April 2011 - wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

New contact details for Wayne Grimsey
by Wayne Grimsey 25 Aug '11

25 Aug '11

Happy new year, WLUG. I moved house this week. My new contact details are: Wayne Grimsey 48A Southey Street Leamington Cambridge Landline: 07 827 8449 Cell: 027 451 2688 Hope you've all had a happy and safe holiday. Wayne > From: wlug-request(a)list.waikato.ac.nz > Subject: wlug Digest, Vol 235, Issue 6 > To: wlug(a)list.waikato.ac.nz > Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2011 12:00:03 +1300 > > Send wlug mailing list submissions to > wlug(a)list.waikato.ac.nz > > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > http://list.waikato.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/wlug > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > wlug-request(a)list.waikato.ac.nz > > You can reach the person managing the list at > wlug-owner(a)list.waikato.ac.nz > > When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific > than "Re: Contents of wlug digest..." > > > Today's Topics: > > 1. Thursday Night Christmas Curry (David Hallett) > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Message: 1 > Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2011 15:19:40 +1300 > From: David Hallett <david(a)pulsar.net.nz> > To: Hamilton Thursday Night Curry > <hamilton(a)list.thursdaynightcurry.com>, Waikato Linux Users Group > <wlug(a)list.waikato.ac.nz> > Cc: waikato(a)nzcs.org.nz > Subject: [wlug] Thursday Night Christmas Curry > Message-ID: > <AANLkTimvR+QbuOq8x7XHuyagOAhKbtisS+JSM+y0ik5i(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" > > We're looking to start running Hamilton curry nights again. > The recent Christmas Curry had a good number of registrations. It was there > that a suggestion was made there to reinstate the Hamilton Thursday Night > Curry. > > If you are interested in attending (even irregularly) please let me know you > intention, and whether you prefer weekly, fortnightly, or monthly. > I'm going to use the NZCS Events System ( > http://www.nzcs.org.nz/events/waikato_bop) to manage RSVPs and booking, thus > significantly reducing the administration overhead. > > Kind regards, > > David Hallett, BSc, MNZCS ITCP > P.O. Box 15-516 > Hamilton, New Zealand > > Phone: +64-7-210 5520 > Mobile: +64-21-802 256 >

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Malware Scam via Indian Call Centre
by Wayne Grimsey 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

Hi guys. Here's a scam that's been doing the rounds. One of my friends in Dunedin received such a phone call: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/18/phone-scam-india-call-centres One of the commenters below the article said he was runnng Linux ... and the caller said that may have caused the problem with his Windows! If they ring me, I might just say something in broken English along the lines of, " Sorry, I can't download your nasty fraudalent expensive malware on my broken abacus, should I try the garbage disposal unit instead?" Wayne

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SweetHome3D
by Chris O'Halloran 21 Apr '11

21 Apr '11

Hi All, I came across this in Linux Journal today. http://www.sweethome3d.com/index.jsp http://www.linuxjournal.com/ I haven't tried it yetbut it's pretty cool seeing what software is available on Linux these days. Maybe some on your might find it interesting. Cheers, Chris

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WLUG meeting is on Monday April 18th
by Chris O'Halloran 17 Apr '11

17 Apr '11

In lieu of the reminder bot, we have a WLUG meeting on next Monday. Tom Butz will be giving a presentation on Arch Linux. You can read a bit more about Arch Linux here http://www.wlug.org.nz/MeetingTopics.2011-04-18 The following month we've invited Michael Doerner to speak on SME Server. http://www.wlug.org.nz/MeetingTopics.2011-05-23 We're also hoping to have a workshop day at the usual Monday night meeting room on May 7th but we've yet to confirm the room's availability and an internet connection. http://www.wlug.org.nz/MeetingTopics.2011-05-07 That's all for now, Chris

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REMINDER: WLUG meeting tonight!
by Meeting Reminder Bot 17 Apr '11

