X-Git-Url: https://pere.pagekite.me/gitweb/homepage.git/blobdiff_plain/f83afb9a7403c0b12e184497a4d38981be23ce20..503eaa90b477154d9c9caeb7258eaf45ff05fcc7:/blog/tags/english/index.html?ds=sidebyside diff --git a/blog/tags/english/index.html b/blog/tags/english/index.html index 86f72d81de..457d286a77 100644 --- a/blog/tags/english/index.html +++ b/blog/tags/english/index.html @@ -1,37 +1,34 @@ - - - Petter Reinholdtsen: Entries Tagged english - - - - - -
-

- Petter Reinholdtsen - -

- -
- -

Entries tagged "english".

- - - + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + + + + Petter Reinholdtsen: Entries Tagged english + + + + + +
+

+ Petter Reinholdtsen + +

+ +
-
-
- The sorry state of multimedia browser plugins in Debian -
-
- 2008-11-25 00:10 -
-
- -

Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser +

Entries tagged "english".

+ +
+ +
+ 25th November 2008 +
+
+

Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by default in Debian Edu. We need an embedded video playing plugin with control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming @@ -50,28 +47,26 @@ wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.

For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin. It seem to be the only one fitting our needs. :/

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, web. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2008-12-07 12:00 -
- -
- -

This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, web. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 7th December 2008 +
+
+

This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in Oslo. Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the LTSP installation. LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network. @@ -86,28 +81,26 @@ development gathering. Would love to have the Debian Edu installer automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one of these cards.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ltsp. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2008-12-28 15:40 -
- - +
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ltsp. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 28th December 2008 +
+
+

The Norwegian Unix User Group is recording our montly presentation on video, and recently we have worked on improving the quality of the recordings by mixing the slides directly with the video stream. For this, we use the @@ -132,28 +125,26 @@ video mixer in a very short time frame. We will need it for USB image is for a 1 GB memory stick, but can be used on any larger stick as well.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug, video. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-01-17 18:50 -
- -
- -

As part of the work we do in NUUG +

+
+ + + Tags: english, nuug, video. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 17th January 2009 +
+
+

As part of the work we do in NUUG to publish video recordings of our monthly presentations, we provide a page with embedded video for easy access to the recording. Putting a good set of HTML tags together to get working embedded video in all @@ -196,28 +187,26 @@ to find a way to get the URL of the playing video out of Opera, so I am not quite sure it picked the Ogg Theora version of the video. I sure hope it was using the announced Ogg Theora support. :)

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, multimedia, nuug, video, web. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-02-20 08:50 -
- -
- -

At work with the University of Oslo, we have several hundred computers +

+
+ + + Tags: english, multimedia, nuug, video, web. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 20th February 2009 +
+
+

At work with the University of Oslo, we have several hundred computers in our computing center. This give us a challenge in tracking the location and cabling of the computers, when they are added, moved and removed. Some times the location register is not updated when a @@ -259,28 +248,26 @@ to 60000 ms to make sure it terminated in a reasonable time frame.

at adjusting our computer tagging procedures to use bar codes for easier automatic tracking of computers.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-02-28 23:50 -
- -
- -

At work, we have a few hundred Linux servers, and with that amount +

+
+ + + Tags: english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 28th February 2009 +
+
+

At work, we have a few hundred Linux servers, and with that amount of hardware it is important to keep track of when the hardware support contract expire for each server. We have a machine (and service) register, which until recently did not contain much useful besides the @@ -441,28 +428,26 @@ contracts, so it is useless in that case. The original Dell code do not handle extended support contracts either, but has been updated to do so.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-03-29 20:30 -
- -
- -

The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from +

+
+ + + Tags: english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 29th March 2009 +
+
+

The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from optimal. There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory. The RFC @@ -495,28 +480,26 @@ computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.

in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up. Time to start a new IETF work group?

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-03-29 21:00 -
- -
- -

I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 29th March 2009 +
+
+

I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian Edu/Skolelinux development gathering. I got a bit done tuning the desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol implementation avahi. It look like it could be useful for us. Almost @@ -532,28 +515,26 @@ proved to be too hard for us. The application seem to need more work before it is ready for me. I look forward to getting home and relax now. :)

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-03-30 11:50 -
- -
- -

Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 30th March 2009 +
+
+

Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure. It is the simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications. @@ -579,28 +560,26 @@ requirements change.

open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, english, nuug, standard. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-04-05 10:00 -
- -
- -

One think I have wanted to figure out for a along time is how to +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, english, nuug, standard. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 5th April 2009 +
+
+

One think I have wanted to figure out for a along time is how to run vlc from cron to do recording of video streams on the net. The task is trivial with mplayer, but I do not really trust the security of mplayer (it crashes too often on strange input), and thus prefer @@ -638,28 +617,26 @@ sleep $DURATION kill $pid wait $pid -

-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug, video. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-04-28 09:30 -
- -
- -

Julien Blache +

+
+ + + Tags: english, nuug, video. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 28th April 2009 +
+
+

Julien Blache claim that no patch is better than a useless patch. I completely disagree, as a patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also @@ -667,28 +644,26 @@ prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent time on fixing it. No patch do not provide any of these positive properties.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-05-02 15:00 -
- -
- -

There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 2nd May 2009 +
+
+

There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone do not yet know them.

@@ -725,28 +700,26 @@ errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are surrounded by today.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-06-24 21:40 -
- -
- -

I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 24th June 2009 +
+
+

I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we could find more ways to speed up the boot system. This was an Ubuntu funded @@ -793,28 +766,26 @@ possible to run a of them in the same process. A quick way to test this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/; insserv'. Will need to test if that work. :)

-
-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-07-22 23:00 -
- -
- -

After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 22nd July 2009 +
+
+

After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to take over the package and become the new upstream. The number of patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the @@ -837,28 +808,26 @@ working on the future release.

It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.

-
-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-07-27 23:50 -
- -
- -

Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2, +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 27th July 2009 +
+
+

Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2, and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing. This conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days. @@ -870,28 +839,26 @@ are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.

fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based non-predictable kernel in the early boot.

-
-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-08-08 14:00 -
- -
- -

According to +

+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 8th August 2009 +
+
+

According to a blog post from Torsten Werner, the current defect report for ISO 29500 (ISO OOXML) is 809 pages. His interesting point is that the @@ -907,28 +874,26 @@ Standard Norway and ISO in how they handled it.

with the future ahead of it. We are working in NUUG to organise a ODF seminar this autumn.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug, standard. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2009-08-12 15:50 -
- -
- -

Just for fun, I did a search right now on Google for a few file ODF +

+
+ + + Tags: english, nuug, standard. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 12th August 2009 +
+
+

Just for fun, I did a search right now on Google for a few file ODF and MS Office based formats (not to be mistaken for ISO or ECMA OOXML), to get an idea of their relative usage. I searched using 'filetype:odt' and equvalent terms, and got these results:

@@ -978,28 +943,26 @@ search done from a machine here in Norway.

Interesting difference, not sure what to conclude from these numbers.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug, standard, web. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-01-27 15:15 -
- -
- -

One of the new features in the next Debian/Lenny based release of +

+
+ + + Tags: english, nuug, standard, web. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 27th January 2010 +
+
+

One of the new features in the next Debian/Lenny based release of Debian Edu/Skolelinux, which is scheduled for release in the next few days, is automatic configuration of the service monitoring system Nagios. The previous release had automatic configuration of trend @@ -1045,28 +1008,26 @@ nagiosadmin" to create a nagiosadmin user and set a password for it to be able to log into the Nagios web pages. After that, everything is taken care of.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug, sitesummary. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-02-11 17:15 -
- -
- -

On Tuesday, the Debian/Lenny based version of +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug, sitesummary. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 11th February 2010 +
+
+

On Tuesday, the Debian/Lenny based version of Skolelinux was finally shipped. This was a major leap forward for the project, and I am very pleased that we finally got the release wrapped up. Work on the first @@ -1081,28 +1042,26 @@ next major release, based on Squeeze. We will try to get as many of the fixes we need into the official Debian packages before the freeze, and have just a few weeks or months to make it happen.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-03-06 18:15 -
- -
- -

6 years ago, as part of the Debian Edu development I am involved +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 6th March 2010 +
+
+

6 years ago, as part of the Debian Edu development I am involved in, I asked for a hook in the kdm and gdm setup to run scripts as root when the user log out. A bug was submitted against the xfree86-common package in 2004 (#230422), @@ -1121,28 +1080,26 @@ a generic way that work with all display managers using this framework. My goal is to get all display managers in Debian use it, similar to how they use the Xsession.d framework today.

-

-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-04-14 17:20 -
- - + +
+
+ +
+ +
+ 14th April 2010 +
+
+

Yesterdays NUUG presentation about Kerberos was inspiring, and reminded me about the need to start using Kerberos in Skolelinux. Setting up a Kerberos server seem to be straight forward, and if we get this in @@ -1179,28 +1136,26 @@ I recommend you to see the video recording from yesterdays NUUG presentation, and start using Kerberos at home. The video show show up in a few days.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-04-19 17:10 -
- -
- -

The last few weeks i have had the pleasure of reading a +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 19th April 2010 +
+
+

The last few weeks i have had the pleasure of reading a thought-provoking collection of essays by Cory Doctorow, on topics touching copyright, virtual worlds, the future of man when the conscience mind can be duplicated into a computer and many more. The @@ -1213,28 +1168,26 @@ epub-version from fbreader and my N810. I strongly recommend this book.

-
- -
-
- -
- -
- 2010-04-28 20:40 -
- -
- -

For some years now, I have wondered how we should handle laptops in +

+ +
+
+ +
+ +
+ 28th April 2010 +
+
+

For some years now, I have wondered how we should handle laptops in Debian Edu. The Debian Edu infrastructure is mostly designed to handle stationary computers, and less suited for computers that come and go.

@@ -1300,28 +1253,26 @@ to make sure we avoid long timeouts there too.

If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-02 13:47 -
- -
- -

One interesting feature in Active Directory, is the ability to +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 2nd May 2010 +
+
+

One interesting feature in Active Directory, is the ability to create a new user with an expired password, and thus force the user to change the password on the first login attempt.

@@ -1392,28 +1343,26 @@ equivalent command to expire a password is 'passwd -e username', which insert zero into the date of the last password change.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug, sikkerhet. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-06 23:25 -
- -
- -

These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug, sikkerhet. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 6th May 2010 +
+
+

These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies. If you want to test your Squeeze system, make sure @@ -1449,28 +1398,26 @@ the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at the list of usertagged bugs related to this.

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-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-13 22:20 -
- -
- -

The last few days a new boot system called +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 13th May 2010 +
+
+

The last few days a new boot system called systemd has been introduced @@ -1503,28 +1450,26 @@ new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is already in experimental. If all go well, Squeeze will be released with parallel booting enabled by default.

-
-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-14 21:10 -
- -
- -

In the recent Debian Edu versions, the +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 14th May 2010 +
+
+

In the recent Debian Edu versions, the sitesummary system is used to keep track of the machines in the school network. Each machine will automatically report its status to the @@ -1550,28 +1495,26 @@ machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS tables in LDAP using this information. Such tool is unfortunately not written yet.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, sitesummary. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-14 22:40 -
- -
- -

Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, sitesummary. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 14th May 2010 +
+
+

Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing. Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than expected, if I am to believe the @@ -1598,28 +1541,26 @@ the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at the list of usertagged bugs related to this.

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-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-19 19:00 -
- -
- -

Today, the last piece of the puzzle for roaming laptops in Debian +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 19th May 2010 +
+
+

Today, the last piece of the puzzle for roaming laptops in Debian Edu finally entered the Debian archive. Today, the new libpam-mklocaluser package was accepted. Two days ago, two other pieces was accepted @@ -1671,28 +1612,26 @@ type that can be used instead to get gdm to also show the message.

If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.

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-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-22 21:30 -
- -
- -

After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 22nd May 2010 +
+
+

After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally found time today to return to the project. Having to spend less time working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now, definitely helped freeing some time.

@@ -1734,28 +1673,26 @@ solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.

If you want to discuss the details of these features, please contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-05-27 23:55 -
- -
- -

A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing. +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 27th May 2010 +
+
+

A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing. The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious issues are known and should be solved: @@ -1795,28 +1732,26 @@ list of usertagged bugs related to this.

Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.

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-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. - -
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-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-01 17:05 -
- -
- -

It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 1st June 2010 +
+
+

It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled. The problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to @@ -1840,28 +1775,26 @@ but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.

I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.

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-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-03 12:05 -
- -
- -

When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 3rd June 2010 +
+
+

When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI information extracted from each machine. The script to do so is included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from @@ -1881,7 +1814,7 @@ maintainer:~#

The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables provided in each machine. Here there are Intel machines without model -information listed with Intel as vendor and mo model, and virtual Xen +information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen machines listed as [no-dmi-info]. One can add -l as a command line option to list the individual machines.

@@ -1894,56 +1827,52 @@ their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions, it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central collector.

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-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, sitesummary. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-06 14:15 -
- -
- -

Via the +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, sitesummary. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 6th June 2010 +
+
+

Via the blog of Rob Weir I came across the very interesting essay named The Art of Standards Wars (PDF 25 pages). I recommend it for everyone following the standards wars of today.

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-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, standard. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-06 23:55 -
- -
- -

If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, standard. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 6th June 2010 +
+
+

If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd. The packages with such needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave @@ -1985,28 +1914,26 @@ to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.

looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good choice.

-
-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-11 22:50 -
- -
- -

The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 11th June 2010 +
+
+

The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly. A few bugs have been discovered and reported in the process (#585410 in nagios3-cgi, @@ -2126,28 +2053,26 @@ packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop packages.

-
-
- - - - Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-13 09:05 -
- -
- -

My +

+
+ + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 13th June 2010 +
+
+

My testing of Debian upgrades from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've finally made the upgrade logs available from @@ -2316,28 +2241,26 @@ continue.

xulrunner-1.9

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-13 11:40 -
- -
- -

For those of us caring about document exchange and +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 13th June 2010 +
+
+

For those of us caring about document exchange and interoperability, OfficeShots is a great service. It is to ODF documents what BrowserShots is for web @@ -2360,28 +2283,26 @@ OfficeShots factories, and the project is able to render ODF documents in 17 different document processing implementation on Linux and Windows. This is great.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, standard. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-16 14:55 -
- -
- -

A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel +

+
+ + + Tags: english, standard. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 16th June 2010 +
+
+

A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel installs packages during the normal debian-installer run. Until now, I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a @@ -2423,28 +2344,26 @@ installation.

install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases like this.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-24 00:35 -
- -
- -

A while back, I +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 24th June 2010 +
+
+

A while back, I complained about the fact that it is not possible with the provided schemas for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets @@ -2487,28 +2406,26 @@ package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.

