.
12093
12094
12095       </div>
12096     </div>
12097     <div class="padding"></div>
12098
12099     <div class="entry">
12100       <div class="title">
12101         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze</a>
12102       </div>
12103       <div class="date">
12104         11th June 2010
12105       </div>
12106       <div class="body">
12107         <p>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
12108 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly.  A few bugs
12109 have been discovered and reported in the process
12110 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585410">#585410</a> in nagios3-cgi,
12111 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584879">#584879</a> already fixed in
12112 enscript and <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> in
12113 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
12114 am working on a script to automate the test.</p>
12115
12116 <p>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
12117 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
12118 it.  To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
12119 script is inserted.  To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
12120 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
12121 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).</p>
12122
12123 <p>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
12124 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
12125 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
12126 is created.  The bug report
12127 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566000">#566000</a> make me suspect
12128 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
12129 to make sure the upgrade go well.  Testing on virtual and real
12130 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
12131 do the trick in such settings anyway.  This is a
12132 <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-804130/">known
12133 issue</a> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
12134 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
12135 working with old kernels or something like that.  I really wish the
12136 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
12137 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
12138 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
12139 Debian Squeeze.</p>
12140
12141 <p>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades.  This test
12142 script, which I call <tt>upgrade-test</tt> for now, is doing the
12143 trick:</p>
12144
12145 <blockquote><pre>
12146 #!/bin/sh
12147 set -ex
12148
12149 if [ "$1" ] ; then
12150     desktop=$1
12151 else
12152     desktop=gnome
12153 fi
12154
12155 from=lenny
12156 to=squeeze
12157
12158 exec &lt; /dev/null
12159 unset LANG
12160 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
12161 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
12162 fuser -mv .
12163 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
12164 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
12165 cat > $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d &lt;&lt;EOF
12166 #!/bin/sh
12167 exit 101
12168 EOF
12169 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
12170 exit_cleanup() {
12171     umount $tmpdir/proc
12172 }
12173 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
12174 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
12175 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
12176
12177 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
12178
12179 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger.  It need the test scripts
12180 # to return the correct answers.
12181 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
12182     chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
12183
12184 # Include the desktop and laptop task
12185 for test in desktop laptop ; do
12186     echo > $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test &lt;&lt;EOF
12187 #!/bin/sh
12188 exit 2
12189 EOF
12190     chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
12191 done
12192
12193 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
12194 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
12195 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
12196 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
12197
12198 echo deb $mirror $to main > $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
12199 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
12200 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
12201 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
12202 fuser -mv
12203 </pre></blockquote>
12204
12205 <p>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
12206 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
12207 differently so far.  I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
12208 regularly and post the result on the web.  The Gnome upgrade currently
12209 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
12210 kdebase-workspace-data</p>
12211
12212 <p>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
12213 (KDE 167 KiB, Gnome 516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
12214 post, so I will refrain from trying.  I can report that for Gnome,
12215 aptitude report 760 packages upgraded, 448 newly installed, 129 to
12216 remove and 1 not upgraded and 1024MB need to be downloaded while for
12217 KDE the same numbers are 702 packages upgraded, 507 newly installed,
12218 193 to remove and 0 not upgraded and 1117MB need to be downloaded</p>
12219
12220 <p>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
12221 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
12222 booting without a hitch.  Was unsure if there were still bugs with
12223 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
12224 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
12225 packages.</p>
12226
12227       </div>
12228       <div class="tags">
12229
12230
12231         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>.
12232
12233
12234       </div>
12235     </div>
12236     <div class="padding"></div>
12237
12238     <div class="entry">
12239       <div class="title">
12240         <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>
12241       </div>
12242       <div class="date">
12243          6th June 2010
12244       </div>
12245       <div class="body">
12246         <p>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
12247 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
12248 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd.  The packages with such
12249 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
12250 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart.  Because of
12251 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
12252 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.</p>
12253
12254 <p>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
12255 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
12256 COLUMNS):</p>
12257
12258 <blockquote><pre>
12259 DEFAULT_RUNLEVEL=2
12260 previous=N
12261 PREVLEVEL=
12262 RUNLEVEL=
12263 runlevel=S
12264 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
12265 UPSTART_INSTANCE=
12266 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
12267 </pre></blockquote>
12268
12269 <p>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
12270 script.</p>
12271
12272 <blockquote><pre>
12273 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-2.88
12274 previous=N
12275 PREVLEVEL=N
12276 RUNLEVEL=S
12277 runlevel=S
12278 </pre></blockquote>
12279
12280 <p>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
12281 sysvinit are not set by upstart.  Not sure if it is intentional or not
12282 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.</p>
12283
12284 <p>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
12285 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
12286 choice.</p>
12287
12288       </div>
12289       <div class="tags">
12290
12291
12292         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12293
12294
12295       </div>
12296     </div>
12297     <div class="padding"></div>
12298
12299     <div class="entry">
12300       <div class="title">
12301         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html">A manual for standards wars...</a>
12302       </div>
12303       <div class="date">
12304          6th June 2010
12305       </div>
12306       <div class="body">
12307         <p>Via the
12308 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html">blog
12309 of Rob Weir</a> I came across the very interesting essay named
12310 <a href="http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf">The Art of
12311 Standards Wars</a> (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
12312 following the standards wars of today.</p>
12313
12314       </div>
12315       <div class="tags">
12316
12317
12318         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>.