17 Apr '11

There's a WLUG meeting tonight: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Tom Butz will be doing a presentation on Arch Linux --Tom Butz's blurb about Archlinux-- A computer's software ideally has the follwoing features: #operating system loads quickly/uses grub-loader (not lilo) #programs load/run quickly #there is a reliable/endless supply of packaged software #the system is secure #the system supports/emulates your favourite legacy applications #the system supports your favourite old hardware Archlinux has no problems with 1) .. 6) - maybe only with 3). See below, --Flipside-- Archlinux allegedly was created by former Crux Linux people. There you had to compile the operating system kernel and your applications. Often applications didn't compile, and you had to hunt around to find out why. Bit of a worry when you needed things now; okay when time wasn't an issue. Archlinux doesn't expect you to compile either your operating system's kernel or your applications: they come precompiled - though for nothing less than a 686-CPU. Tough if you've got something less/different, but then you could always go for Slackware instead (there everything's compiled to run on a 386-CPU!). A program called 'pacman' does what 'synaptic' does for Ubuntu and Debian. If for some reason you want to run, say, Slackware programs, you can easily do that. Just make sure the libraries are there compatible. But remember, Archlinux packages are compiled for i686 systems, and therefore usually faster. By the way, 'pacman' will respect 'alien' software and simply refuse to install over it. What did +I+ select? X-window manager 'blackbox' - it's anything but a 'black box'. Firefox, sylpheed (email), geeqie (image viewer), totem (media player). I've used mplayer/xine/vlc before, but I think totem's the better player. mplayer, however, comes with a lot of encoding stuff such as avisplit etc., so I've kept it, just in case. qemu emulates my old Windows 3.11 system: now I can still use my fax-machine (even as a printer). qemu also emulates a Sinclair ZX running very old games (the emulator's written in MSDOS assembler). Archlinux also has a Commodore C64/PET 2001 emulator (vice), in case you've got programs for these veterans (supports C64 sound!). Archlinux supports a parallel printer port, be it for talking to another oldie using the PLIP-protocol, be it for reading from/writing to an IOMEGA Zip-floppy (not being sold any more, though pretty much alive). I also run Open COBOL on Archlinux to manage my video-clip library in a COBOL database. Much handier than using a clip-on database. But that's largely a matter of taste. COBOL supposedly is dead, but somehow must have managed to rise from the dead as Open COBOL. Archlinux' flipside? #Debian's repositories are expected to have eternal life, but would the same apply to Archlinux' pacman repositories? Not sure. #If you migrate to another system that's not a 686, tough luck. #If you decide that you want to upgrade your +whole+ system that could take a whole night. Sometimes that's what you need to do (continuous/rolling releases vs releases at set dates). Very hard if you're on dial-up. #If you're on dial-up - like me - you need to install, say, Slackware's dialler. Archlinux doesn't come with one. A bit of a nuisance, but some recent UBUNTUs don't support dial-up either, or so I'm told.

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REMINDER: WLUG meeting is on Monday
by Meeting Reminder Bot 14 Apr '11

14 Apr '11

There's a Waikato Linux Users Group meeting on Monday: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Tom Butz will be doing a presentation on Arch Linux --Tom Butz's blurb about Archlinux-- A computer's software ideally has the follwoing features: #operating system loads quickly/uses grub-loader (not lilo) #programs load/run quickly #there is a reliable/endless supply of packaged software #the system is secure #the system supports/emulates your favourite legacy applications #the system supports your favourite old hardware Archlinux has no problems with 1) .. 6) - maybe only with 3). See below, --Flipside-- Archlinux allegedly was created by former Crux Linux people. There you had to compile the operating system kernel and your applications. Often applications didn't compile, and you had to hunt around to find out why. Bit of a worry when you needed things now; okay when time wasn't an issue. Archlinux doesn't expect you to compile either your operating system's kernel or your applications: they come precompiled - though for nothing less than a 686-CPU. Tough if you've got something less/different, but then you could always go for Slackware instead (there everything's compiled to run on a 386-CPU!). A program called 'pacman' does what 'synaptic' does for Ubuntu and Debian. If for some reason you want to run, say, Slackware programs, you can easily do that. Just make sure the libraries are there compatible. But remember, Archlinux packages are compiled for i686 systems, and therefore usually faster. By the way, 'pacman' will respect 'alien' software and simply refuse to install over it. What did +I+ select? X-window manager 'blackbox' - it's anything but a 'black box'. Firefox, sylpheed (email), geeqie (image viewer), totem (media player). I've used mplayer/xine/vlc before, but I think totem's the better player. mplayer, however, comes with a lot of encoding stuff such as avisplit etc., so I've kept it, just in case. qemu emulates my old Windows 3.11 system: now I can still use my fax-machine (even as a printer). qemu also emulates a Sinclair ZX running very old games (the emulator's written in MSDOS assembler). Archlinux also has a Commodore C64/PET 2001 emulator (vice), in case you've got programs for these veterans (supports C64 sound!). Archlinux supports a parallel printer port, be it for talking to another oldie using the PLIP-protocol, be it for reading from/writing to an IOMEGA Zip-floppy (not being sold any more, though pretty much alive). I also run Open COBOL on Archlinux to manage my video-clip library in a COBOL database. Much handier than using a clip-on database. But that's largely a matter of taste. COBOL supposedly is dead, but somehow must have managed to rise from the dead as Open COBOL. Archlinux' flipside? #Debian's repositories are expected to have eternal life, but would the same apply to Archlinux' pacman repositories? Not sure. #If you migrate to another system that's not a 686, tough luck. #If you decide that you want to upgrade your +whole+ system that could take a whole night. Sometimes that's what you need to do (continuous/rolling releases vs releases at set dates). Very hard if you're on dial-up. #If you're on dial-up - like me - you need to install, say, Slackware's dialler. Archlinux doesn't come with one. A bit of a nuisance, but some recent UBUNTUs don't support dial-up either, or so I'm told.

