July 2020 - wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

List Of IPTV Resources
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 22 Sep '24

22 Sep '24

This user <https://github.com/iptv-org> just popped up in my GitHub feed. One repo <https://github.com/iptv-org/iptv> claims to be a list of links to over 8000 streaming TV channels from nations all over the world, while the other is a list of tools*, providers and other resources. Do be aware it’s a bit of a mixed bag: yes, there are legitimate channels (no encryption so far that I have noticed), but also some dubious-looking links. *Oddly, FFmpeg and youtube-dl aren’t in the list.

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Apple’s Windows 10
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 19 Jul '22

19 Jul '22

Fred Brooks predicted long ago that complex pieces of software would eventually reach the point of irreducible entropy, where any attempt to fix a bug would simply introduce a new one. Microsoft’s Windows 10 seems to be about there, and it’s now clear that Apple’s macOS 10.15 “Catalina” has also joined that elite group <https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/05/27/apple_catalina_update/>: The first spin of Catalina, officially released in October 2019, was a mess. ... The biggest issue was that all kinds of apps simply stopped working. ... Peripherals like mice, keyboards and printers stopped working. Email went missing; iCloud backups failed; users were constantly harassed by login requests; updates didn’t update ... ... So came for the first update to its new system one week after the main launch which fixed some, but not all, of the issues. ... Version two came in December 2019 and fixed some of those issues, but not all. ... More bug fixes came with version three in January 2020, but the OS seemed to have finally stabilized; something that was then spectacularly undone with version .4. ... Then we had the “supplemental update” to version 10.15.4, which fixed some, but not all, of the problems – most significantly the problem with Finder and transferring large files. And, amazingly, appeared to undo the good work that had been done with website security and broke SSH for some users. But now, with version point-five this week, that problem appears to have been sorted and, of course, your battery might last longer too.

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Stopping Alert Volume Going To 100%
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 20 Jan '21

20 Jan '21

For quite a while now, I’ve been annoyed by the system notification volume going to 100% on my Debian systems, regardless of my attempts to set it to a lower level. For example, when I open the KDE System Settings app, change something, then try to close the window, the sound that accompanies the save/discard/cancel alert is always startlingly loud. I think I have finally found a fix: in your /etc/pulse/daemon.conf, put in a line saying flat-volumes = no (You should find an existing comment “; flat-volumes = yes” that indicates the default.) You can make this new setting take effect in the current session immediately without having to logout or reboot, by executing the following as the currently-logged-in user: pulseaudio -k (This kills and restarts the PulseAudio daemon for your user session.) There are several discussions of the pros and cons of this issue online, going back some years. For example, here <https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1265267>. Also a mention about the “flat-volumes” setting in the ever-reliable Arch Linux Wiki here <https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/PulseAudio>.

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Random Firefox Tweaks
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 12 Dec '20

12 Dec '20

Been looking at various settings changes you can make in the “about:config” page in Firefox. Here are a couple I have found useful: * keyword.enabled -- set to false to stop Firefox trying to do a search on the contents of the address box if it doesn’t match a URL. This is why I have a search box separate from the address box. * browser.fixup.alternate.enabled -- set to false to stop it helpfully tacking on “www.” and “.com” if the original URL you type doesn’t work. I have occasionally been confused by it complaining about not finding a URL, but showing a different one from the one I typed. By the way, when you first try to view this page, Firefox shows you a warning to ensure you understand the consequences of messing about with settings at this level. It remembers it has shown you this warning by adding the following line to the prefs.js file in your profile: user_pref("browser.aboutConfig.showWarning", false); Firefox seems to overwrite this file when it quits, and reloads it when it is launched again.

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NZ Govt Unveils “Algorithm Charter”
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 22 Sep '20

22 Sep '20

The Charter <https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/28/new_zealand_algorithm_charter/> requires Government departments who sign on to it to “maintain transparency” about the algorithms they use, but does not make them reveal the actual details of these algorithms. Nor does it explain what it means by an “algorithm”.