12319
12320
12321       </div>
12322     </div>
12323     <div class="padding"></div>
12324
12325     <div class="entry">
12326       <div class="title">
12327         <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>
12328       </div>
12329       <div class="date">
12330          3rd June 2010
12331       </div>
12332       <div class="body">
12333         <p>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
12334 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
12335 information extracted from each machine.  The script to do so is
12336 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
12337 the Skolelinux build servers:</p>
12338
12339 <blockquote><pre>
12340 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
12341   vendor                    count
12342   Dell Computer Corporation     1
12343     PowerEdge 1750              1
12344   IBM                           1
12345     eserver xSeries 345 -[8670M1X]-     1
12346   Intel                         2
12347   [no-dmi-info]                 3
12348 maintainer:~#
12349 </pre></blockquote>
12350
12351 <p>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
12352 provided in each machine.  Here there are Intel machines without model
12353 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
12354 machines listed as [no-dmi-info].  One can add -l as a command line
12355 option to list the individual machines.</p>
12356
12357 <p>A larger list is
12358 <a href="http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/">available from the the
12359 city of Narvik</a>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
12360 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly.  In their report there
12361 are ~1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
12362 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
12363 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
12364 collector.</p>
12365
12366       </div>
12367       <div class="tags">
12368
12369
12370         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>.
12371
12372
12373       </div>
12374     </div>
12375     <div class="padding"></div>
12376
12377     <div class="entry">
12378       <div class="title">
12379         <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>
12380       </div>
12381       <div class="date">
12382          1st June 2010
12383       </div>
12384       <div class="body">
12385         <p>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
12386 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled.  The
12387 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
12388 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
12389 wait.</p>
12390
12391 <p>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
12392 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">#583312</a> initially filed
12393 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
12394 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
12395 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/524751">#524751</a> initially filed against
12396 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.</p>
12397
12398 <p>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
12399 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
12400 distribution work out of the box for these users.  The nvidia driver
12401 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
12402 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
12403 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
12404 distribution that work for them.  I have no idea what the solution is,
12405 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.</p>
12406
12407 <p>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.</p>
12408
12409       </div>
12410       <div class="tags">
12411
12412
12413         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>.
12414
12415
12416       </div>
12417     </div>
12418     <div class="padding"></div>
12419
12420     <div class="entry">
12421       <div class="title">
12422         <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>
12423       </div>
12424       <div class="date">
12425         27th May 2010
12426       </div>
12427       <div class="body">
12428         <p>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
12429 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
12430 issues are known and should be solved:
12431
12432 <p><ul>
12433
12434 <li>The wicd package seen to
12435 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/508289">break NFS mounting</a> and
12436 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/581586">network setup</a> when
12437 parallel booting is enabled.  No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
12438 seem to be on the case.</li>
12439
12440 <li>The nvidia X driver seem to
12441 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">have a race condition</a>
12442 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect.  The
12443 maintainer is on the case.</li>
12444
12445 <li>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
12446 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
12447 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/575080">try to switch back</a> to
12448 sysv-rc.  One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
12449 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
12450 sysv-rc more robust.  Will investigate some more and probably upload a
12451 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
12452 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.</li>
12453
12454 </ul></p>
12455
12456 <p>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
12457 solvable before Squeeze is released.  In addition to these there are
12458 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
12459 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.</p>
12460
12461 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12462 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12463 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12464 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12465
12466 <p>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.</p>
12467
12468       </div>
12469       <div class="tags">
12470
12471
12472         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>.
12473
12474
12475       </div>
12476     </div>
12477     <div class="padding"></div>
12478
12479     <div class="entry">
12480       <div class="title">
12481         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html">More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer</a>
12482       </div>
12483       <div class="date">
12484         22nd May 2010
12485       </div>
12486       <div class="body">
12487         <p>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
12488 found time today to return to the project.  Having to spend less time
12489 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
12490 definitely helped freeing some time.</p>
12491
12492 <p>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu.  We
12493 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
12494 get disk and network controllers working.  Without having these
12495 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
12496 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
12497 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
12498 an external medium is a support pain.  Initially, I expected it to be
12499 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
12500 debian-installer to find and use them.  This proved to be wrong.