If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-06-28 00:30 -
- -
- -

The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 28th June 2010 +
+
+

The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI tool to browse the LDAP tree. The only one I was able to find in Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is @@ -2539,28 +2456,26 @@ useful GUI alternative. It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze. Unless that changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-01 11:40 -
- -
- -

For a laptop, centralized user directories and password checking is +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 1st July 2010 +
+
+

For a laptop, centralized user directories and password checking is a bit troubling. Laptops are typically used also when not connected to the network, and it is vital for a user to be able to log in or unlock the screen saver also when a central server is unavailable. @@ -2759,28 +2674,26 @@ modify it manually.

If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-03 23:55 -
- -
- -

Here is a short update on my +

+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 3rd July 2010 +
+
+

Here is a short update on my my Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing. Here is a summary of the difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude. I'm @@ -2873,28 +2786,26 @@ in git today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely. No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce the difference somewhat. -

-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-09 12:55 -
- -
- -

Since +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 9th July 2010 +
+
+

Since my last post about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a LDAP GUI that is even better than luma. The java application @@ -2909,28 +2820,26 @@ have with it is how it handle errors. If something go wrong, its non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list and remove the failing query. Nothing big, but very annoying.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-11 22:00 -
- -
- -

Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 11th July 2010 +
+
+

Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.

@@ -3005,28 +2914,26 @@ Xperience, Inc., 2000. I found its files on a personal home page over at redhat.com.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-14 23:45 -
- -
- -

For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 14th July 2010 +
+
+

For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way @@ -3084,28 +2991,26 @@ might be a good place to put it.

If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-17 21:00 -
- -
- -

This is a +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 17th July 2010 +
+ - -
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-18 16:45 -
- -
- -

Thanks to +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, ldap, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 18th July 2010 +
+
+

Thanks to todays opengeodata blog entry, I just discovered that the OpenStreetmap.org site have gotten @@ -3455,28 +3358,26 @@ alternative for them because the front page lacked routing support, and I hope their needs will be catered for when routing show up on the www.openstreetmap.org front page.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, kart, web. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-25 10:00 -
- -
- -

The last few months me and the other Debian Edu developers have +

+
+ + + Tags: english, kart, web. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 25th July 2010 +
+
+

The last few months me and the other Debian Edu developers have been working hard to get the Debian/Squeeze based version of Debian Edu/Skolelinux into shape. This future version will use Kerberos for authentication, and services are slowly migrated to single signon, @@ -3512,28 +3413,26 @@ release another day.

If you want to help out with implementing Kerberos for Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug, sikkerhet. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-27 17:45 -
- -
- -

I just posted this announcement culminating several months of work +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug, sikkerhet. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 27th July 2010 +
+
+

I just posted this announcement culminating several months of work with the next Debian Edu release. Not nearly done, but one major step completed.

@@ -3645,28 +3544,26 @@ http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugsInBugzilla

Please direct replies to debian-edu@lists.debian.org

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-07-27 23:50 -
- -
- -

I discovered this while doing +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 27th July 2010 +
+
+

I discovered this while doing automated testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze. A few packages in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed @@ -3715,28 +3612,26 @@ apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular dependency. Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at it.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-08-03 23:30 -
- -
- -

The new roaming workstation profile in Debian Edu/Squeeze is fairly +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 3rd August 2010 +
+
+

The new roaming workstation profile in Debian Edu/Squeeze is fairly similar to the laptop setup am I working on using Ubuntu for the University of Oslo, and just for the heck of it, I tested today how hard it would be to integrate that profile into the university @@ -3767,28 +3662,26 @@ setup in Debian Edu has been changed or as with the university, where the environment is different but provides the protocols Debian Edu uses.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-08-07 14:45 -
- -
- -

A few days ago, I +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 7th August 2010 +
+
+

A few days ago, I tried to install a Roaming workation profile from Debian Edu/Squeeze while on the university network here at the University of Oslo, and @@ -3840,28 +3733,26 @@ with UID and GID values.

If you want to help out with implementing these things for Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-08-08 21:20 -
- -
- -

A few years ago, I was involved in a project planning to use +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 8th August 2010 +
+
+

A few years ago, I was involved in a project planning to use Windows file servers as home directory servers for Debian Edu/Skolelinux machines. This was thought to be no problem, as the access would be through the SMB network file system protocol, and we @@ -4085,28 +3976,26 @@ it. :)

script so useful that he created a GIT repository and stored it in http://github.com/gebi/fs-test.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-08-09 20:15 -
- -
- -

As reported earlier, the last few days I have looked at how Debian +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 9th August 2010 +
+
+

As reported earlier, the last few days I have looked at how Debian Edu clients are configured, and tried to get rid of all hardcoded configuration settings on the clients. I believe the work to be mostly done, and the clients seem to work just fine with dynamically @@ -4223,56 +4112,52 @@ detect Kerberos realm from DNS, by looking for _kerberos TXT entries before falling back to the upper case DNS domain name. Will have to implement it for Debian Edu. :)

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-08-15 22:20 -
- -
- -

I found the notes from Rob Weir on +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 15th August 2010 +
+
+

I found the notes from Rob Weir on how to crush dissent matching my own thoughts on the matter quite well. Highly recommended for those wondering which road our society should go down. In my view we have been heading the wrong way for a long time.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, lenker, nuug, personvern, sikkerhet. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-08-26 13:30 -
- -
- -

My file system sematics program +

+
+ + + Tags: english, lenker, nuug, personvern, sikkerhet. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 26th August 2010 +
+
+

My file system sematics program presented a few days ago is very useful to verify that a file system can work as a unix home directory,and today I had to extend it a bit. I'm @@ -4372,28 +4257,26 @@ directory.

script so useful that he created a GIT repository and stored it in http://github.com/gebi/fs-test.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-08-30 19:30 -
- -
- -

Just got an email from Tobias Gruetzmacher as a followup on my +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 30th August 2010 +
+
+

Just got an email from Tobias Gruetzmacher as a followup on my previous post about sshfs. He reported another problem with sshfs. It fail to handle hard links properly. A simple way to spot this is to @@ -4417,28 +4300,26 @@ nevertheless. :)

git from http://github.com/gebi/fs-test

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-09-01 21:00 -
- -
- -

This evening I made my first Perl GUI application. The last few +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 1st September 2010 +
+
+

This evening I made my first Perl GUI application. The last few days I have worked on a Perl module for controlling my recently aquired Spykee robots, and the module is now getting complete enought that it is possible to use it to control the robot driving at least. @@ -4487,28 +4368,26 @@ where to make it available first. I will add a link to the NUUG wiki for those that want to check back later to find it.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug, robot. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-09-04 10:10 -
- -
- -

In the Debian +

+ +
+
+ +
+ +
+ 4th September 2010 +
+
+

In the Debian popularity-contest numbers, the adobe-flashplugin package the second most popular used package that is missing in Debian. The sixth most popular is flashplayer-mozilla. This is a clear indication that @@ -4549,28 +4428,26 @@ release team have not had time to reply to it yet. I hope they agree with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus accept the new package into Squeeze.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, video, web. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-09-09 23:55 -
- -
- -

A few days ago I had the mixed pleasure of bying a new digital +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, video, web. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 9th September 2010 +
+
+

A few days ago I had the mixed pleasure of bying a new digital camera, a Canon IXUS 130. It was instructive and very disturbing to be able to verify that also this camera producer have the nerve to specify how I can or can not use the videos produced with the camera. @@ -4611,28 +4488,26 @@ the issue. The solution is to support the open standards for video, like Ogg Theora, and avoid MPEG-4 and H.264 if you can.

-
- -
-
- -
- -
- 2010-10-03 22:30 -
- -
- -

    +
+ +
+
+ +
+ +
+ 3rd October 2010 +
+
+

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, lenker, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-10-09 14:00 -
- -
- -

This summer I got the chance to buy cheap Spykee robots, and since +

+
+ + + Tags: english, lenker, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 9th October 2010 +
+
+

This summer I got the chance to buy cheap Spykee robots, and since then I have worked on getting Linux software in place to control them. The firmware for the robot is available from the producer, and using that source it was trivial to figure out the protocol specification. @@ -4699,28 +4572,26 @@ source or binary package:

If you are interested in helping out with developing this library, please let me know.

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, nuug, robot. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-10-19 14:45 -
- -
- -

The Gnash project is the +

+
+ + + Tags: english, nuug, robot. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 19th October 2010 +
+
+

The Gnash project is the most promising solution for a Free Software Flash implementation. It has done great so far, but there is still far to go, and recently its funding has dried up. I believe AVM2 support in Gnash is vital to the @@ -4763,28 +4634,26 @@ people will participate to make this happen. The more money the project gets, the more features it can develop using these funds. :)

-
-
- - - - Tags: english, multimedia, nuug, video, web. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-10-24 22:45 -
- -
- -

Some updates.

+
+
+ + + Tags: english, multimedia, nuug, video, web. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 24th October 2010 +
+
+

Some updates.

My gnash pledge to raise money for the project is going well. The lower limit of 10 @@ -4815,28 +4684,26 @@ client servers and diskless workstations. A nice touch added yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows clients to get a Linux desktop on request.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-07 11:45 -
- -
- -

Prioritising packages for the Debian Edu / +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 7th November 2010 +
+
+

Prioritising packages for the Debian Edu / Skolelinux DVD, which is supposed provide a school with all the services and user applications needed on the pupils computer network has always been hard. Even @@ -4873,56 +4740,52 @@ free X driver should work.

desktop packages as well as the language specific packages making the DVD more useful again.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-09 16:10 -
- -
- -

+
+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 9th November 2010 +
+
+

3D printing is just great. I just came across this Debian logo in 3D linked in from the thingiverse blog.

-
-
- - - - Tags: 3d-printer, debian, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-20 07:20 -
- -
- -

Answering +

+
+ + + Tags: 3d-printer, debian, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 20th November 2010 +
+
+

Answering the call from the Gnash project for buildbot slaves to test the @@ -4946,28 +4809,26 @@ fatal problem. Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is useful as a file server for NUUG. Will try to find time to set up a gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-20 22:50 -
- -
- -

I'm still running upgrade testing of the +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 20th November 2010 +
+
+

I'm still running upgrade testing of the Lenny Gnome and KDE Desktop, but have not had time to spend on reporting the status. Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.

@@ -5181,28 +5042,26 @@ Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-22 11:20 -
- -
- -

Most of the computers in use by the +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 22nd November 2010 +
+
+

Most of the computers in use by the Debian Edu/Skolelinux project are virtual machines. And they have been Xen machines running on a fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate @@ -5275,28 +5134,26 @@ the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and set up grub to boot from the disk image. After this, the KVM machines seem to work just fine.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-22 14:15 -
- -
- -

Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 22nd November 2010 +
+
+

Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated upgrade testing of the Lenny Gnome and KDE Desktop to do apt-get autoremove when using apt-get. @@ -5734,28 +5591,26 @@ aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of differences. I have no idea what packages should be installed after the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-27 11:30 -
- -
- -

In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 27th November 2010 +
+
+

In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC. Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try to play a video file or stream. Only if VLC fail will I drag out @@ -5787,28 +5642,26 @@ the current video. It is very nice when playing short videos from the web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at what is going on.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, video, web. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-11-29 18:40 -
- -
- -

On friday, the first Debian Edu / Skolelinux +

+
+ + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, video, web. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 29th November 2010 +
+
+

On friday, the first Debian Edu / Skolelinux development gathering in a long time take place here in Oslo, Norway. I really look forward to seeing all the good people working on the @@ -5824,28 +5677,26 @@ people registered as members. Last year 32 members cast their vote in the memberdb based election system. I hope more people find time to vote this year.

-
-
- - - - Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-12-09 19:30 -
- -
- -

A few days ago, I was introduces to some students in the robot +

+
+ + + Tags: debian edu, english, nuug. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 9th December 2010 +
+
+

A few days ago, I was introduces to some students in the robot student assosiation Robotica Osloensis at the University of Oslo where I work, who planned to get their own 3D printer. They wanted to learn from me based on my @@ -5865,28 +5716,26 @@ some 3D scans I got made during Dagen@IFI when one of the groups at the computer science department at the university demonstrated their very cool 3D scanner.

-
-
- - - - Tags: 3d-printer, english, reprap. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-12-10 08:20 -
- -
- -

With this weeks lawless +

+
+ + + Tags: 3d-printer, english, reprap. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 10th December 2010 +
+ - -
-
- -
- -
- 2010-12-11 15:10 -
- -
- -

As I continue to explore +

+
+ + + Tags: bitcoin, debian, english, personvern, sikkerhet. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 11th December 2010 +
+
+

As I continue to explore BitCoin, I've starting to wonder what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws and regulations here in Norway. Here are some random notes.

@@ -6027,31 +5874,29 @@ criticism of bitcoin. Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought it was interesting to read. The arguments presented seem to be equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.

-
-
- - - - Tags: bitcoin, debian, english, personvern, sikkerhet. - -
-
-
- -
- -
- 2010-12-22 14:55 -
- -
- -

The last few days I have spent at work here at the University of oslo testing if the new +

+
+ + + Tags: bitcoin, debian, english, personvern, sikkerhet. + + +
+
+
+ +
+ +
+ 22nd December 2010 +
+
+

The last few days I have spent at work here at the University of Oslo testing if the new batch of computers will work with Linux. Every year for the last few -years the university have organized shared bid of a few thousand +years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand computers, and this year HP won the bid. Two different desktops and five different laptops are on the list this year. We in the UNIX group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL @@ -6108,7 +5953,7 @@ few. memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE notice this. -

  • For laptops, is suspecd/hibernate working? I'm testing if the +
  • For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working? I'm testing if the special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after resume.
  • @@ -6131,31 +5976,29 @@ the test results later. For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid, and audio fail on RHEL6. Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p. As you can see, I have most machines left to test. One interesting -observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the framerate than +observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than RHEL6 with glxgears. No idea why.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: debian, debian edu, english. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2010-12-25 09:40 -
    - -
    - -

    Half a year ago I +

    +
    + + + Tags: debian, debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 25th December 2010 +
    +
    +

    Half a year ago I wrote a bit about OfficeShots, a web service to allow anyone to test how ODF documents are handled by @@ -6169,28 +6012,26 @@ LibreOffice has been tested already (but sadly not listed as a option for OfficeShots users yet). I am glad to see that the ODF community got such a great test tool available.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: english, standard. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2010-12-25 10:50 -
    - -
    - -

    A few days ago +

    +
    + + + Tags: english, standard. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 25th December 2010 +
    +
    +

    A few days ago an article in the Norwegian Computerworld magazine about how version 2.0 of @@ -6387,28 +6228,26 @@ DR. EDGAR DAVID VILLANUEVA NUÑEZ
    Congressman of the Republic of Perú.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: digistan, english, standard. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2010-12-25 20:25 -
    - -
    - -

    The +

    + +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 25th December 2010 +
    +
    +

    The Digistan definition of a free and open standard reads like this:

    @@ -6562,28 +6401,26 @@ this.