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Gnome 3 is out
by Peter Reutemann 08 Apr '11

08 Apr '11

Hi there Just came across the following news item on H-Online: GNOME 3 released "After around five years of planning and development, the GNOME developers have released the third generation of their Linux and Unix desktop, GNOME 3. GNOME 3 brings new operating concepts and a new look; the GNOME Shell reduces the visual complexity of the user interface to allow users to better focus on the applications that they use. Virtual desktops are also now an integral part of how users work with GNOME, with simple workspace navigation and a single keypress (or mouse gesture) able to bring an overview of all the windows and workspaces." -- http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/GNOME-3-released-1223255.html But the new Gnome desktop might not be for everyone: "The debate about whether KDE or GNOME is the better Linux desktop is longstanding. Yet as Linux pundit Bruce Byfield discusses, it has entered a fresh chapter now that both desktop environments have versions that are radically different from their incarnations just a few years back. Moreover, 'the differences in KDE 4.6 and GNOME 3 (the latest releases) are greater than they have ever been,' he writes. Casting aside his usual diplomacy, Byfield acknowledges that he's heard rave reviews about GNOME 3, but disagrees: 'I suspect that the majority of users are more likely to be satisfied with KDE 4.6 than GNOME 3.'" -- http://tech.slashdot.org/story/11/04/05/1944232/GNOME-vs-KDE-the-Latest-Rou… Personally, I'm quite happy right now using "docky" with the old Gnome desktop. The early versions of Gnome 3 that I tried weren't exactly stable and rather resource hungry, but still an interesting approach to redefining the desktop experience. I might give it a go again after a few bugfix release cycles. ;-) Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cs.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Optimizing Linux for SSD usage
by Narender 06 Apr '11

06 Apr '11

Hi I thought this was interesting. http://searchenterpriselinux.techtarget.com/tip/Optimizing-Linux-for-SSD-us… >>Does EXT 4 has features suited for SSD or EXT 3 would also work well? Even newer gen spindle hard drives start to use larger disk blocks so that partition need to be on the boundary to get best perf. Latest gen OS should all take care of that. I personally tried windows 7 and Ubuntu 10 to partition and then dump the partition table and double check the boundary. >> we are using CenOS5.3 (64 bit ) in our production. could someone please give pointer about what version of centos we should put on it. Best Regards --N

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Fwd: [NZOSS-Openchat] Red Hat opens shop in NZ
by Peter Reutemann 06 Apr '11

06 Apr '11

Apologies for cross-posting. Cheers, Peter ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: ... Date: Wed, Apr 6, 2011 at 12:26 Subject: [NZOSS-Openchat] Red Hat opens shop in NZ To: NZOSS Open Discussion List <openchat(a)lists.nzoss.org.nz> http://www.techworld.com.au/article/382295/red_hat_opens_nz_office/ "... we're excited about opportunities to continue working with the New Zealand open source community and government organisations to grow the use of open source. We will also aim for our investment to help foster the local creation and development of innovative new ideas and technologies that can be showcased to the rest of the world." Perhaps we should invite the NZ manager onto this list? _______________________________________________ Openchat mailing list Openchat(a)lists.nzoss.org.nz http://lists.nzoss.org.nz/mailman/listinfo/openchat -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cs.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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