12501 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
12502 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
12503 /cdrom/firmware/).  This also proved to not work, and at this point I
12504 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
12505 going to work.</p>
12506
12507 <p>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
12508 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
12509 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
12510 packages.  It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
12511 "external" media devices.  Today I changed it to also look in the
12512 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
12513 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu.  I also changed it to
12514 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
12515 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
12516 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
12517 Edu.</p>
12518
12519 <p>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
12520 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
12521 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
12522 run these before activating the firmware during installation.  The
12523 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
12524 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.</p>
12525
12526 <p>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
12527 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.</p>
12528
12529       </div>
12530       <div class="tags">
12531
12532
12533         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>.
12534
12535
12536       </div>
12537     </div>
12538     <div class="padding"></div>
12539
12540     <div class="entry">
12541       <div class="title">
12542         <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>
12543       </div>
12544       <div class="date">
12545         14th May 2010
12546       </div>
12547       <div class="body">
12548         <p>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
12549 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
12550 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
12551 expected, if I am to believe the
12552 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
12553 on debian-devel@</a>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
12554 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
12555 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen.  If serious problems are
12556 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
12557 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
12558 version.</p>
12559
12560 More information about
12561 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12562 based boot sequencing</a> is available from the Debian wiki.  It is
12563 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
12564 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:</p>
12565
12566 <blockquote><pre>
12567 CONCURRENCY=none
12568 </pre></blockquote>
12569
12570 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12571 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12572 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12573 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12574
12575       </div>
12576       <div class="tags">
12577
12578
12579         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>.
12580
12581
12582       </div>
12583     </div>
12584     <div class="padding"></div>
12585
12586     <div class="entry">
12587       <div class="title">
12588         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_MAC_address_of_all_clients.html">Sitesummary tip: Listing MAC address of all clients</a>
12589       </div>
12590       <div class="date">
12591         14th May 2010
12592       </div>
12593       <div class="body">
12594         <p>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
12595 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">sitesummary
12596 system</a> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
12597 network.  Each machine will automatically report its status to the
12598 central server after boot and once per night.  The network setup is
12599 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
12600 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines.  This is useful
12601 to update the DHCP configuration.</p>
12602
12603 <p>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
12604 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary.  Run
12605 this on the collector host:</p>
12606
12607 <blockquote><pre>
12608 perl -MSiteSummary -e 'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(" ", get_macaddresses(shift)), "\n"; });'
12609 </pre></blockquote>
12610
12611 <p>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
12612 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.</p>
12613
12614 <p>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
12615 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
12616 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
12617 tables in LDAP using this information.  Such tool is unfortunately not
12618 written yet.</p>
12619
12620       </div>
12621       <div class="tags">
12622
12623
12624         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>.
12625
12626
12627       </div>
12628     </div>
12629     <div class="padding"></div>
12630
12631     <div class="entry">
12632       <div class="title">
12633         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html">systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart</a>
12634       </div>
12635       <div class="date">
12636         13th May 2010
12637       </div>
12638       <div class="body">
12639         <p>The last few days a new boot system called
12640 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd">systemd</a>
12641 has been
12642 <a href="http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html">introduced</a>
12643
12644 to the free software world.  I have not yet had time to play around
12645 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
12646 <a href="http://upstart.ubuntu.com/">upstart</a>, and might prove to be
12647 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
12648 based boot system.  Tollef is
12649 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/580814">in the process</a> of getting
12650 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work.  I
12651 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
12652 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
12653 at the moment do not.</p>
12654
12655 <p>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
12656 platform support.  It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
12657 some new kernel features enabled to function properly.  This means
12658 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
12659 system.  Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
12660 way forward.</p>
12661
12662 <p>In the mean time, based on the
12663 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
12664 on debian-devel@</a> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
12665 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
12666 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
12667 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies.  A
12668 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
12669 already in experimental.  If all go well, Squeeze will be released
12670 with parallel booting enabled by default.</p>
12671
12672       </div>
12673       <div class="tags">
12674
12675
12676         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>.
12677
12678
12679       </div>
12680     </div>
12681     <div class="padding"></div>
12682
12683     <div class="entry">
12684       <div class="title">
12685         <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>
12686       </div>
12687       <div class="date">
12688          6th May 2010
12689       </div>
12690       <div class="body">
12691         <p>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
12692 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
12693 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies.  If you want
12694 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
12695 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12696 based boot sequencing</a> is enabled, and add this line to
12697 /etc/default/rcS:</p>
12698
12699 <blockquote><pre>
12700 CONCURRENCY=makefile
12701 </pre></blockquote>
12702
12703 <p>That is it.  It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
12704 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
12705 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
12706 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts.  Startpar is configured
12707 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
12708 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
12709 make this happen.</p>
12710
12711 <p>Give it a try, and see if you like the result.  If some services
12712 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
12713 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
12714 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies).  Report bugs and get
12715 the package maintainers to fix it. :)</p>
12716
12717 <p>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
12718 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct.  I
12719 expect we will get there in Squeeze+1, if we get manage to test and
12720 fix the remaining issues.</p>
12721
12722 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
12723 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
12724 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
12725 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
12726
12727       </div>
12728       <div class="tags">
12729
12730
12731         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>.