    It would be nice to see other analysis of other specifications to see if they are free and open standards.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: digistan, english, standard, video. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2010-12-27 14:45 -
    - -
    - -

    One of the reasons I like the Digistan definition of +

    +
    + + + Tags: digistan, english, standard, video. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 27th December 2010 +
    +
    +

    One of the reasons I like the Digistan definition of "Free and Open Standard" is that this is a new term, and thus the meaning of the term has been decided by Digistan. The term "Open Standard" has @@ -6802,28 +6639,26 @@ competition to downplay the significance of open standards. I hope we can turn this tide by focusing on the advantages of Free and Open Standards.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: digistan, english, standard. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2010-12-30 23:15 -
    - -
    - -

    After trying to +

    +
    + + + Tags: digistan, english, standard. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 30th December 2010 +
    + - -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2011-01-12 22:10 -
    - -
    - -

    Today I discovered +

    +
    + + + Tags: digistan, english, standard. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 12th January 2011 +
    +
    +

    Today I discovered via digi.no that the Chrome developers, in a surprising announcement, yesterday @@ -6941,28 +6774,26 @@ I guess time will tell.

    more background and information on the move it a blog post yesterday.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: english, standard, video. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2011-01-16 00:20 -
    - -
    - -

    The video format struggle on the web continues, and the three +

    +
    + + + Tags: english, standard, video. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 16th January 2011 +
    +
    +

    The video format struggle on the web continues, and the three contenders seem to be Ogg Theora, H.264 and WebM. Most video sites seem to use H.264, while others use Ogg Theora. Interestingly enough, the comments I see give me the feeling that a lot of people believe @@ -7011,28 +6842,26 @@ realise that I failed to make it clear enough this text is about the <video> tag support in browsers and not the video support provided by external plugins like the Flash plugins.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: english, nuug, standard, video. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2011-01-23 00:20 -
    - -
    - -

    In the +

    +
    + + + Tags: english, nuug, standard, video. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 23rd January 2011 +
    +
    +

    In the discover-data package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information about the running hardware for use when people report missing @@ -7109,28 +6938,26 @@ fi

    This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as well.

    -
    -
    - - - - Tags: debian, english. - -
    -
    -
    - -
    - -
    - 2011-01-28 15:40 -
    - -
    - -

    The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security +

    +
    + + + Tags: debian, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 28th January 2011 +
    +
    +

    The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security issues here at my work with the University of Oslo. My idea is that it should be possible to use the information about security issues available on the Internet, and check our locally @@ -7201,27 +7028,3559 @@ RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries for their packages.

    -
    -
    - +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian, english, sikkerhet. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 3rd April 2011 +
    +
    +

    Here is a small update for my English readers. Most of my blog +posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short +update in English.

    + +

    The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work +done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port +of the British service +FixMyStreet up and running, +and it has been running for a month now. The entire project has been +organised by me and two others. Around Christmas we gathered sponsors +to fund the development work. In January I drafted a contract with +mySociety on what to develop, +and in February the development took place. Most of it involved +converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British +easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get +running in any country by now. The Norwegian +FiksGataMi is using +OpenStreetmap as the map +source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and +support for this had to be added/fixed.

    + +

    The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend +polishing the system before we announced it March 7th. The system is +running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000 +problem reports in a few weeks. Soon we hope to announce the Android +and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the +public infrastructure.

    + +

    Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without +such service?

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian, english, fiksgatami, kart. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 6th April 2011 +
    +
    +

    The Gnash project is still +the most promising solution for a Free Software Flash implementation. +A few days ago the project +announced +that it will participate in Google Summer of Code. I hope many +students apply, and that some of them succeed in getting AVM2 support +into Gnash.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, multimedia, video, web. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 29th April 2011 +
    +
    +

    The last few days I have spent some time trying to add support for +the Open311 API in the +Norwegian FixMyStreet service. +Earlier I believed Open311 would be a useful API to use to submit +reports to the municipalities, but when I noticed that the +New Zealand version of +FixMyStreet had implemented Open311 on the server side, it occurred to +me that this was a nice way to allow the public, press and +municipalities to do data mining directly in the FixMyStreet service. +Thus I went to work implementing the Open311 specification for +FixMyStreet. The implementation is not yet ready, but I am starting +to get a draft limping along. In the process, I have discovered a few +issues with the Open311 specification.

    + +

    One obvious missing feature is the lack of natural language +handling in the specification. The specification seem to assume all +reports will be written in English, and do not provide a way for the +receiving end to specify which languages are understood there. To be +able to use the same client and submit to several Open311 receivers, +it would be useful to know which language to use when writing reports. +I believe the specification should be extended to allow the receivers +of problem reports to specify which language they accept, and the +submitter to specify which language the report is written in. +Language of a text can also be automatically guessed using statistical +methods, but for multi-lingual persons like myself, it is useful to +know which language to use when writing a problem report. I suspect +some lang=nb,nn kind of attribute would solve it.

    + +

    A key part of the Open311 API is the list of services provided, +which is similar to the categories used by FixMyStreet. One issue I +run into is the need to specify both name and unique identifier for +each category. The specification do not state that the identifier +should be numeric, but all example implementations have used numbers +here. In FixMyStreet, there is no number associated with each +category. As the specification do not forbid it, I will use the name +as the unique identifier for now and see how open311 clients handle +it.

    - - Tags: debian, english, sikkerhet. - -
    -
    -
    +

    The report format in open311 and the report format in FixMyStreet +differ in a key part. FixMyStreet have a title and a description, +while Open311 only have a description and lack the title. I'm not +quite sure how to best handle this yet. When asking for a FixMyStreet +report in Open311 format, I just merge title an description into the +open311 description, but this is not going to work if the open311 API +should be used for submitting new reports to FixMyStreet.

    + +

    The search feature in Open311 is missing a way to ask for problems +near a geographic location. I believe this is important if one is to +use Open311 as the query language for mobile units. The specification +should be extended to handle this, probably using some new lat=, lon= +and range= options.

    + +

    The final challenge I see is that the FixMyStreet code handle +several administrations in one interface, while the Open311 API seem +to assume only one administration. For FixMyStreet, this mean a +report can be sent to several administrations, and the categories +available depend on the location of the problem. Not quite sure how +to best handle this. I've noticed +SeeClickFix added +latitude and longitude options to the services request, but it do not +solve the problem of what to return when no location is specified. +Will have to investigate this a bit more.

    + +

    My distaste for web forums have kept me from bringing these issues +up with the open311 developer group. I really wish they had a email +list available via Gmane to use for +discussions instead of only +a forum. Oh, +well. That will probably resolve itself, one way or another. I've +also tried visiting the IRC channel #open311 on FreeNode, but no-one +seem to reply to my questions there. This make me wonder if I just +fail to understand how the open311 community work. It sure do not +work like the free software project communities I am used to.

    + +
    + +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 30th April 2011 +
    +
    +

    Today, the first draft implementation of an +Open311 API for the Norwegian +service FiksGataMi started to +work. It is only available on the developer server for now, and I +have not tested it using any existing Open311 client (I lack the +platforms needed to run the clients I have found so far), but it is +able to query the database and extract a list of open and closed +requests within a given category and reported to a given municipality. +I believe that is a good start to create a useful service for those +that want to do data mining on the requests submitted so far.

    + +

    Where is it? Visit +http://fiksgatami-dev.nuug.no/open311.cgi/v2/ +to have a look. Please send feedback to the +fiksgatami +(at) nuug.no mailing list.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, fiksgatami, open311. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 20th June 2011 +
    +
    +

    Reading +the +thingiverse blog, I came across two highlights of interesting +parts of the +Autodesk +and +Microsoft +Kinect End User License Agreements (EULAs), which illustrates +quite well why I stay away from software with EULAs. Whenever I take +the time to read their content, the terms are simply unacceptable.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, opphavsrett. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 26th July 2011 +
    +
    +

    The Norwegian FiksGataMi +site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because +I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10 +years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get +security support for a few years.

    + +

    The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules +that are missing in Debian at the moment. It would be great if these +modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up +their own FixMyStreet clone +in their own country using only Debian packages. The list of modules +missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group +will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI, +Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide, +Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma, +Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl, +URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet +easier in the future.

    + +

    Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules +installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name' +and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package. But this leave me +with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really +do not have time for.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian, english, fiksgatami. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 29th July 2011 +
    +
    +

    While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions +mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its +desktop to be useful for more people. The use case for this is my +parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the +issues.

    + +

    I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to +implement. After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to +do this in Debian we would have a source.

    + +
      + +
    1. Simple GUI based upgrade of packages. When there +are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar +indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade +tool to handle it. I have no problem guiding both of my parents +through the process over the phone. If a kernel reboot is required, +this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool. Last +time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in +Debian.
    2. + +
    3. Simple handling of missing Firefox browser +plugins. When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not +currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system +should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type, +and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages +advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the +Packages file in the APT archive). If one or more packages are found, +it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime +type. If the package require the user to accept some non-free +license, this is explained to the user. The entire process make it +more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and +make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and +not the browser for any missing features.
    4. + +
    5. Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format +handlers. When the media players encounter a format or codec +it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system +should search for a package that would add support for it. This +happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264. The selection +and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser +plugin handling. This is as far as I know implemented using a +gstreamer hook. The end result is that the user easily get access to +the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while +explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.
    6. + +
    7. Better browser handling of some MIME types. When +displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to +start emacs to show it. If I remember correctly, when doing the same +in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser. At least I +know Opera will show text files within the browser. I much prefer the +latter behaviour.
    8. + +
    + +

    There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite +upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade, +it do not matter much.

    + +

    I really hope we could get these features in place for the next +Debian release. It would require the coordinated effort of several +maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian, english, multimedia, web. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 30th July 2011 +
    +
    +

    In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that +are started from /etc/rcS.d/. In fact, there is a bite more of them +than make sense, and this causes a few problems. What kind of +problems, you might ask. There are at least two problems. The first +is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to +runlevel 1. One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to +the expected state. The other is that single user boot will sometimes +run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before +the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a +machine from a problem in that subsystem. A minor additional point is +that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/ +directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in +parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.

    + +

    So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/. In short, only the +scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is +presented during a single user boot should go there. Everything else +should go into the numeric runlevels. This means things like +lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from +the numeric runlevels. Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d +scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved +out. Do your package have one of them? Please help us make single +user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.

    + +

    Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions +etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no +need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt +is presented.

    + +

    As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound. To keep +Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the +scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency +order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved, +and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been +moved first. This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure +that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep +the system state correct. This will require some coordination when it +comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with +scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending +on them. Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo +package, while others are still left to do. I wish I had time to work +on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will +find time to push this forward.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 4th August 2011 +
    +
    +

    Wouter Verhelst have some +interesting +comments and opinions on my blog post on +the +need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian and my blog post about +the +default KDE desktop in Debian. I only have time to address one +small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the +misunderstanding he bring forward:

    + +

    +Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a +single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line; +this runs rcS and rc1 scripts) +

    + +

    This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode +and booting into runlevel 1 is the same. I am not surprised he +believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible +thing to believe. But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken, +runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user +mode. I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit +hard to explain.

    + +

    Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab: +"~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin". This means the only thing that is +executed in single user mode is sulogin. Single user mode is a boot +state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode, +only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process +enters the single user state. When switching to runlevel 1, the state +is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1 +and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which +runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel +1. It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the +mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot +mode).

    + +

    This summary might make it clearer. When booting for the first +time into single user mode, the following commands are executed: +"/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin". When booting into +runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "/etc/init.d/rc +S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin". A problem show up when +trying to continue after visiting single user mode. Not all services +are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an +unpredicatble state. This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting +after visiting single user mode.

    + +

    A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of +scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/. When switching from say runlevel 2 +to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly +stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not +started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels +2-5. I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts +out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not required to get a +functioning single user mode during boot.

    + +

    I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system, +and discovered this problem a few years ago. I suspect it originates +from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: bootsystem, debian, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 17th September 2011 +
    +
    +

    For convenience, I want to store copies of all my DVDs on my file +server. It allow me to save shelf space flat while still having my +movie collection easily available. It also make it possible to let +the kids see their favourite DVDs without wearing the physical copies +down. I prefer to store the DVDs as ISOs to keep the DVD menu and +subtitle options intact. It also ensure that the entire film is one +file on the disk. As this is for personal use, the ripping is +perfectly legal here in Norway.

    + +

    Normally I rip the DVDs using dd like this:

    + +
    +#!/bin/sh
    +# apt-get install lsdvd
    +title=$(lsdvd 2>/dev/null|awk '/Disc Title: / {print $3}')
    +dd if=/dev/dvd of=/storage/dvds/$title.iso bs=1M
    +
    + +

    But some DVDs give a input/output error when I read it, and I have +been looking for a better alternative. I have no idea why this I/O +error occur, but suspect my DVD drive, the Linux kernel driver or +something fishy with the DVDs in question. Or perhaps all three.

    + +

    Anyway, I believe I found a solution today using dvdbackup and +genisoimage. This script gave me a working ISO for a problematic +movie by first extracting the DVD file system and then re-packing it +back as an ISO. + +

    +#!/bin/sh
    +# apt-get install lsdvd dvdbackup genisoimage
    +set -e
    +tmpdir=/storage/dvds/
    +title=$(lsdvd 2>/dev/null|awk '/Disc Title: / {print $3}')
    +dvdbackup -i /dev/dvd -M -o $tmpdir -n$title
    +genisoimage -dvd-video -o $tmpdir/$title.iso $tmpdir/$title
    +rm -rf $tmpdir/$title
    +
    + +

    Anyone know of a better way available in Debian/Squeeze?

    + +

    Update 2011-09-18: I got a tip from Konstantin Khomoutov about the +readom program from the wodim package. It is specially written to +read optical media, and is called like this: readom dev=/dev/dvd +f=image.iso. It got 6 GB along with the problematic Cars DVD +before it failed, and failed right away with a Timmy Time DVD.