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How Qualcomm Shook Down The Cell Phone Industry For Almost 20 Years
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 15 Aug '20

15 Aug '20

A pretty sobering read <https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/05/how-qualcomm-shook-down-the-cel…>: Qualcomm's first weapon against competitors: patent licensing terms requiring customers to pay a royalty on every phone sold—not just phones that contained Qualcomm's wireless chips. Sound familiar? Judge Koh draws a direct parallel to licensing behavior that got Microsoft in legal trouble in the 1990s. Microsoft would offer PC makers a discount if they agreed to pay Microsoft a licensing fee for every PC sold—whether or not the PC shipped with a copy of MS-DOS. This effectively meant that a PC maker had to pay twice if it shipped a PC running a non-Microsoft operating system. There’s a lot more--the article reads like a catalogue of gangster-like tactics. All of which is perfectly all right under the US interpretation of “Free Enterprise”, of course ... Also, reading the details of how Qualcomm managed to sabotage Intel’s efforts to develop 5G chips, it seems to me that Qualcomm is directly responsible for the situation today where US companies are lagging behind Chinese ones like Huawei in 5G capability.

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Allowing PBL'ed IP addresses in Postfix
by David McNab 31 Jul '20

31 Jul '20

Hi, Has anyone had experience with configuring Postfix to allow inbound client SMTP connections from NZ-based IP addresses that have been Policy Block Listed (PBL'ed) by their ISP? Spark have PBL'ed most or all of their home and small business fibre/*DSL connection IP addresses. 2degrees have PBL'ed most/all of their cellular data IP addresses. I'm trying to support a user to send email from their cellphone email client. Cheers David

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Bug In Grub2 Breaks Secure Boot (Yawn)
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 30 Jul '20

30 Jul '20

Seems a vulnerability has been found in everyone’s favourite bootloader <https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2020/07/new-flaw-neuters-sec…> which allows a bypass of the “Secure Boot” mechanism in modern UEFI-based machines. But given that so many other bypasses already exist, nobody seems especially worried about this. For example, the article references an attempt by Microsoft to revoke the certification of (an obsolete version of) a secure bootloader from Kaspersky Lab with a vulnerability in it; the revocation caused so many headaches for users that it had to be rolled back.

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NoiseTorch
by Peter Reutemann 28 Jul '20

28 Jul '20

Hi everyone Angus mentioned NoiseTorch at last night's meeting as a way of avoiding noise from being recorded when using microphones: 'NoiseTorch is an easy to use open source application for Linux with PulseAudio. It creates a virtual microphone that suppresses noise, in any application. Use whichever conferencing or VOIP application you like and simply select the NoiseTorch Virtual Microphone as input to torch the sound of your mechanical keyboard, computer fans, trains and the likes.' -- source: https://github.com/lawl/NoiseTorch Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Hackers Stole GitHub and GitLab OAuth Tokens From Git Analytics Firm Waydev
by Peter Reutemann 28 Jul '20

28 Jul '20

'Waydev, an analytics platform used by software companies, has disclosed a security breach that occurred earlier this month. From a report: The company says that hackers broke into its platform and stole GitHub and GitLab OAuth tokens from its internal database. Waydev, a San Francisco-based company, runs a platform that can be used to track software engineers' work output by analyzing Git-based codebases. To do this, Waydev runs a special app listed on the GitHub and GitLab app stores. When users install the app, Waydev receives an OAuth token that it can use to access its customers' GitHub or GitLab projects. Waydev stores this token in its database and uses it on a daily basis to generate analytical reports for its customers. Waydev CEO and co-founder Alex Circei told ZDNet today in a phone call that hackers used a blind SQL injection vulnerability to gain access to its database, from where they stole GitHub and GitLab OAuth tokens. The hackers then used some of these tokens to pivot to other companies' codebases and gain access to their source code projects.' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/20/07/27/1918237 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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