12732
12733
12734       </div>
12735     </div>
12736     <div class="padding"></div>
12737
12738     <div class="entry">
12739       <div class="title">
12740         <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>
12741       </div>
12742       <div class="date">
12743         27th July 2009
12744       </div>
12745       <div class="body">
12746         <p>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2,
12747 and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable
12748 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing.  This
12749 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
12750 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
12751 installation.  Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
12752 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.</p>
12753
12754 <p>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
12755 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
12756 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.</p>
12757
12758       </div>
12759       <div class="tags">
12760
12761
12762         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>.
12763
12764
12765       </div>
12766     </div>
12767     <div class="padding"></div>
12768
12769     <div class="entry">
12770       <div class="title">
12771         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html">Taking over sysvinit development</a>
12772       </div>
12773       <div class="date">
12774         22nd July 2009
12775       </div>
12776       <div class="body">
12777         <p>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
12778 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
12779 take over the package and become the new upstream.  The number of
12780 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
12781 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
12782 the package up to date.</p>
12783
12784 <p>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
12785 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman.  About 10 days ago, I made
12786 a new upstream tarball with version number 2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
12787 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
12788 distributions.  We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
12789 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge.  Since the
12790 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
12791 upstream project at <a href="http://savannah.nongnu.org/">Savannah</a>, and continue
12792 development there.  The project is registered and currently waiting
12793 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
12794 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
12795 working on the future release.</p>
12796
12797 <p>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
12798 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.</p>
12799
12800       </div>
12801       <div class="tags">
12802
12803
12804         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>.
12805
12806
12807       </div>
12808     </div>
12809     <div class="padding"></div>
12810
12811     <div class="entry">
12812       <div class="title">
12813         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html">Debian boots quicker and quicker</a>
12814       </div>
12815       <div class="date">
12816         24th June 2009
12817       </div>
12818       <div class="body">
12819         <p>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
12820 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
12821 could find more ways to speed up the boot system.  This was an Ubuntu
12822 funded
12823 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint">developer
12824 gathering</a>. It was quite productive.  We also discussed the future
12825 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
12826 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
12827 asynchronous and event base.  The Ubuntu approach using udev and
12828 upstart might be a good way forward.  Time will show.</p>
12829
12830 <p>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
12831 process in Debian.  All of these should be applied to get a quick
12832 boot:</p>
12833
12834 <ul>
12835
12836 <li>Use dash as /bin/sh.</li>
12837
12838 <li>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
12839    clock is in UTC.</li>
12840
12841 <li>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
12842    <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
12843    based boot sequencing</a>, and enable concurrent booting.</li>
12844
12845 </ul>
12846
12847 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
12848 <a href="http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/">Carlos
12849 Villegas</a>.
12850
12851 <p>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
12852 unstable yesterday.  When we tested it, we were able to cut 6 seconds
12853 from the boot sequence.  It depend on very correct dependency
12854 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
12855 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
12856 using this.</p>
12857
12858 <p>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
12859 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
12860 startup speed as well.  Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
12861 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
12862 possible to run a of them in the same process.  A quick way to test
12863 this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
12864 insserv'.  Will need to test if that work. :)</p>
12865
12866       </div>
12867       <div class="tags">
12868
12869
12870         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>.
12871
12872
12873       </div>
12874     </div>
12875     <div class="padding"></div>
12876
12877     <div class="entry">
12878       <div class="title">
12879         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/BSAs_p_stander_om_piratkopiering_m_ter_motstand.html">BSAs påstander om piratkopiering møter motstand</a>
12880       </div>
12881       <div class="date">
12882         17th May 2009
12883       </div>
12884       <div class="body">
12885         <p>Hvert år de siste årene har BSA, lobbyfronten til de store
12886 programvareselskapene som Microsoft og Apple, publisert en rapport der
12887 de gjetter på hvor mye piratkopiering påfører i tapte inntekter i
12888 ulike land rundt om i verden.  Resultatene er tendensiøse.  For noen
12889 dager siden kom
12890 <a href="http://global.bsa.org/globalpiracy2008/studies/globalpiracy2008.pdf">siste
12891 rapport</a>, og det er flere kritiske kommentarer publisert de siste
12892 dagene.  Et spesielt interessant kommentar fra Sverige,
12893 <a href="http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.229795/bsa-hoftade-sverigesiffror">BSA
12894 höftade Sverigesiffror</a>, oppsummeres slik:</p>
12895
12896 <blockquote>
12897 I sin senaste rapport slår BSA fast att 25 procent av all mjukvara i
12898 Sverige är piratkopierad. Det utan att ha pratat med ett enda svenskt
12899 företag. "Man bör nog kanske inte se de här siffrorna som helt
12900 exakta", säger BSAs Sverigechef John Hugosson.