    + +

    Next, I got a tip from Bastian Blank about +his +program python-dvdvideo, which seem to be just what I am looking +for. Tested it with my problematic Timmy Time DVD, and it succeeded +creating a ISO image. The git source built and installed just fine in +Squeeze, so I guess this will be my tool of choice in the future.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, opphavsrett, video. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 7th October 2011 +
    +
    +

    Here in Norway the public libraries are debating with the +publishing houses how to handle electronic books. Surprisingly, the +libraries seem to be willing to accept digital restriction mechanisms +(DRM) on books and renting e-books with artificial scarcity from the +publishing houses. Time limited renting (2-3 years) is one proposed +model, and only allowing X borrowers for each book is another. +Personally I find it amazing that libraries are even considering such +models.

    + +

    Anyway, while reading part of +this debate, it occurred to me that someone should present a more +sensible approach to the libraries, to allow its borrowers to get used +to a better model. The idea is simple:

    + +

    Create a computer system for the libraries, either in the form of a +Live DVD or a installable distribution, that provide a simple kiosk +solution to hand out free e-books. As a start, the books distributed +by Project Gutenberg (abount +36,000 books), Project Runenberg +(1149 books) and The +Internet Archive (3,033,748 books) could be included, but any book +where the copyright has expired or with a free licence could be +distributed.

    + +

    The computer system would make it easy to:

    + +
      + +
    • Copy e-books into a USB stick, reading tablets, cell phones and + other relevant equipment.
    • + +
    • Show the books for reading on the the screen in the library.
    • + +
    + +

    In addition to such kiosk solution, there should probably be a web +site as well to allow people easy access to these books without +visiting the library. The site would be the distribution point for +the kiosk systems, which would connect regularly to fetch any new +books available.

    + +

    Are there anyone working on a system like this? I guess it would +fit any library in the world, and not just the Norwegian public +libraries. :)

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, opphavsrett. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 21st November 2011 +
    +
    +

    At work we have heaps of servers. I believe the total count is +around 1000 at the moment. To be able to get help from the vendors +when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers +up to date. If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the +vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the +firmware is upgraded. So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the +firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the +university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine. +For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide +the tools to do so.

    + +

    To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to +fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got. Most of +our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers +so far. This blog post is about the Dell part.

    + +

    On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find +an XML file +with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing +which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP +site I can find it. Using a simple perl XML parser I can then +download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from +within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to +be activated on the first reboot.

    + +

    This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on. +Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all +servers at a site? Please get in touch and lets share resources.

    + +

    +#!/usr/bin/perl
    +use strict;
    +use warnings;
    +use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
    +BEGIN {
    +    # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
    +    my %rhelmodules = (
    +        'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
    +        );
    +    for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
    +        eval "use $module;";
    +        if ($@) {
    +            my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
    +            system("yum install -y $pkg");
    +            eval "use $module;";
    +        }
    +    }
    +}
    +my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
    +
    +upgrade_dell();
    +
    +exit 0;
    +
    +sub run_firmware_script {
    +    my ($opts, $script) = @_;
    +    unless ($script) {
    +        print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
    +        exit 1
    +    }
    +    print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
    +
    +    if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
    +        print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
    +    } else {
    +        print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
    +    }
    +}
    +
    +sub run_firmware_scripts {
    +    my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
    +    # Run firmware packages
    +    for my $dir (@dirs) {
    +        print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
    +        opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
    +        while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
    +            next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
    +            run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
    +        }
    +        closedir $dh;
    +    }
    +}
    +
    +sub download {
    +    my $url = shift;
    +    print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
    +    system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
    +}
    +
    +sub upgrade_dell {
    +    my @dirs;
    +    my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
    +    chomp $product;
    +
    +    if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
    +
    +        # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
    +        system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
    +
    +        my $tmpdir = tempdir(
    +            CLEANUP => 1
    +            );
    +        chdir($tmpdir);
    +        fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
    +        system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
    +        my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
    +        # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
    +        my $fwopts = "-q";
    +        if (@paths) {
    +            for my $url (@paths) {
    +                fetch_dell_fw($url);
    +            }
    +            run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
    +        } else {
    +            print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
    +            print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
    +        }
    +        chdir('/');
    +    } else {
    +        print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
    +        print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
    +    }
    +}
    +
    +sub fetch_dell_fw {
    +    my $path = shift;
    +    my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
    +    download($url);
    +}
    +
    +# Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
    +# firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
    +# machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
    +sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
    +    my $filename = shift;
    +
    +    my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
    +    chomp $product;
    +    my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
    +
    +    print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
    +
    +    my $xml = XMLin($filename);
    +    my @paths;
    +    for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
    +        my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
    +        my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
    +        my $oscode;
    +        if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
    +            $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
    +        } else {
    +            $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
    +        }
    +        if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
    +        {
    +            @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
    +        }
    +    }
    +    for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
    +        my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
    +
    +        # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
    +        next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
    +
    +        my $cpath = $component->{path};
    +        for my $path (@paths) {
    +            if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
    +                push(@paths, $cpath);
    +            }
    +        }
    +    }
    +    return @paths;
    +}
    +
    + +

    The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect +it could work on other platforms with some tweaking. Anyone know a +index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers? At the +moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting +outdated.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 3rd January 2012 +
    +
    +

    During christmas, I have been working getting the next version of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux ready +for release. The initial problem I looked at was particularly +interesting.

    + +

    The installer would hang at the end when it was doing it +post-installation configuration, and whatevery I did to try to find +the cause and fix it always worked while I tested it, but never when I +integrated it into the installer and ran the installation from +scratch. I would try to restart processes, close file descriptors, +remove or create files, and the installer would always unblock and +wrap up its tasks.

    + +

    Eventually the cause was found. The kernel was simply running out +of entropy, causing the Kerberos setup to hang waiting for more. +Pressing keys was adding entropy to the kernel, and thus all my tries +to fix the problem worked not because what I was typing to fix it, but +because I was typing.

    + +

    The fix I implemented was to add a background process looking at +the level of entropy in the kernel (by checking +/proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail), and if it was too small, the +installer will flush the kernel file buffers and do 'find /' to +generate some disk IO. Disk IO generate entropy in the kernel, and is +one of the few things that can be initated from within the system to +generate entropy.

    + +

    The fix is in +beta1 +of the Debian Edu/Squeeze version, and we +welcome more testers and +developers. We plan to release beta2 this weekend.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 7th January 2012 +
    +
    +

    I am happy to announce that today we managed to wrap up and publish +the second beta version of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux. If +you want to test a LDAP backed Kerberos server with out of the box PXE +configuration for running diskless machines and installing new +machines, check it out. If you need a software solution for your +school, check it out too. The full announcement is +available +on the project announcement list.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 10th January 2012 +
    +
    +

    In the Squeeze version of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux soon +to be released, users of the system will get their default browser +start page set from LDAP, allowing the system administrator to point +all users to the school web page by updating one setting in LDAP. In +addition to setting the default start page when a machine boots, users +are shown the same page as a welcome page when they log in for the +first time.

    + +

    The LDAP object dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no have an attribute +labeledURI with "http://www/ LDAP for Debian Edu/Skolelinux" as the +default content. By changing this value to another URL, all users get +to see the page behind this new URL.

    + +

    An easy way to update it is by using the ldapvi tool. It can be +called as "ldapvi -ZD '(cn=admin)'' to update LDAP with the +new setting.

    + +

    We have written the code to adjust the default start page and show +the welcome page, and I wonder if there is an easier way to do this +from within Iceweasel instead.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, web. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 25th January 2012 +
    +
    +

    The next version of Debian Edu +/ Skolelinux will include a new tool +sitesummary2ldapdhcp, which can be used to quickly set up all +the computers in a school without much manual labour. Here is a short +summary on how to use it to set up a new school.

    + +

    First, install a combined Main Server and Thin Client Server as the +central server in the network. Next, PXE boot all the client machines +as thin clients and wait 5 minutes after the last client booted to +allow the clients to report their existence to the central server. When +this is done, log on to the central server and run +sitesummary2ldapdhcp -a in the konsole to use the +collected information to generate system objects in LDAP. The output +will look similar to this:

    + +

    +% sitesummary2ldapdhcp -a
    +info: Updating machine tjener.intern [10.0.2.2] id ether-00:01:02:03:04:05.
    +info: Create GOsa machine for auto-mac-00-01-02-03-04-06 [10.0.16.20] id ether-00:01:02:03:04:06.
    +
    +Enter password if you want to activate these changes, and ^c to abort.
    +
    +Connecting to LDAP as cn=admin,ou=ldap-access,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
    +enter password: *******
    +% 
    +

    + +

    After providing the LDAP administrative password (the same as the +root password set during installation), the LDAP database will be +populated with system objects for each PXE booted machine with +automatically generated names. The final step to set up the school is +then to log into GOsa, +the web based user, group and system administration system to change +system names, add systems to the correct host groups and finally +enable DHCP and DNS for the systems. All clients that should be used +as diskless workstations should be added to the workstation-hosts +group. After this is done, all computers can be booted again via PXE +and get their assigned names and group based configuration +automatically.

    + +

    We plan to release beta3 with the updated version of this feature +enabled this weekend. You might want to give it a try.

    + +

    Update 2012-01-28: When calling sitesummary2ldapdhcp to add new +hosts, one need to add the option -a. I forgot to mention this in my +original text, and have added it to the text now.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, sitesummary. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 27th January 2012 +
    +
    +

    With some computer hardware, one need non-free firmware blobs. +This is the sad fact of todays computers. In the next version of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux based +on Squeeze, we provide several scripts and modifications to make +firmware blobs easier to handle. The common use case I run into is a +laptop with a wireless network card requiring non-free firmware to +work, but there are other use cases as well.

    + +

    First and foremost, Debian Edu provide ISO images for DVD and CD +with all firmware packages in the Debian sections main and non-free +included, to ensure debian-installer find and can install all of them +during installation. This take care firmware for network devices used +by the installer when installing from from local media. But for +example multimedia devices are not activated in the installer and are +not taken care of by this.

    + +

    For non-network devices, we provide the script +/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/auto-addfirmware which +search through the dmesg output for drivers requesting extra +firmware. The firmware file name is looked up in the Contents-ARCH.gz +file available in the package repository, and the packages providing +the requested firmware file(s) is installed. I have proposed to do +something similar in debian-installer (BTS report +#655507), to allow PXE +installs of Debian to handle firmware installation better. Run the +script as root from the command line to fetch and install the needed +firmware packages.

    + +

    Debian Edu provide PXE installation of Debian out of the box, and +because some machines need firmware to get their network cards +working, the installation initrd some times need extra firmware +included to be able to install at all. To fill the PXE installation +initrd with extra firmware, the +/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/pxe-addfirmware script is +provided. Again, just run it as root on the command line to fill the +PXE initrd with firmware packages.

    + +

    Last, some LTSP clients might also need firmware to get their +network cards working. For this, +/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/ltsp-addfirmware is +provided to update the LTSP initrd with firmware blobs. It is used +the same way as the other firmware related tools.

    + +

    At the moment, we do not run any of these during installation. We +do not know if this is acceptable for the local administrator to use +non-free software, and it is their choice.

    + +

    We plan to release beta3 this weekend. You might want to give it a +try.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 4th February 2012 +
    +
    +

    I am happy to announce that finally we managed today to wrap up and +publish the third beta version of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux based +on Squeeze. If you want to test a LDAP backed Kerberos server with +out of the box PXE configuration for running diskless machines and +installing new machines, check it out. If you need a software +solution for your school, check it out too. The full announcement is +available +on the project announcement list.

    + +

    I am very happy to report these changes and improvements since +beta2 (there are more, see announcement for full list):

    + +
      + +
    • It is now possible to change the pre-configured IP subnet from + 10.0.0.0/8 to something else by using the subnet-change tool after + the installation.
    • + +
    • Too full partitions are now automatically extended on the Main + Server, based on the rules specified in /etc/fsautoresizetab.
    • + +
    • The CUPS queues are now automatically flushed every night, and all + disabled queues are restarted every hour. This should cut down on + the amount of manual administration needed for printers.
    • + +
    • The set of initial users have been changed. Now a personal user + for the local system administrator is created during installation + instead of the previously created localadmin and super-admin users, + and this user is granted administrative privileges using group + membership. This reduces the number of passwords one need to keep + up to date on the system.
    • -

      RSS Feed

      +
    + +

    The new main server seem to work so well that I am testing it as my +private DNS/LDAP/Kerberos/PXE/LTSP server at home. I will use it look +for issues we could fix to polish Debian Edu even further before the +final Squeeze release is published.

    + +

    Next weekend the project organise a +developer +gathering in Oslo. We will continue the work on the Squeeze +version, and start initial planning for the Wheezy version. Perhaps I +will see you there?

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 5th February 2012 +
    +
    +

    Since the Lenny version of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux, a +feature to save power have been included. It is as simple as it is +practical: Shut down unused clients at night, and turn them on again +in the morning. This is done using the +shutdown-at-night Debian package.

    + +

    To enable this feature on a client, the machine need to be added to +the netgroup shutdown-at-night-hosts. For Debian Edu, this is done in +LDAP, and once this is in place, the machine in question will check +every hour from 16:00 until 06:00 to see if the machine is unused, and +shut it down if it is. If the hardware in question is supported by +the +nvram-wakeup +package, the BIOS is told to turn the machine back on around 07:00 +- +10 minutes. If this isn't working, one can configure wake-on-lan to +try to turn on the client. The wake-on-lan option is only documented +and not enabled by default in Debian Edu.

    + +

    It is important to not turn all machines on at once, as this can +blow a fuse if several computers are connected to the same fuse like +the common setup for a classroom. The nvram-wakeup method only work +for machines with a functioning hardware/BIOS clock. I've seen old +machines where the BIOS battery were dead and the hardware clock were +starting from 0 (or was it 1990?) every boot. If you have one of +those, you have to turn on the computer manually.

    + +

    The shutdown-at-night package is completely self contained, and can +also be used outside the Debian Edu environment. For those without a +central LDAP server with netgroups, one can instead touch the file +/etc/shutdown-at-night/shutdown-at-night to enable it. +Perhaps you too can use it to save some power?

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 13th February 2012 +
    +
    +

    New in the Squeeze version of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux is the +ability for clients to automatically configure their proxy settings +based on their environment. We want all systems on the client to use +the WPAD based proxy definition fetched from http://wpad/wpad.dat, to +allow sites to control the proxy setting from a central place and make +sure clients do not have hard coded proxy settings. The schools can +change the global proxy setting by editing +tjener:/etc/debian-edu/www/wpad.dat and the change propagate +to all Debian Edu clients in the network.