12901 </blockquote>
12902
12903 <p>Mon tro om de er like metodiske når de gjetter på andelen piratkopiering i Norge?  To andre kommentarer er <a
12904 href="http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/comment/2242134/bsa-piracy-figures-shot-reality">BSA
12905 piracy figures need a shot of reality</a> og <a
12906 href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3958/125/">Does The WIPO
12907 Copyright Treaty Work?</a></p>
12908
12909 <p>Fant lenkene via <a
12910 href="http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/17/1632242">oppslag
12911 på Slashdot</a>.</p>
12912
12913       </div>
12914       <div class="tags">
12915
12916
12917         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>.
12918
12919
12920       </div>
12921     </div>
12922     <div class="padding"></div>
12923
12924     <div class="entry">
12925       <div class="title">
12926         <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>
12927       </div>
12928       <div class="date">
12929          7th May 2009
12930       </div>
12931       <div class="body">
12932         <p>Kom over
12933 <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10216873-16.html">interessante
12934 tall</a> fra IDG om utviklingen av linuxservermarkedet.  Fikk meg til
12935 å tenke på antall tjenermaskiner ved Universitetet i Oslo der jeg
12936 jobber til daglig.  En rask opptelling forteller meg at vi har 490
12937 (61%) fysiske unix-tjener (mest linux men også noen solaris) og 196
12938 (25%) windowstjenere, samt 112 (14%) virtuelle unix-tjenere.  Med den
12939 bakgrunnskunnskapen kan jeg godt tro at IDG er inne på noe.</p>
12940
12941       </div>
12942       <div class="tags">
12943
12944
12945         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>.
12946
12947
12948       </div>
12949     </div>
12950     <div class="padding"></div>
12951
12952     <div class="entry">
12953       <div class="title">
12954         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kryptert_harddisk___naturligvis.html">Kryptert harddisk - naturligvis</a>
12955       </div>
12956       <div class="date">
12957          2nd May 2009
12958       </div>
12959       <div class="body">
12960         <p><a href="http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1658676.ece">Dagens
12961 IT melder</a> at Intel hevder at det er dyrt å miste en datamaskin,
12962 når en tar tap av arbeidstid, fortrolige dokumenter,
12963 personopplysninger og alt annet det innebærer.  Det er ingen tvil om
12964 at det er en kostbar affære å miste sin datamaskin, og det er årsaken
12965 til at jeg har kryptert harddisken på både kontormaskinen og min
12966 bærbare.  Begge inneholder personopplysninger jeg ikke ønsker skal
12967 komme på avveie, den første informasjon relatert til jobben min ved
12968 Universitetet i Oslo, og den andre relatert til blant annet
12969 foreningsarbeide.  Kryptering av diskene gjør at det er lite
12970 sannsynlig at dophoder som kan finne på å rappe maskinene får noe ut
12971 av dem.  Maskinene låses automatisk etter noen minutter uten bruk,
12972 og en reboot vil gjøre at de ber om passord før de vil starte opp.
12973 Jeg bruker Debian på begge maskinene, og installasjonssystemet der
12974 gjør det trivielt å sette opp krypterte disker.  Jeg har LVM på toppen
12975 av krypterte partisjoner, slik at alt av datapartisjoner er kryptert.
12976 Jeg anbefaler alle å kryptere diskene på sine bærbare.  Kostnaden når
12977 det er gjort slik jeg gjør det er minimale, og gevinstene er
12978 betydelige.  En bør dog passe på passordet.  Hvis det går tapt, må
12979 maskinen reinstalleres og alt er tapt.</p>
12980
12981 <p>Krypteringen vil ikke stoppe kompetente angripere som f.eks. kjøler
12982 ned minnebrikkene før maskinen rebootes med programvare for å hente ut
12983 krypteringsnøklene.  Kostnaden med å forsvare seg mot slike angripere
12984 er for min del høyere enn gevinsten.  Jeg tror oddsene for at
12985 f.eks. etteretningsorganisasjoner har glede av å titte på mine
12986 maskiner er minimale, og ulempene jeg ville oppnå ved å forsøke å
12987 gjøre det vanskeligere for angripere med kompetanse og ressurser er
12988 betydelige.</p>
12989
12990       </div>
12991       <div class="tags">
12992
12993
12994         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>.
12995
12996
12997       </div>
12998     </div>
12999     <div class="padding"></div>
13000
13001     <div class="entry">
13002       <div class="title">
13003         <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>
13004       </div>
13005       <div class="date">
13006          2nd May 2009
13007       </div>
13008       <div class="body">
13009         <p>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
13010 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
13011 do not yet know them.</p>
13012
13013 <p>The first one is <a href="http://valgrind.org/">valgrind</a>, a
13014 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
13015 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run 'valgrind program',
13016 and it will report any problems on stdout.  It is even better if the
13017 program include debug information.  With debug information, it is able
13018 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
13019 occurs.  It can report things like 'reading past memory block in file
13020 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M', and
13021 'using uninitialised value in control logic'.  This tool has made it
13022 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
13023 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
13024
13025 <p>The second one is
13026 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity">Coverity</a> which is
13027 a source code checker.  It is able to process the source of a program
13028 and find problems in the logic without running the program.  It
13029 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
13030 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel.  It is now a commercial tool
13031 and the company behind it is running
13032 <a href="http://www.scan.coverity.com/">a community service</a> for the
13033 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
13034 their source checked for free.  Several thousand defects have been
13035 found and fixed so far.  It can find errors like 'lock L taken in file
13036 X line N is never released if exiting in line M', or 'the code in file
13037 Y lines O to P can never be executed'.  The projects included in the
13038 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
13039 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.</p>
13040
13041 <p>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
13042 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
13043 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
13044 surrounded by today.</p>
13045
13046       </div>
13047       <div class="tags">
13048
13049
13050         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
13051
13052
13053       </div>
13054     </div>
13055     <div class="padding"></div>
13056
13057     <div class="entry">
13058       <div class="title">
13059         <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>
13060       </div>
13061       <div class="date">
13062         28th April 2009
13063       </div>
13064       <div class="body">
13065         <p>Julien Blache
13066 <a href="http://blog.technologeek.org/2009/04/12/214">claim that no
13067 patch is better than a useless patch</a>.  I completely disagree, as a
13068 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
13069 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
13070 time on fixing it.  No patch do not provide any of these positive
13071 properties.</p>
13072
13073       </div>
13074       <div class="tags">
13075
13076
13077         Tags: <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>.
13078
13079
13080       </div>
13081     </div>
13082     <div class="padding"></div>
13083
13084     <div class="entry">
13085       <div class="title">
13086         <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>
13087       </div>
13088       <div class="date">
13089         30th March 2009
13090       </div>
13091       <div class="body">
13092         <p>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
13093 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
13094 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
13095 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
13096 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
13097 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
13098 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
13099 application.</p>
13100
13101 <p>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
13102 independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
13103 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
13104 protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
13105 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
13106 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
13107 blocked from doing so.</p>
13108
13109 <p>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
13110 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
13111 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
13112 requirements change.</p>
13113
13114 <p>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
13115 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
13116 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.</p>
13117
13118       </div>
13119       <div class="tags">
13120
13121
13122         Tags: <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>.
13123
13124
13125       </div>
13126     </div>
13127     <div class="padding"></div>
13128
13129     <div class="entry">
13130       <div class="title">
13131         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html">Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering</a>
13132       </div>
13133       <div class="date">
13134         29th March 2009
13135       </div>
13136       <div class="body">
13137         <p>I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
13138 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering.  I got a bit done tuning the
13139 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
13140 implementation avahi.  It look like it could be useful for us.  Almost
13141 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
13142 get to know the Skolelinux system.  Walter Bender, involved in the
13143 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
13144 also helped me improve my OLPC installation.  He also showed me that
13145 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
13146 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian.  As a
13147 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu.  We also
13148 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
13149 proved to be too hard for us.  The application seem to need more work
13150 before it is ready for me.  I look forward to getting home and relax
13151 now. :)</p>
13152
13153       </div>
13154       <div class="tags">
13155
13156
13157         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>.
13158
13159
13160       </div>
13161     </div>
13162     <div class="padding"></div>
13163
13164     <div class="entry">
13165       <div class="title">
13166         <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>
13167       </div>
13168       <div class="date">
13169         29th March 2009
13170       </div>
13171       <div class="body">
13172         <p>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
13173 optimal.  There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
13174 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with
13175 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory.  The RFC
13176 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
13177 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.</p>
13178
13179 <p>In <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux</a>,
13180 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
13181 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
13182 and LTSP configuration in LDAP.  These objects have a lot in common,
13183 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
13184 object per entity.  For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
13185 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
13186 DNS information and another with DHCP information.  The schemas
13187 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
13188 object.  In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
13189 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
13190 It just do not scale.  I believe it is time for a few RFC
13191 specifications to cleam up this mess.</p>
13192
13193 <p>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
13194 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
13195 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
13196 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.</p>
13197
13198 <p>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
13199 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.</p>
13200
13201 <p>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
13202 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up.  Time to start a
13203 new IETF work group?</p>
13204
13205       </div>
13206       <div class="tags">
13207
13208
13209         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>.