    + +

    The problem is that some systems do not understand the WPAD system. +In other words, how do one get from a WPAD file like this (this is a +simple one, they can run arbitrary code):

    + +
    +function FindProxyForURL(url, host)
    +{
    +   if (!isResolvable(host) ||
    +       isPlainHostName(host) ||
    +       dnsDomainIs(host, ".intern"))
    +      return "DIRECT";
    +   else
    +      return "PROXY webcache:3128; DIRECT";
    +}
    +
    +

    to a proxy setting in the process environment looking like this:

    +
    +http_proxy=http://webcache:3128/
    +ftp_proxy=http://webcache:3128/
    +
    +

    To do this conversion I developed a perl script that will execute +the javascript fragment in the WPAD file and return the proxy that +would be used for +http://www.debian.org/, +and insert this extracted proxy URL in /etc/environment and +/etc/apt/apt.conf. The perl script wpad-extract work just +fine in Squeeze, but in Wheezy the library it need to run the +javascript code is no longer +able to build because the C library it depended on is now a C++ +library. I hope someone find a solution to that problem before Wheezy +is frozen. An alternative would be for us to rewrite wpad-extract to +use some other javascript library currently working in Wheezy, but no +known alternative is known at the moment.

    + +

    This automatic proxy system allow the roaming workstation (aka +laptop) setup in Debian Edu/Squeeze to use the proxy when the laptop +is connected to the backbone network in a Debian Edu setup, and to +automatically use any proxy present and announced using the WPAD +feature when it is connected to other networks. And if no proxy is +announced, direct connections will be used instead.

    + +

    Silently using a proxy announced on the network might be a privacy +or security problem. But those controlling DHCP and DNS on a network +could just as easily set up a transparent proxy, and force all HTTP +and FTP connections to use a proxy anyway, so I consider that +distinction to be academic. If you are afraid of using the wrong +proxy, you should avoid connecting to the network in question in the +first place. In Debian Edu, the proxy setup is updated using dhcp and +ifupdown hooks, to make sure the configuration is updated every time +the network setup changes.

    + +

    The WPAD system is documented in a +IETF +draft and a +Wikipedia +page for those that want to learn more.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 14th February 2012 +
    +
    +

    Once in a while my home server have disk problems. Thanks to Linux +Software RAID, I have not lost data yet (but +I was +close this summer :). But once a disk is starting to behave +funny, a practical problem present itself. How to get from the Linux +device name (like /dev/sdd) to something that can be used to identify +the disk when the computer is turned off? In my case I have SATA +disks with a unique ID printed on the label. All I need is a way to +figure out how to query the disk to get the ID out.

    + +

    After fumbling a bit, I +found +that hdparm -I will report the disk serial number, which is +printed on the disk label. The following (almost) one-liner can be +used to look up the ID of all the failed disks:

    + +
    +for d in $(cat /proc/mdstat |grep '(F)'|tr ' ' "\n"|grep '(F)'|cut -d\[ -f1|sort -u);
    +do
    +    printf "Failed disk $d: "
    +    hdparm -I /dev/$d |grep 'Serial Num'
    +done
    +
    + +

    Putting it here to make sure I do not have to search for it the +next time, and in case other find it useful.

    + +

    At the moment I have two failing disk. :(

    + +
    +Failed disk sdd1:       Serial Number:      WD-WCASJ1860823
    +Failed disk sdd2:       Serial Number:      WD-WCASJ1860823
    +Failed disk sde2:       Serial Number:      WD-WCASJ1840589
    +
    + +

    The last time I had failing disks, I added the serial number on +labels I printed and stuck on the short sides of each disk, to be able +to figure out which disk to take out of the box without having to +remove each disk to look at the physical vendor label. The vendor +label is at the top of the disk, which is hidden when the disks are +mounted inside my box.

    + +

    I really wish the check_linux_raid Nagios plugin for checking Linux +Software RAID in the +nagios-plugins-standard +debian package would look up this value automatically, as it would +make the plugin a lot more useful when my disks fail. At the moment +it only report a failure when there are no more spares left (it really +should warn as soon as a disk is failing), and it do not tell me which +disk(s) is failing when the RAID is running short on disks.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, raid. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 19th February 2012 +
    +
    +

    One week delayed due to DVD build problems, we managed today to +wrap up and publish the first release candidate for +Debian Edu / Skolelinux based +on Squeeze. The full announcement is +available +on the project announcement list. Check it out if you need a software +solution for your school.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 27th February 2012 +
    +
    +

    This weekend we wrapped up and published the second release +candidate for Debian Edu / +Skolelinux based on Squeeze. The full announcement did for some +reason not make it the project announcement list, but is +available +from the Debian development announcement list. Check it out if you +need a software solution for your school.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 3rd March 2012 +
    +
    +

    Many years ago, the Skolelinux +/ Debian Edu project initiated a student project to create a tool +for making stop motion movies. The proposal came from a teacher +needing such tool on Skolelinux. The project, called "stopmotion", +was manned by two extraordinary students and won a school award and a +national aware with this great project. The project was initiated and +mentored by Herman Robak, and manned by the students Bjørn Erik Nilsen +and Fredrik Berg Kjølstad. They got in touch with people at Aardman +Animation studio and received feedback on how professionals would like +such stopmotion tool to work, and the end result was and is used by +animators around the globe. But as is usual after studying, both got +jobs and went elsewhere, and did not have time to properly tend to the +project, and it has been lingering for a few years now. Until last +year...

    + +

    Last year some of the users got together with Herman, and moved the +project to Sourceforge and in effect restarted the project under a new +name, +linuxstopmotion. +The name change was done to make it possible to find the project using +Internet search engines (try to search for 'stopmotion' to see what I +mean). I've been following +the +mailing list and the improvement already in place and planned for +the future is encouraging. If you want to make stop motion movies. +Check it out. :)

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, video. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 4th March 2012 +
    +
    +

    This weekend we wrapped up and published the third release +candidate for Debian Edu / +Skolelinux based on Squeeze. The full announcement is +available +from the project announcement list. Check it out if you +need a software solution for your school.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 7th March 2012 +
    +
    + + +

    One of the Debian Edu developers, Wolfgang Schweer, just created a +screen cast documenting how to create a lot of new users in LDAP on +Debian Edu Squeeze. The video is embedded here in quarter size, and +also available from vimeo and +download as a +Ogg +Theora file. Check it out below.

    + +

    Download video as + Ogg.

    +

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 9th March 2012 +
    +
    +

    Inspired by the +interview series conducted by Raphael, I started a Norwegian +interview series with people involved in the Debian Edu / Skolelinux +community. This was so popular that I believe it is time to move to a +more international audience.

    + +

    While Debian Edu and +Skolelinux originated in France and Norway, and have most users in +Europe, there are users all around the globe. One of those far away +from me is Nigel Barker, a long time Debian Edu system administrator +and contributor. It is thanks to him that Debian Edu is adjusted to +work out of the box in Japan. I got him to answer a few questions, +and am happy to share the response with you. :) + + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    My name is Nigel Barker, and I am British. I am married to Yumiko, +and we have three lovely children, aged 15, 14 and 4(!) I am the IT +Coordinator at Hiroshima International School, Japan. I am also a +teacher, and in fact I spend most of my day teaching Mathematics, +Science, IT, and Chemistry. I was originally a Chemistry teacher, but +I have always had an interest in computers. Another teacher teaches +primary school IT, but apart from that I am the only computer person, +so that means I am the network manager, technician and webmaster, +also, and I help people with their computer problems. I teach python +to beginners in an after-school club. I am way too busy, so I really +appreciate the simplicity of Skolelinux.

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    In around 2004 or 5 I discovered the ltsp project, and set up a +server in the IT lab. I wanted some way to connect it to our central +samba server, which I was also quite poor at configuring. I discovered +Edubuntu when it came out, but it didn't really improve my setup. I +did various desperate searches for things like "school Linux server" +and ended up in a document called "Drift" something or other. Reading +there it became clear that Skolelinux was going to solve all my +problems in one go. I was very excited, but apprehensive, because my +previous attempts to install Debian had ended in failure (I used +Mandrake for everything - ltsp, samba, apache, mail, ns...). I +downloaded a beta version, had some problems, so subscribed to the +Debian Edu list for help. I have remained subscribed ever since, and +my school has run a Skolelinux network since Sarge.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    For me the integrated setup. This is not just the server, or the +workstation, or the ltsp. Its all of them, and its all configured +ready to go. I read somewhere in the early documentation that it is +designed to be setup and managed by the Maths or Science teacher, who +doesn't necessarily know much about computers, in a small Norwegian +school. That describes me perfectly if you replace Norway with +Japan.

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    The desktop is fairly plain. If you compare it with Edubuntu, who +have fun themes for children, or with distributions such as Mint, who +make the desktop beautiful. They create a good impression on people +who don't need to understand how to use any of it, but who might be +important to the school. School administrators or directors, for +instance, or parents. Even kids. Debian itself usually has ugly +default theme settings. It was my dream a few years back that some +kind of integration would allow Edubuntu to do the desktop stuff and +Debian Edu the servers, but now I realise how impossible that is. A +second disadvantage is that if something goes wrong, or you need to +customise something, then suddenly the level of expertise required +multiplies. For example, backup wasn't working properly in Lenny. It +took me ages to learn how to set up my own server to do rsync backups. +I am afraid of anything to do with ldap, but perhaps Gosa will +help.

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    Nowadays I only use Debian on my personal computers. I have one for +studio work (I play guitar and write songs), running AV Linux +(customised Debian) a netbook running Squeeze, and a bigger laptop +still running Skolelinux Lenny workstation. I have a Tjener in my +house, that's very useful for the family photos and music. At school +the students only use Skolelinux. (Some teachers and the office still +have windows). So that means we only use free software all day every +day. Open office, The GIMP, Firefox/Iceweasel, VLC and Audacity are +installed on every computer in school, irrespective of OS. We also +have Koha on Debian for the library, and Apache, Moodle, b2evolution +and Etomite on Debian for the www. The firewall is Untangle.

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    Current trends are in our favour. Open source is big in industry, +and ordinary people have heard of it. The spread of Android and the +popularity of Apple have helped to weaken the impression that you have +to have Microsoft on everything. People complain to me much less about +file formats and Word than they did 5 years ago. The Edu aspect is +also a selling point. This is all customised for schools. Where is the +Windows-edu, or the Mac-edu? But of course the main attraction is +budget.The trick is to convince people that the quality is not +compromised when you stop paying and use free software instead. That +is one reason why I say the desktop experience is a weakness. People +are not impressed when their USB drive doesn't work, or their browser +doesn't play flash, for example.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 11th March 2012 +
    +
    +

    This weekend we finally published the first stable release of +Skolelinux / Debian Edu based +on Debian/Squeeze. The full announcement is +available +from the project announcement list. Now is a good time to test if it +you have not done so already.

    + +

    I plan to present the new version at +a NUUG +meeting on tuesday. I look forward to seeing you there if you are +in Oslo, Norway.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 16th March 2012 +
    +
    +

    Documentation in Debian Edu is provided in several languages, and +it is important to make it both easy to contribute and to keep the +translated versions in sync. To do this we have come up with what we +believe is a very efficient work flow.

    + +
      + +
    1. The documentation is written in a +moinmoin wiki (see for example +the +Squeeze release manual) with support for exporting the content as +docbook XML.
    2. + +
    3. This docbook document is given to po4a to extract a gettext style +.pot file with the content, which in turn is used to create .po files +with the translated text.
    4. + +
    5. The .po files are given to translators, and they can always tell +which part of the original wiki document is new or changed. They can +use their normal translation tools like lokalize or poedit to write +the translation. There is even a system in place to handle translated +images.
    6. + +
    7. The translated .po files are combined with the original docbook +XML document using po4a to create a translated docbook document.
    8. + +
    9. The final step is to use all the generated docbook files and +create PDF and HTML version of the original and translated documents.
    10. + +
    + +

    This setup work very well, but have a few issues. The biggest +issue is that the docbook support +we use in moinmoin is not actively maintained. The docbook +support is also buggy, and our build system contain workarounds to +make sure the generated docbook is usable despite these bugs.

    + +

    If you want to have a look at our setup, it is all there in the +debian-edu-doc +package.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 19th March 2012 +
    +
    +

    Debian Edu / Skolelinux +users are spread all across the globe. The second inteview after +the +Squeeze release was publised is with John Ingleby, a teacher and +long time Linux user in United Kingdom.

    + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    I teach ICT part time at the Rudolf Steiner School in Kings +Langley, near London, UK. Previously I worked as a technical +author/trainer while my children attended the school, and I also +contributed to the Schoolforge UK community with the aim of +encouraging UK schools to adopt free/open source software. Five or six +years ago we had about 50 schools interested in some way, but we +weren't able to convert many of them into sustainable +installations.

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    Skolelinux had two representatives at an early Edubuntu meeting in +London which I attended. However at that time our school network had +just been installed using CentOS, LTSP 4 and GNOME. When LTSP 5 came +along we switched to Edubuntu thin client servers so now we have a +mixed environment which includes Windows PCs and student laptops, as +well as their MacBooks and iPads. However, the proprietary systems +have always been rather problematic, and we never built a GUI for the +LDAP server, so when I discovered Skolelinux is configured for all +these things we decided to try it.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    By far the biggest advantage is the Debian Edu community. Apart +from that I have always believed in the same "sustainable computing" +goals that Skolelinux is built on: installing Linux on computers which +would otherwise be thrown away, to provide a reliable, secure and +low-cost IT environment for schools. From my own experience I know +that a part-time person can teach and manage a network of about 25 +Linux computers, but it would take much more of my time if we had +proprietary software everywhere.

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    As a newcomer I'm just finding out who's who in the community and +how you're organised, and what your procedures are for dealing with +various things such as editing manual pages and so-on. The only +English language mailing list seems to be for developers as well as +users, so my inbox needs heavy pruning each day!

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    Besides the software already mentioned at school we use Samba, +OpenLDAP, CUPS, Nagios and Dansguardian for the network, and on the +desktops we have LibreOffice, Firefox, GIMP and Inkscape. At home I +use Ubuntu and an Android 4 eePad Transformer (but I'm not sure if +that counts...)

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    That's a tough question! For very many years UK schools installed +and taught only proprietary software, so that at the highest levels +the notion of "computer" means simply "proprietary office +applications". However, schools today are experiencing budget +constraints, and many are having to think hard about upgrading Windows +XP. At the same time, we have students showing teachers how to use +iPads, MacBooks and Android, so the choice of operating system is no +longer quite so automatic. What is more, our government at last +realised that we need people with programming skills, so they're +putting coding back in the curriculum! And it's encouraging that the +first 10,000 Raspberry Pi units sold out in 2 hours.

    + +

    I don't really know what strategy is going to get UK schools to use +free software, but building an active community of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu users in this country has to be part of it.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 25th March 2012 +
    +
    + + +

    The same Debian Edu developer that did the last screen cast I +published, Wolfgang Schweer, has created a new screen cast showing how +to set up Kmail in Debian Edu Squeze to authenticate using Kerberos, +allowing users to check their local email account without providing +any password. The video is embedded here in quarter size, +and also available from vimeo +and download as a +Ogg +Theora file. Check it out below.

    + +

    Download video as + Ogg.

    +

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 1st April 2012 +
    +
    +

    Germany is a core area for the +Debian Edu and Skolelinux +user community, and this time I managed to get hold of Wolfgang +Schweer, a valuable contributor to the project from Germany. + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    I've studied Mathematics at the university 'Ruhr-Universität' in +Bochum, Germany. Since 1981 I'm working as a teacher at the school +"Westfalen-Kolleg +Dortmund", a second chance school. Here, young adults is given +the opportunity to get further education in order to do the school +examination 'Abitur', which will allow to study at a university. This +second chance is of value for those who want a better job perspective +or failed to get a higher school examination being teens.

    + +

    Besides teaching I was involved in developing online courses for a +blended learning project called 'abitur-online.nrw' and in some other +information technology related projects. For about ten years I've been +teacher and coordinator for the 'abitur-online' project at my +school. Being now in my early sixties, I've decided to leave school at +the end of April this year.

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    The first information about Skolelinux must have come to my +attention years ago and somehow related to LTSP (Linux Terminal Server +Project). At school, we had set up a network at the beginning of 1997 +using Suse Linux on the desktop, replacing a Novell network. Since +2002, we used old machines from the city council of Dortmund as thin +clients (LTSP, later Ubuntu/Lessdisks) cause new hardware was out of +reach. At home I'm using Debian since years and - subscribed to the +Debian news letter - heard from time to time about Skolelinux. About +two years ago I proposed to replace the (somehow undocumented and only +known to me) system at school by a well known Debian based system: +Skolelinux.

    + +

    Students and teachers appreciated the new system because of a +better look and feel and an enhanced access to local media on thin +clients. The possibility to alter and/or reset passwords using a GUI +was welcomed, too. Being able to do administrative tasks using a GUI +and to easily set up workstations using PXE was of very high value for +the admin teachers.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    It's open source, easy to set up, stable and flexible due to it's +Debian base. It integrates LTSP out-of-the-box. And it is documented! +So it was a perfect choice.

    + +

    Being open source, there are no license problems and so it's +possible to point teachers and students to programs like +OpenOffice.org, ViewYourMind (mind mapping) and The Gimp. It's of +high value to be able to adapt parts of the system to special needs of +a school and to choose where to get support for this.

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    Nothing yet.

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    At home (Debian Sid with Gnome Desktop): Iceweasel, LibreOffice, +Mutt, Gedit, Document Viewer, Midnight Commander, flpsed (PDF +Annotator). At school (Skolelinux Lenny): Iceweasel, Gedit, +LibreOffice.

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    Some time ago I thought it was enough to tell people about it. But +that doesn't seem to work quite well. Now I concentrate on those more +interested and hope to get multiplicators that way.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 5th April 2012 +
    +
    +

    About two weeks ago, I was interviewed via email about +Debian Edu and Skolelinux by +Bruce Byfield in Linux Weekly News. The result was made public for +non-subscribers today. I am pleased to see liked our Linux solution +for schools. Check out his article +Debian Edu/Skolelinux: A +distribution for education if you want to learn more.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 6th April 2012 +
    +
    +

    Recently I have spent time with +Skolelinux Drift AS on speeding +up a Debian Edu / Skolelinux +Lenny installation using LTSP diskless workstations, and in the +process I discovered something very surprising. The reason the KDE +menu was responding slow when using it for the first time, was mostly +due to the way KDE find application icons. I discovered that showing +the Multimedia menu would cause more than 20 000 IP packages to be +passed between the LTSP client and the NFS server. Most of these were + +NFS LOOKUP calls, resulting in a NFS3ERR_NOENT response. Because the +ping times between the client and the server were in the range 2-20 +ms, the menus would be very slow. Looking at the strace of kicker in +Lenny (or plasma-desktop i Squeeze - same problem there), I see that +the source of these NFS calls are access(2) system calls for +non-existing files. KDE can do hundreds of access(2) calls to find +one icon file. In my example, just finding the mplayer icon required +around 230 access(2) calls.

    + +

    The KDE code seem to search for icons using a list of icon +directories, and the list of possible directories is large. In +(almost) each directory, it look for files ending in .png, .svgz, .svg +and .xpm. The result is a very slow KDE menu when /usr/ is NFS +mounted. Showing a single sub menu may result in thousands of NFS +requests. I am not the first one to discover this. I found a +KDE bug report +from 2009 about this problem, and it is still unsolved.

    + +

    My solution to speed up the KDE menu was to create a package +kde-icon-cache that upon installation will look at all .desktop files +used to generate the KDE menu, find their icons, search the icon paths +for the file that KDE will end up finding at run time, and copying the +icon file to /var/lib/kde-icon-cache/. Finally, I add symlinks to +these icon files in one of the first directories where KDE will look +for them. This cut down the number of file accesses required to find +one icon from several hundred to less than 5, and make the KDE menu +almost instantaneous. I'm not quite sure where to make the package +publicly available, so for now it is only available on request.

    + +

    The bug report mention that this do not only affect the KDE menu +and icon handling, but also the login process. Not quite sure how to +speed up that part without replacing NFS with for example NBD, and +that is not really an option at the moment.

    + +

    If you got feedback on this issue, please let us know on debian-edu +(at) lists.debian.org.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 8th April 2012 +
    +
    +

    It take all kind of contributions to create a Linux distribution +like Debian Edu / Skolelinux, +and this time I lend the ear to Justin B. Rye, who is listed as a big +contributor to the +Debian +Edu Squeeze release manual. + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    I'm a 44-year-old linguistics graduate living in Edinburgh who has +occasionally been employed as a sysadmin.

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    I'm neither a developer nor a Skolelinux/Debian Edu user! The only +reason my name's in the credits for the documentation is that I hang +around on debian-l10n-english waiting for people to mention things +they'd like a native English speaker to proofread... So I did a sweep +through the wiki for typos and Norglish and inconsistent spellings of +"localisation".

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    These questions are too hard for me - I don't use it! In fact I +had hardly any contact with I.T. until long after I'd got out of the +education system.

    + +

    I can tell you the advantages of Debian for me though: it soaks up +as much of my free time as I want and no more, and lets me do +everything I want a computer for without ever forcing me to spend +money on the latest hardware.

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    I've been using Debian since Rex; popularity-contest says the +software that I use most is xinit, xterm, and xulrunner (in other +words, I use a distinctly retro sort of desktop).

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    Well, I don't know. I suppose I'd be inclined to try reasoning +with the people who make the decisions, but obviously if that worked +you would hardly need a strategy.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 15th April 2012 +
    +
    +

    Behind Debian Edu and +Skolelinux there are a lot of people doing the hard work of +setting together all the pieces. This time I present to you Andreas +Mundt, who have been part of the technical development team several +years. He was also a key contributor in getting GOsa and Kerberos set +up in the recently released +Debian +Edu Squeeze version.

    + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    My name is Andreas Mundt, I grew up in south Germany. After +studying Physics I spent several years at university doing research in +Quantum Optics. After that I worked some years in an optics company. +Finally I decided to turn over a new leaf in my life and started +teaching 10 to 19 years old kids at school. I teach math, physics, +information technology and science/technology.

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    Already before I switched to teaching, I followed the Debian Edu +project because of my interest in education and Debian. Within the +qualification/training period for the teaching, I started +contributing.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    The advantages of Debian Edu are the well known name, the +out-of-the-box philosophy and of course the great free software of the +Debian Project!

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    As every coin has two sides, the out-of-the-box philosophy has its +downside, too. In my opinion, it is hard to modify and tweak the +setup, if you need or want that. Further more, it is not easily +possible to upgrade the system to a new release. It takes much too +long after a Debian release to prepare the -Edu release, perhaps +because the number of developers working on the core of the code is +rather small and often busy elsewhere.

    + +

    The Debian LAN +project might fill the use case of a more flexible system.

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    I am only using non-free software if I am forced to and run Debian +on all my machines. For documents I prefer LaTeX and PGF/TikZ, then +mutt and iceweasel for email respectively web browsing. At school I +have Arduino and Fritzing in use for a micro controller project.

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    One of the major problems is the vendor lock-in from top to bottom: +Especially in combination with ignorant government employees and +politicians, this works out great for the "market-leader". The school +administration here in Baden-Wuerttemberg is occupied by that vendor. +Documents have to be prepared in non-free, proprietary formats. Even +free browsers do not work for the school administration. Publishers +of school books provide software only for proprietary platforms.

    + +

    To change this, political work is very important. Parts of the +political spectrum have become aware of the problem in the last years. +However it takes quite some time and courageous politicians to 'free' +the system. There is currently some discussion about "Open Data" and +"Free/Open Standards". I am not sure if all the involved parties have +a clue about the potential of these ideas, and probably only a +fraction takes them seriously. However it might slowly make free +software and the philosophy behind it more known and popular.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 19th April 2012 +
    +
    +

    Here in Norway, the + Ministry of +Government Administration, Reform and Church Affairs is behind +a directory of +standards that are recommended or mandatory for use by the +government. When the directory was created, the people behind it made +an effort to ensure that everyone would be able to implement the +standards and compete on equal terms to supply software and solutions +to the government. Free software and non-free software could compete +on the same level.

    + +

    But recently, some standards with RAND +(Reasonable +And Non-Discriminatory) terms have made their way into the +directory. And while this might not sound too bad, the fact is that +standard specifications with RAND terms often block free software from +implementing them. The reasonable part of RAND mean that the cost per +user/unit is low,and the non-discriminatory part mean that everyone +willing to pay will get a license. Both sound great in theory. In +practice, to get such license one need to be able to count users, and +be able to pay a small amount of money per unit or user. By +definition, users of free software do not need to register their use. +So counting users or units is not possible for free software projects. +And given that people will use the software without handing any money +to the author, it is not really economically possible for a free +software author to pay a small amount of money to license the rights +to implement a standard when the income available is zero. The result +in these situations is that free software are locked out from +implementing standards with RAND terms.

    + +

    Because of this, when I see someone claiming the terms of a +standard is reasonable and non-discriminatory, all I can think of is +how this really is non-reasonable and discriminatory. Because free +software developers are working in a global market, it does not really +help to know that software patents are not supposed to be enforceable +in Norway. The patent regimes in other countries affect us even here. +I really hope the people behind the standard directory will pay more +attention to these issues in the future.

    + +

    You can find more on the issues with RAND, FRAND and RAND-Z terms +from Simon Phipps +(RAND: +Not So Reasonable?).

    + +

    Update 2012-04-21: Just came across a +blog +post from Glyn Moody over at Computer World UK warning about the +same issue, and urging people to speak out to the UK government. I +can only urge Norwegian users to do the same for +the +hearing taking place at the moment (respond before 2012-04-27). +It proposes to require video conferencing standards including +specifications with RAND terms.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, multimedia, nuug, standard, video. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 26th April 2012 +
    +
    +

    In an +article today published by Computerworld Norway, the photographer +Eirik Helland Urke reports +that the video editor application included with +HTC One +X have some quite surprising terms of use. The article is mostly +based on the twitter message from mister Urke, stating: + +

    +"Drøy +brukeravtale: HTC kan bruke MINE redigerte videoer kommersielt. Selv +kan jeg KUN bruke dem privat." +

    + +

    I quickly translated it to this English message:

    + +

    +"Arrogant user agreement: HTC can use MY edited videos +commercially. Although I can ONLY use them privately." +

    + +

    I've been unable to find the text of the license term myself, but +suspect it is a variation of the MPEG-LA terms I +discovered +with my Canon IXUS 130. The HTC One X specification specifies that +the recording format of the phone is .amr for audio and .mp3 for +video. AMR is +Adaptive +Multi-Rate audio codec with patents which according to the +Wikipedia article require an license agreement with +VoiceAge. MP4 is +MPEG4 with +H.264, which according to Wikipedia require a licence agreement +with MPEG-LA.

    + +

    I know why I prefer +free and open +standards also for video.

    + +
    + +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 30th April 2012 +
    +
    +

    +

    + +

    I normally cut my hair short, and my tool of choice has been a +common hair/beard cutter, bought in a electrical shop here in Norway. +But the last ones have not really been up to the task. My last +cutter, some model from Braun, could only cut a few of my hairs at the +time, and cutting my head took forever. And the one before that did +not work very well either. We have looked for something better for a +while, but it was not until I ended up visiting a hairdresser that we +discovered that there are indeed better tools available. But these +are not marketed and sold to "regular consumers". The hair saloons +can get them through their suppliers, but their suppliers only sell +companies. The models they sell, are very different from the ones +available from Elkjøp and Lefdal. The main difference is their +efficiency. It would cut my hair in 5 minutes, instead of the 30-40 +minutes required by my impotent Braun. The hairdresser I visited had +a Panasonic ER160, which unfortunately is no longer available from the +producer. But I found it had a successor, the Panasonic ER1611.

    + +

    The next step was to find somewhere to buy it. This was not +straight forward. The list of suppliers I got from the hairdresser +did not want to sell anything to me. But searching for the model on +the web we found a supplier in Norway willing to sell it to us for +around NOK 4000,-. This was a bit much. We kept searching and +finally found a Danish supplier +selling +it for around NOK 1800,-. We ordered one, and it arrived a few +days ago.

    + +

    The instructions said it had to charge for 8 hours when we started +to use it, so we left it charging over night. Normally it will only +need one hour to charge. The following evening we successfully tested +it, and I can warmly recommend it to anyone looking for a real hair +cutter. The ones we have used until now have been hair cutter +toys.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 13th May 2012 +
    +
    +

    It has been a few busy weeks for me, but I am finally back to +publish another interview with the people behind +Debian Edu and Skolelinux. +This time it is one of our German developers, who have helped out over the +years to make sure both a lot of major but also a lot of the minor +details get right before release. + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    My name is Jürgen Leibner, I'm 49 years old and living in +Bielefeld, a town in northern Germany. I worked nearly 20 years as +certified engineer in the department for plant design and layout of an +international company for machinery and equipment. Since 2011 I'm a +certified technical writer (tekom e.V.) and doing technical +documentations for a steam turbine manufacturer. From April this year +I will manage the department of technical documentation at a +manufacturer of automation and assembly line engineering.

    + +

    My first contact with linux was around 1993. Since that time I used +it at work and at home repeatedly but not exclusively as I do now at +home since 2006.