13210
13211
13212       </div>
13213     </div>
13214     <div class="padding"></div>
13215
13216     <div class="entry">
13217       <div class="title">
13218         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Endelig_er_Debian_Lenny_gitt_ut.html">Endelig er Debian Lenny gitt ut</a>
13219       </div>
13220       <div class="date">
13221         15th February 2009
13222       </div>
13223       <div class="body">
13224         <p>Endelig er <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>
13225 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090214">Lenny</a> gitt ut.
13226 Et langt steg videre for Debian-prosjektet, og en rekke nye
13227 programpakker blir nå tilgjengelig for de av oss som bruker den
13228 stabile utgaven av Debian.  Neste steg er nå å få
13229 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> /
13230 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> ferdig
13231 oppdatert for den nye utgaven, slik at en oppdatert versjon kan
13232 slippes løs på skolene.  Takk til alle debian-utviklerne som har
13233 gjort dette mulig.  Endelig er f.eks. fungerende avhengighetsstyrt
13234 bootsekvens tilgjengelig i stabil utgave, vha pakken
13235 <tt>insserv</tt>.</p>
13236
13237       </div>
13238       <div class="tags">
13239
13240
13241         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>.
13242
13243
13244       </div>
13245     </div>
13246     <div class="padding"></div>
13247
13248     <div class="entry">
13249       <div class="title">
13250         <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>
13251       </div>
13252       <div class="date">
13253          7th December 2008
13254       </div>
13255       <div class="body">
13256         <p>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
13257 Oslo.  Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
13258 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
13259 LTSP installation.  LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network.
13260 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
13261 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box.  Was working on getting the
13262 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
13263 finish it before the weekend was up.</p>
13264
13265 <p>Did not find time to look at the 4 VGA cards in one box we got from
13266 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
13267 development gathering.  Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
13268 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
13269 of these cards.</p>
13270
13271       </div>
13272       <div class="tags">
13273
13274
13275         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>.
13276
13277
13278       </div>
13279     </div>
13280     <div class="padding"></div>
13281
13282     <div class="entry">
13283       <div class="title">
13284         <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>
13285       </div>
13286       <div class="date">
13287         25th November 2008
13288       </div>
13289       <div class="body">
13290         <p>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
13291 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
13292 default in Debian Edu.  We need an embedded video playing plugin with
13293 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
13294 all the multimedia content available on the web.  The test results and
13295 notes are available on
13296 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">the
13297 Debian wiki</a>.  I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
13298 fill this need.  My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
13299 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages.  A lot of the MIME
13300 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
13301 video/ogg), just do not work.  And simple formats like the
13302 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn't supported by the
13303 totem and vlc plugins.  I hope the situation will improve soon.  No
13304 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.</p>
13305
13306 <p>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin.  It seem to
13307 be the only one fitting our needs. :/</p>
13308
13309       </div>
13310       <div class="tags">
13311
13312
13313         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>.
13314
13315
13316       </div>
13317     </div>
13318     <div class="padding"></div>
13319
13320     <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>
13321     <div id="sidebar">
13322
13323
13324
13325 <h2>Archive</h2>
13326 <ul>
13327
13328 <li>2018
13329 <ul>
13330
13331 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/01/">January (1)</a></li>
13332
13333 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/02/">February (5)</a></li>
13334
13335 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/03/">March (5)</a></li>
13336
13337 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/04/">April (3)</a></li>
13338
13339 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13340
13341 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/07/">July (4)</a></li>
13342
13343 </ul></li>
13344
13345 <li>2017
13346 <ul>
13347
13348 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/01/">January (4)</a></li>
13349
13350 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/02/">February (3)</a></li>
13351
13352 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/03/">March (5)</a></li>
13353
13354 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/04/">April (2)</a></li>
13355
13356 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/06/">June (5)</a></li>
13357
13358 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/07/">July (1)</a></li>
13359
13360 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/08/">August (1)</a></li>
13361
13362 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/09/">September (3)</a></li>
13363
13364 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/10/">October (5)</a></li>
13365
13366 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13367
13368 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/12/">December (4)</a></li>
13369
13370 </ul></li>
13371
13372 <li>2016
13373 <ul>
13374
13375 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
13376
13377 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
13378
13379 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13380
13381 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
13382
13383 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
13384
13385 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13386
13387 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/07/">July (2)</a></li>
13388
13389 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/08/">August (5)</a></li>
13390
13391 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/09/">September (2)</a></li>
13392
13393 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/10/">October (3)</a></li>
13394
13395 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/11/">November (8)</a></li>
13396
13397 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/12/">December (5)</a></li>
13398
13399 </ul></li>
13400
13401 <li>2015
13402 <ul>
13403
13404 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
13405
13406 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
13407
13408 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
13409
13410 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
13411
13412 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
13413
13414 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
13415
13416 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
13417
13418 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
13419
13420 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
13421
13422 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
13423
13424 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
13425
13426 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
13427
13428 </ul></li>
13429
13430 <li>2014
13431 <ul>
13432
13433 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
13434
13435 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
13436
13437 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
13438
13439 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
13440
13441 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
13442
13443 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13444
13445 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
13446
13447 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
13448
13449 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
13450
13451 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
13452
13453 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13454
13455 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
13456
13457 </ul></li>
13458
13459 <li>2013
13460 <ul>
13461
13462 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
13463
13464 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
13465