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    Once a day in the early year of 2001 when I wanted to fetch my +daughter from primary school, there was a teacher sitting in the +middle of 20 old computers trying to boot them and he failed. I helped +him to get them booting. That was seen by the school director and she +asked me if I would like to manage that the school gets all that old +computers in use. I answered: "Yes".

    + +

    Some weeks later every of the 10 classrooms had one computer +running Windows98. I began to collect old computers and equipment as +gifts and installed the first computer room with a peer-to-peer +network. I did my work at school without being payed in my spare time +and with a lot of fun. About one year later the school was connected +to Internet and a local area network was installed in the school +building. That was the time to have a server and I knew it must be a +Linux server to be able to fulfil all the wishes of the teachers and +being able to do this in a transparent and economic way, without extra +costs for things like licence and software. So I searched for a +school server system running under Linux and I found a couple of +people nearby who founded 'skolelinux.de'. It was the Skolelinux +prerelease 32 I first tried out for being used at the school. I +managed the IT of that school until the municipal authority took over +the IT management and centralised the services for all schools in +Bielefeld in December of 2006.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    When I'm looking back to the beginning, there were other advantages +for me as today.

    + +

    In the past there were advantages like:

    + +

      + +
    • I don't need to buy it so it generates no costs to the school as +they had little money to spent for computers and software.
    • + +
    • It has a licence which grands all rights to use it without +cost.
    • + +
    • It was more able to fit all requirements of a server system for +schools than a Microsoft server system, even if there are only Windows +clients because of it's preconfigured overall concept of being a +infrastructure solution and community for schools, not only a +server
    • + +
    • I was able to configure the server to the needs of the +school.
    • + +

    + +

    Today some of the advantages has been lost, changed or new ones +came up in this way:

    + +

      + +
    • Most schools here do have money to buy hardware and software +now.
    • + +
    • They are today mostly managed from central IT departments which +have own concepts which often do not fit to Debian Edu concepts +because they are to close to Microsoft ideology.
    • + +
    • With the Squeeze version of Debian Edu which now uses GOsa² for +management I feel more able to manage the daily tasks than with the +interfaces used in the past.
    • + +
    • It is more modular than in the past and fits even better to the +different needs.
    • + +
    • The documentation is usable and gets better every day.
    • + +
    • More people than ever before are using Debian Edu all over the +world and so the community, which is an very important part I think, +is sharing knowledge and minds.
    • + +
    • Most, maybe all, of the technical requirements for schools are +solved today by Debian Edu.
    • + +

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

      + +
    • There are too few IT companies able to integrate Debian Edu into +their product portfolio for serving schools with concepts or even +whole municipality areas.
    • + +
    • Debian Edu has beside other free and open software projects not +enough lobbyists which promote free and open software to +politicians.
    • + +
    • Technically there are no disadvantages I'm aware of.
    • + +

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    I use Debian stable on my home server and on my little desktop +computer. On my laptop I use Debian testing/sid. The applications I +use on my laptop and my desktop are Open/Libre-office, Iceweasel, +KMail, DigiKam, Amarok, Dolphin, okular and all the other programs I +need from the KDE environment. On console I use newsbeuter, mutt, +screen, irssi and all the other famous and useful tools.

    + +

    My home server provides mail services with exim, dovecot, roundcube +and mutt over ssh on the console, file services with samba, NFS, +rsync, web services with apache, moinmoin-wiki, multimedia services +with gallery2 and mediatomb and database services with MySQL for me +and the whole family. I probably forgot something.

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    I believe, we should provide concepts for IT companies to integrate +Debian Edu into their product portfolio with use cases for different +countries and areas all over the world.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 18th May 2012 +
    +
    +

    In january, I +discovered +the ColorHug, a USB dongle from +Hughski to calibrate +the color on a computer screen. The software required is +included +in Debian, and I decided back then to preorder from the next +batch. Yesterday I finally heard back from them, and got the +opportunity to order. Today I ordered mine, and eagerly await the +delivery. I hope it arrive next week, as I got a confirmation that it +should go in the mail on monday. :)

    + +

    If you want to ensure the colors on the screen match the intended +colors, I suggest you check out this cheap tool with free software +drivers. :)

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 26th May 2012 +
    +
    +

    I just come across a blog post from Glyn Moody reporting the +claimed cost from Microsoft on requiring ODF to be used by the UK +government. I just sent him an email to let him know that his +assumption are most likely wrong. Sharing it here in case some of my +blog readers have seem the same numbers float around in the UK.

    + +

    Hi. I just noted your +http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-500-million/index.htm +comment:

    + +

    "They're all in Danish, not unreasonably, but even +with the help of Google Translate I can't find any figures about the +savings of "moving to a flexible two standard" as claimed by the +Microsoft email. But I assume it is backed up somewhere, so let's take +it, and the £500 million figure for the UK, on trust." +

    + +

    I can tell you that the Danish reports are inflated. I believe it is +the same reports that were used in the Norwegian debate around 2007, +and Gisle Hannemyr (a well known IT commentator in Norway) had a look +at the content. In short, the reason it is claimed that using ODF +will be so costly, is based on the assumption that this mean every +existing document need to be converted from one of the MS Office +formats to ODF, transferred to the receiver, and converted back from +ODF to one of the MS Office formats, and that the conversion will cost +10 minutes of work time for both the sender and the receiver. In +reality the sender would have a tool capable of saving to ODF, and the +receiver would have a tool capable of reading it, and the time spent +would at most be a few seconds for saving and loading, not 20 minutes +of wasted effort.

    + +

    Microsoft claimed all these costs were saved by allowing people to +transfer the original files from MS Office instead of spending 10 +minutes converting to ODF. :)

    + +

    See +http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php +and +http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php +for background information. Norwegian only, sorry. :)

    +

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, nuug, standard. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 27th May 2012 +
    +
    +

    In 2003, a German teacher showed up on the +Debian Edu and Skolelinux +mailing list with interesting problems and reports proving he setting +up Linux for a (for us at the time) lot of pupils. His name was Ralf +Gesellensetter, and he has been an important tester and contributor +since then, helping to make sure the +Debian Edu +Squeeze release became as good as it is..

    + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    I am a teacher from Germany, and my subjects are Geography, +Mathematics, and Computer Science ("Informatik"). During the past 12 +years (since 2000), I have been working for a comprehensive (and soon, +also inclusive) school leading to all kind of general levels, such as +O- or A-level ("Abitur"). For quite as long, I've been taking care of +our computer network.

    + +

    Now, in my early 40s, I enjoy the privilege of spending a lot of my +spare time together with my wife, our son (3 years) and our daughter +(4 months).

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    We had tried different Linux based school servers, when members of +my local Linux User Group (LUG OWL) detected Skolelinux. I remember +very well, being part of a party celebrating the Linux New Media Award +("Best Newcomer Distribution", also nominated: Ubuntu) that was given +to Skolelinux at Linux World Exposition in Frankfurt, 2005 (IIRC). Few +months later, I had the chance to join a developer meeting in Ulsrud +(Oslo) and to hand out the award to Knut Yrvin and others. For more +than 7 years, Skolelinux is part of our schools infrastructure, namely +our main server (tjener), one LTSP (today without thin clients), and +approximately 50 work stations. Most of these have the option to boot a +locally installed Skolelinux image. As a consequence, I joined quite +a few events dealing with free software or Linux, and met many Debian +(Edu) developers. All of them seemed quite nice and competent to me, +one more reason to stick to Skolelinux.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    Debian driven, you are given all the advantages of a community +project including well maintained updates. Once, you are familiar with +the network layout, you can easily roll out an entire educational +computer infrastructure, from just one installation media. As only +free software (FOSS) is used, that supports even elderly hardware, +up-sizing your IT equipment is only limited by space (i.e. available +labs). Especially if you run a LTSP thin client server, your +administration costs tend towards zero.

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    While Debian's stability has loads of advantages for servers, this +might be different in some cases for clients: Schools with unlimited +budget might buy new hardware with components that are not yet +supported by Debian stable, or wish to use more recent versions of +office packages or desktop environments. These schools have the +option to run Debian testing or other distributions - if they have the +capacity to do so. Another issue is that Debian release cycles +include a wide range of changes; therefor a high percentage of human +power seems to be absorbed by just keeping the features of Skolelinux +within the new setting of the version to come. During this process, +the cogs of Debian Edu are getting more and more professional, +i.e. harder to understand for novices.

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    LibreOffice, Wikipedia, Openstreetmap, Iceweasel (Mozilla Firefox), +KMail, Gimp, Inkscape - and of course the Linux Kernel (not only on +PC, Laptop, Mobile, but also our SAT receiver)

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

      + +
    1. Support computer science as regular subject in schools to make +people really "own" their hardware, to make them understand the +difference between proprietary software products, and free software +developing.
    2. + +
    3. Make budget baskets corresponding: In Germany's public schools +there are more or less fixed budgets for IT equipment (including +licenses), so schools won't benefit from any savings here. This +privilege is left to private schools which have consequently a large +share among German Skolelinux schools.
    4. + +
    5. Get free software in the seminars where would-be teachers are +trained. In many cases, teachers' software customs are respected by +decision makers rather than the expertise of any IT experts.
    6. + +
    7. Don't limit ourself to free software run natively. Everybody uses +free software or free licenses (for instance Wikipedia), and this +general concept should get expanded to free educational content to be +shared world wide (school books e.g.).
    8. + +
    9. Make clear where ever you can that the market share of free (libre) +office suites is much above 20 p.c. today, and that you pupils don't +need to know the "ribbon menu" in order to get employed.
    10. + +
    11. Talk about the difference between freeware and free software.
    12. + +
    13. Spread free software, or even collections of portable free apps +for USB pen drives. Endorse students to get a legal copy of +Libreoffice rather than accepting them to use illegal serials. And +keep sending documents in ODF formats.
    14. + +

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 31st May 2012 +
    +
    +

    A few days ago my color calibration gadget +ColorHug arrived in the +mail, and I've had a few days to test it. As all my machines are +running Debian Squeeze, where +the +calibration software is missing (it is present in Wheezy and Sid), +I ran the calibration using the Fedora based live CD. This worked +just fine. So far I have only done the quick calibration. It was +slow enough for me, so I will leave the more extensive calibration for +another day.

    + +

    After calibration, I get a +ICC color +profile file that can be passed to programs understanding such +tools. KDE do not seem to understand it out of the box, so I searched +for command line tools to use to load the color profile into X. +xcalib was the first one I found, and it seem to work fine for single +monitor setups. But for my video player, a laptop with a flat screen +attached, it was unable to load the color profile for the correct +monitor. After searching a bit, I +discovered +that the dispwin tool from the argyll package would do what I wanted, +and a simple

    + +

    +dispwin -d 1 profile.icc
    +

    + +

    later I had the color profile loaded for the correct monitor. The +result was a bit more pink than I expected. I guess I picked the +wrong monitor type for the "led" monitor I got, but the result is good +enough for now.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 1st June 2012 +
    +
    +

    A few years ago I wrote +how +to extract support status for your Dell and HP servers. Recently +I have learned from colleges here at the +University of Oslo that Dell have +made this even easier, by providing a SOAP based web service. Given +the service tag, one can now query the Dell servers and get machine +readable information about the support status. This perl code +demonstrate how to do it:

    + +

    +use strict;
    +use warnings;
    +use SOAP::Lite;
    +use Data::Dumper;
    +my $GUID = '11111111-1111-1111-1111-111111111111';
    +my $App = 'test';
    +my $servicetag = $ARGV[0] or die "Please supply a servicetag. $!\n";
    +my ($deal, $latest, @dates);
    +my $s = SOAP::Lite
    +    -> uri('http://support.dell.com/WebServices/')
    +    -> on_action( sub { join '', @_ } )
    +    -> proxy('http://xserv.dell.com/services/assetservice.asmx')
    +    ;
    +my $a = $s->GetAssetInformation(
    +    SOAP::Data->name('guid')->value($GUID)->type(''),
    +    SOAP::Data->name('applicationName')->value($App)->type(''),
    +    SOAP::Data->name('serviceTags')->value($servicetag)->type(''),
    +);
    +print Dumper($a -> result) ;
    +

    + +

    The output can look like this:

    + +

    +$VAR1 = {
    +          'Asset' => {
    +                     'Entitlements' => {
    +                                       'EntitlementData' => [
    +                                                            {
    +                                                              'EntitlementType' => 'Expired',
    +                                                              'EndDate' => '2009-07-29T00:00:00',
    +                                                              'Provider' => '',
    +                                                              'StartDate' => '2006-07-29T00:00:00',
    +                                                              'DaysLeft' => '0'
    +                                                            },
    +                                                            {
    +                                                              'EntitlementType' => 'Expired',
    +                                                              'EndDate' => '2009-07-29T00:00:00',
    +                                                              'Provider' => '',
    +                                                              'StartDate' => '2006-07-29T00:00:00',
    +                                                              'DaysLeft' => '0'
    +                                                            },
    +                                                            {
    +                                                              'EntitlementType' => 'Expired',
    +                                                              'EndDate' => '2007-07-29T00:00:00',
    +                                                              'Provider' => '',
    +                                                              'StartDate' => '2006-07-29T00:00:00',
    +                                                              'DaysLeft' => '0'
    +                                                            }
    +                                                          ]
    +                                     },
    +                     'AssetHeaderData' => {
    +                                          'SystemModel' => 'GX620',
    +                                          'ServiceTag' => '8DSGD2J',
    +                                          'SystemShipDate' => '2006-07-29T19:00:00-05:00',
    +                                          'Buid' => '2323',
    +                                          'Region' => 'Europe',
    +                                          'SystemID' => 'PLX_GX620',
    +                                          'SystemType' => 'OptiPlex'
    +                                        }
    +                   }
    +        };
    +

    + +

    I have not been able to find any documentation from Dell about this +service outside the +inline +documentation, and according to +one +comment it can have stability issues, but it is a lot better than +scraping HTML pages. :)

    + +

    Wonder if HP and other server vendors have a similar service. If +you know of one, drop me an email. :)

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, nuug. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 2nd June 2012 +
    +
    +

    Back in 2010, Mike Gabriel showed up on the +Debian Edu and Skolelinux +mailing list. He quickly proved to be a valuable developer, and +thanks to his tireless effort we now have Kerberos integrated into the +Debian Edu +Squeeze version.

    + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    My name is Mike Gabriel, I am 38 years old and live near Kiel, +Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. I live together with a wonderful partner +(Angela Fuß) and two own children and two bonus children (contributed +by Angela).

    + +

    During the day I am part-time employed as a system administrator +and part-time working as an IT consultant. The consultancy work +touches free software topics wherever and whenever possible. During +the nights I am a free software developer. In the gaps I also train in +becoming an osteopath.

    + +

    Starting in 2010 we (Andreas Buchholz, Angela Fuß, Mike Gabriel) +have set up a free software project in the area of Kiel that aims at +introducing free software into schools. The project's name is +"IT-Zukunft Schule" (IT future for schools). The project links IT +skills with communication skills.

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    While preparing our own customised Linux distribution for +"IT-Zukunft Schule" we were repeatedly asked if we really wanted to +reinvent the wheel. What schools really need is already available, +people said. From this impulse we started evaluating other Linux +distributions that target being used for school networks.

    + +

    At the end we short-listed two approaches and compared them: a +commercial Linux distribution developed by a company in Bremen, +Germany, and Skolelinux / Debian Edu. Between 12/2010 and 03/2011 we +went to several events and met people being responsible for marketing +and development of either of the distributions. Skolelinux / Debian +Edu was by far much more convincing compared to the other product that +got short-listed beforehand--across the full spectrum. What was most +attractive for me personally: the perspective of collaboration within +the developmental branch of the Debian Edu project itself.

    + +

    In parallel with this, we talked to many local and not-so-local +people. People teaching at schools, headmasters, politicians, data +protection experts, other IT professionals.

    + +

    We came to two conclusions:

    + +

    First, a technical conclusion: What schools need is available in +bits and pieces here and there, and none of the solutions really fit +by 100%. Any school we have seen has a very individual IT setup +whereas most of each school's requirements could mapped by a standard +IT solution. The requirement to this IT solution is flexibility and +customisability, so that individual adaptations here and there are +possible. In terms of re-distributing and rolling out such a +standardised IT system for schools (a system that is still to some +degree customisable) there is still a lot of work to do here +locally. Debian Edu / Skolelinux has been our choice as the starting +point.

    + +

    Second, a holistic conclusion: What schools need does not exist at +all (or we missed it so far). There are several technical solutions +for handling IT at schools that tend to make a good impression. What +has been missing completely here in Germany, though, is the enrolment +of people into using IT and teaching with IT. "IT-Zukunft Schule" +tries to provide an approach for this.

    + +

    Only some schools have some sort of a media concept which explains, +defines and gives guidance on how to use IT in class. Most schools in +Northern Germany do not have an IT service provider, the school's IT +equipment is managed by one or (if the school is lucky) two (admin) +teachers, most of the workload these admin teachers get done in there +spare time.

    + +

    We were surprised that only a very few admin teachers were +networked with colleagues from other schools. Basically, every school +here around has its individual approach of providing IT equipment to +teachers and students and the exchange of ideas has been quasi +non-existent until 2010/2011.

    + +

    Quite some (non-admin) teachers try to avoid using IT technology in +class as a learning medium completely. Several reasons for this +avoidance do exist.

    + +

    We discovered that no-one has ever taken a closer look at this +social part of IT management in schools, so far. On our quest journey +for a technical IT solution for schools, we discussed this issue with +several teachers, headmasters, politicians, other IT professionals and +they all confirmed: a holistic approach of considering IT management +at schools, an approach that includes the people in place, will be new +and probably a gain for all.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    There is a list of advantages: international context, openness to +any kind of contributions, do-ocracy policy, the closeness to Debian, +the different installation scenarios possible (from stand-alone +workstation to complex multi-server sites), the transparency within +project communication, honest communication within the group of +developers, etc.

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    Every coin has two sides:

    + +

    Technically: BTS issue +#311188, tricky upgradability of a Debian Edu main server, network +client installations on top of a plain vanilla Debian installation +should become possible sometime in the near future, one could think +about splitting the very complex package debian-edu-config into +several portions (to make it easier for new developers to +contribute).

    + +

    Another issue I see is that we (as Debian Edu developers) should +find out more about the network of people who do the marketing for +Debian Edu / Skolelinux. There is a very active group in Germany +promoting Skolelinux on the bigger Linux Days within Germany. Are +there other groups like that in other countries? How can we bring +these marketing people together (marketing group A with group B and +all of them with the group of Debian Edu developers)? During the last +meeting of the German Skolelinux group, I got the impression of people +there being rather disconnected from the development department of +Debian Edu / Skolelinux.

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    For my daily business, I do not use commercial software at all.

    + +

    For normal stuff I use Iceweasel/Firefox, Libreoffice.org. For +serious text writing I prefer LaTeX. I use gimp, inkscape, scribus for +more artistic tasks. I run virtual machines in KVM and Virtualbox.

    + +

    I am one of the upstream developers of X2Go. In 2010 I started the +development of a Python based X2Go Client, called PyHoca-GUI. +PyHoca-GUI has brought forth a Python X2Go Client API that currently +is being integrated in Ubuntu's software center.

    + +

    For communications I have my own Kolab server running using Horde +as web-based groupware client. For IRC I love to use irssi, for Jabber +I have several clients that I use, mostly pidgin, though. I am also +the Debian maintainer of Coccinella, a Jabber-based interactive +whiteboard.

    + +

    My favourite terminal emulator is KDE's Yakuake.

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    Communicate, communicate, communicate. Enrol people, enrol people, +enrol people.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 6th June 2012 +
    +
    +

    A few days ago +I +reported how to get the support status out of Dell using an +unofficial and undocumented SOAP API, which I since have found out was +discovered +by Daniel De Marco in february. Combined with my web scraping +code for HP, Dell and IBM +from +2009, I got inspired and wrote +a +web service based on Scraperwiki to make it easy to look up the +support status and get a machine readable result back.

    + +

    This is what it look like at the moment when asking for the JSON +output: + +

    +% GET https://views.scraperwiki.com/run/computer-hardware-support-status/?format=json&vendor=Dell&servicetag=2v1xwn1
    +supportstatus({"servicetag": "2v1xwn1", "warrantyend": "2013-11-24", "shipped": "2010-11-24", "scrapestamputc": "2012-06-06T20:26:56.965847", "scrapedurl": "http://143.166.84.118/services/assetservice.asmx?WSDL", "vendor": "Dell", "productid": ""})
    +%
    +
    + +

    It currently support Dell and HP, and I am hoping for help to add +support for other vendors. The python source is available on +Scraperwiki and I welcome help with adding more features.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, nuug. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 9th June 2012 +
    +
    +

    Slashdot got a story about Intel planning a +TV +with face recognition to recognise the viewer, and it occurred to +me that it would be more interesting to turn it around, and do face +recognition on the TV image itself. It could let the viewer know who +is present on the screen, and perhaps look up their credibility, +company affiliation, previous appearances etc for the viewer to better +evaluate what is being said and done. That would be a feature I would +be willing to pay for.

    + +

    I would not be willing to pay for a TV that point a camera on my +household, like the big brother feature apparently proposed by Intel. +It is the telescreen idea fetched straight out of the book +1984 by George +Orwell.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: english, surveillance. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 11th June 2012 +
    +
    +

    During my work on +Debian Edu +based on Squeeze, I came across some issues that should be +addressed in the Wheezy release. I finally found time to wrap up my +notes and provide quick summary of what I found, with a bit +explanation.

    + +

      + +
    • We need to rewrite our package installation framework, as tasksel +changed from using tasksel tasks to using meta packages (aka packages +with dependencies like our education-* packages), and our installation +system depend on tasksel tasks in +/usr/share/tasksel/debian-edu-tasks.desc for package +installation.
    • + +
    • Enable Kerberos login for more services. Now with the Kerberos +foundation in place, we should use it to get single sign on with more +services, and avoiding unneeded password / login questions. We should +at least try to enable it for these services: +
        + +
      • CUPS for admins to add/configure printers and users when using + quotas.
      • +
      • Nagios for admins checking the system status.
      • +
      • GOsa for admins updating LDAP and users changing their passwords.
      • +
      • LDAP for admins updating LDAP.
      • +
      • Squid for users when exam mode / filtering is active.
      • +
      • ssh for admins and users to save a password prompt.
      • + +
    • + +
    • When we move GOsa to use Kerberos instead of LDAP bind to +authenticate users, we should try to block or at least limit access to +use LDAP bind for authentication, to ensure Kerberos is used when it +is intended, and nothing fall back to using the less safe LDAP bind
    • + +
    • Merge debian-edu-config and debian-edu-install. The split made +sense when d-e-install did a lot more, but these days it is just an +inconvenience when we update the debconf preseeding values.
    • + +
    • Fix partman-auto to allow us to abort the installation before +touching the disk if the disk is too small. This is +BTS report #653305 and the +d-i developers are fine with the patch and someone just need to apply +it and upload. After this is done we need to adjust +debian-edu-install to use this new hook.
    • + +
    • Adjust to new LTSP framework (boot time config instead of install +time config). LTSP changed its design, and our hooks to install +packages and update the configuration is most likely not going to work +in Wheezy. + +
    • Consider switching to NBD instead of NFS for LTSP root, to allow +the Kernel to cache files in its normal file cache, possibly speeding +up KDE login on slow networks.
    • + +
    • Make it possible to create expired user passwords that need to +change on first login. This is useful when handing out password on +paper, to make sure only the user know the password. This require +fixes to the PAM handling of kdm and gdm.
    • + +
    • Make GUI for adding new machines automatically from sitesummary. +The current command line script is not very friendly to people most +familiar with GUIs. This should probably be integrated into GOsa to +have it available where the admin will be looking for it..
    • + +
    • We should find way for Nagios to check that the DHCP service +actually is working (as in handling out IP addresses). None of the +Nagios checks I have found so far have been working for me.
    • + +
    • We should switch from libpam-nss-ldapd to sssd for all profiles +using LDAP, and not only on for roaming workstations, to have less +packages to configure and consistent setup across all profiles.
    • + +
    • We should configure Kerberos to update LDAP and Samba password +when changing password using the Kerberos protocol. The hook was +requested in BTS report +#588968 and is now available in Wheezy. We might need to write a +MIT Kerberos plugin in C to get this.
    • + +
    • We should clean up the set of applications installed by default. +
        + +
      • reduce the number of chemistry visualisers
      • +
      • consider dropping xpaint
      • +
      • and probably more?
      • +
    • + +
    • Some hardware need external firmware to work properly. This is +mostly the case for WiFi network cards, but there are some other +examples too. For popular laptops to work out of the box, such +firmware need to be installed from non-free, and we should provide +some GUI to do this. Ubuntu already have this implemented, and we +could consider using their packages. At the moment we have some +command line script to do this (one for the running system, another +for the LTSP chroot).
    • + + +
    • In Squeeze, we provide KDE, Gnome and LXDE as desktop options. We +should extend the list to Xfce and Sugar, and preferably find a way to +install several and allow the admin or the user to select which one to +use.
    • + +
    • The golearn tool from the goplay package make it easy to check out +interesting educational packages. We should work on the package +tagging in Debian to ensure it represent all the useful educational +packages, and extend the tool to allow it to use packagekit to install +new applications with a simple mouse click.
    • + +
    • The Squeeze version got half a exam solution already in place, +with the introduction of iptable based network blocking, but for it to +be a complete exam solution the Squid proxy need to enable +filtering/blocking as well when the exam mode is enabled. We should +implement a way to easily enable this for the schools that want it, +instead of the "it is documented" method of today.
    • + +
    • A feature used in several schools is the ability for a teacher to +"take over" the desktop of individual or all computers in the room. +There are at least three implementations, +italc, +controlaula og +epoptes and we should pick one of +them and make it trivial to set it up in a school. The challenges is +how to distribute crypto keys and how to group computers in one room +and how to set up which machine/user can control the machines in a +given room.
    • + +
    • Tablets and surf boards are getting more and more popular, and we +should look into providing a good solution for integrating these into +the Debian Edu network. Not quite sure how. Perhaps we should +provide a installation profile with better touch screen support for +them, or add some sync services to allow them to exchange +configuration and data with the central server. This should be +investigated.
    • + +

    + +

    I guess we will discover more as we continue to work on the Wheezy +version.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 24th June 2012 +
    +
    +

    Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the +University of Tromsø, I started +collecting computer related songs for use at parties. The original +version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from +Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML +while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format. I have +not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should +put it up on some public version control repository where others can +help me extend and update the book. If anyone is volunteering to help +me with this, send me an email. Also let me know if there are songs +missing in my book.

    + +

    I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to +me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of +singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks. +Especially now that Debconf +12 is about to start (and I am not going). Want to sing? Check +out Petter's +Computer Science Songbook. + +

    +
    + + + Tags: debian, english, multimedia. + + +
    +
    +
    + +
    + +
    + 26th June 2012 +
    +
    +

    I've been too busy at home, but finally I found time to wrap up +another interview with the people behind +Debian Edu and Skolelinux. +This time we get to know José Luis Redrejo Rodríguez, one of our great +helpers from Spain. His effort was the reason we added support for +several desktop types (KDE, Gnome and most recently LXDE) in Debian +Edu, and have all of these available in the recently published +Debian Edu +Squeeze version.

    + +

    Who are you, and how do you spend your days?

    + +

    I'm a father, teacher and engineer who is working for the Education +ministry of the Region of Extremadura (Spain) in the implementation of +ICT in schools

    + +

    How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu +project?

    + +

    At 2006, I verified that both, we in Extremadura and Skolelinux +project, had been working in parallel for some years, doing very +similar things, using very similar tools and with similar targets, so +I decided it was time to join forces as much as possible.

    + +

    What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    A community of highly skilled experts working together, with a +really open schema of collaboration and work. I really love the +concepts of Do-ocracy and Merit-ocracy and the way these concepts are +been used everyday inside Debian Edu.

    + +

    What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian +Edu?

    + +

    Sometimes the differences in the implementations, laws or +economical and technical resources in the different countries don't +allow us to agree in the same solution for all of us, and several +approaches are needed, what is a waste of effort. Also, there is a +lack of more man power to be able to follow the fast evolution of the +technologies in school.

    + +

    Which free software do you use daily?

    + +

    Debian, of course, and due to my kind of job I am most of my time +between Iceweasel, Geany and +Terminator.

    + +

    Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to +get schools to use free software?

    + +

    I think there is not a single strategy because there are very +different scenarios: schools with mixed proprietary and free +environments, schools using only workstations, other schools using +laptops, netbooks, tablets, interactive white-boards, etc.

    + +

    Also the range of ages of the students is very broad and you can +not use the same solutions for primary schools and secondary or even +universities. So different strategies are needed.

    + +

    But, looking at these differences, and looking back to the things +we've done and implemented, and the places were we have spent most of +our forces, I think we should focus as much as possible in free +multi-platform environments, using only standards tools, and moving +more and more to Internet or network solutions that could be deployed +using wireless. I think we'll see more and more personal devices in +the schools, devices the students and teachers will take home with +them, so the solutions must be able to be taken at home and continue +working there.

    + +
    +
    + + + Tags: debian edu, english, intervju. + + +
    +
    +
    + +

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