13466 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
13467
13468 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
13469
13470 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
13471
13472 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
13473
13474 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
13475
13476 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
13477
13478 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
13479
13480 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
13481
13482 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
13483
13484 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
13485
13486 </ul></li>
13487
13488 <li>2012
13489 <ul>
13490
13491 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
13492
13493 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
13494
13495 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
13496
13497 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
13498
13499 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
13500
13501 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
13502
13503 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
13504
13505 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
13506
13507 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
13508
13509 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
13510
13511 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
13512
13513 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
13514
13515 </ul></li>
13516
13517 <li>2011
13518 <ul>
13519
13520 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
13521
13522 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
13523
13524 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
13525
13526 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
13527
13528 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
13529
13530 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13531
13532 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
13533
13534 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
13535
13536 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
13537
13538 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
13539
13540 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13541
13542 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
13543
13544 </ul></li>
13545
13546 <li>2010
13547 <ul>
13548
13549 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
13550
13551 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
13552
13553 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13554
13555 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
13556
13557 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
13558
13559 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
13560
13561 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
13562
13563 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
13564
13565 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
13566
13567 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
13568
13569 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
13570
13571 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
13572
13573 </ul></li>
13574
13575 <li>2009
13576 <ul>
13577
13578 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
13579
13580 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
13581
13582 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
13583
13584 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
13585
13586 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
13587
13588 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
13589
13590 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
13591
13592 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
13593
13594 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
13595
13596 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
13597
13598 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13599
13600 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
13601
13602 </ul></li>
13603
13604 <li>2008
13605 <ul>
13606
13607 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
13608
13609 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
13610
13611 </ul></li>
13612
13613 </ul>
13614
13615
13616
13617 <h2>Tags</h2>
13618 <ul>
13619
13620  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (16)</a></li>
13621
13622  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
13623
13624  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
13625
13626  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
13627
13628  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (9)</a></li>
13629
13630  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (17)</a></li>
13631
13632  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
13633
13634  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
13635
13636  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (160)</a></li>
13637
13638  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (158)</a></li>
13639
13640  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook (4)</a></li>
13641
13642  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
13643
13644  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (17)</a></li>
13645
13646  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (25)</a></li>
13647
13648  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
13649
13650  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (378)</a></li>
13651
13652  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
13653
13654  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (13)</a></li>
13655
13656  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (32)</a></li>
13657
13658  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
13659
13660  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (18)</a></li>
13661
13662  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
13663
13664  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
13665
13666  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (16)</a></li>
13667
13668  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (20)</a></li>
13669
13670  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
13671
13672  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lego">lego (4)</a></li>
13673
13674  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
13675
13676  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
13677
13678  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
13679
13680  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
13681
13682  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (41)</a></li>
13683
13684  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (10)</a></li>
13685
13686  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (299)</a></li>
13687
13688  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (190)</a></li>
13689
13690  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (33)</a></li>
13691
13692  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
13693
13694  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (71)</a></li>
13695
13696  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (107)</a></li>
13697
13698  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (2)</a></li>
13699
13700  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
13701
13702  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
13703
13704  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
13705
13706  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (10)</a></li>
13707
13708  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
13709
13710  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (6)</a></li>
13711
13712  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
13713
13714  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (54)</a></li>
13715
13716  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
13717
13718  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (5)</a></li>
13719
13720  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (55)</a></li>
13721
13722  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (6)</a></li>
13723
13724  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (12)</a></li>
13725
13726  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (55)</a></li>
13727
13728  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (4)</a></li>
13729
13730  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
13731
13732  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (9)</a></li>
13733
13734  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/verkidetfri">verkidetfri (11)</a></li>
13735
13736  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (66)</a></li>
13737
13738  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
13739
13740  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (41)</a></li>
13741
13742 </ul>
13743
13744
13745     </div>
13746     <p style="text-align: right">
13747  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
13748 </p>
13749
13750   </body>
13751 </html>