- wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

Geo – A Simple BASH Utility To Get Network And Geolocation Details
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'A while ago, we wrote a blog post about “Bash-Snippets”, a set of BASH scripts for heavy command-line users. Those scripts consists of many useful utilities such as crypt, geo, cheat, weather, ytview and more. Using bash-Snippets, you can install all utilities or a particular one. In this brief guide, we are going to discuss about only one utility in the Bash-Snippets called “Geo”. It is used to display wan, lan, router, dns, mac address, and geolocation output, with clean stdout for piping.' -- source: https://www.ostechnix.com/geo-simple-bash-utility-get-network-geolocation-d… 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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Oracle Finally Killed Sun
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'The news from the ex-Sun community jungle drums is that the January rumours were true and Oracle laid off the core talent of the Solaris and SPARC teams on Friday (perhaps hoping to get the news lost in the Labor Day weekend). With 90% gone according to Bryan Cantrill that surely has to mean either a skeleton-staffed maintenance-only future for the product range, especially with Solaris 12 cancelled, or an attempt to force Solaris workloads onto Oracle’s SPARC Cloud offering. A classic Oracle “silent EOL”, no matter what they claim as they satisfy their contractual commitments to Fujitsu and others. ' -- source: https://meshedinsights.com/2017/09/03/oracle-finally-killed-sun/ 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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Linux Mint 18.3 to Launch with Revamped Backup Tool, Window Progress, and More
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Last month, we reported that development of Linux Mint 18.3 kicked off with HybridSleep support for the Cinnamon desktop environment, HiDPI support and GTK3 porting for the Software Sources tool, as well as the revamp of the Software Manager graphical package manager, which was also ported to latest GTK+ 3 technologies. And now, the Linux Mint creator reveals the fact that Linux Mint 18.3 will be shipping with a revamped Backup Tool that won't require root anymore, offers a much easier to use interface that no longer requires you to select the type or source of a backup, and it's capable of backing up your entire Home directory. The tool will restore files in their initial location, with the same permissions and timestamps.' -- source: http://news.softpedia.com/news/linux-mint-18-3-to-launch-with-revamped-back… 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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To Linux Mint KDE 18.2… and back
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Linux Mint KDE is just one of several flavours of Linux Mint, and obviously not the flagship of this distribution. However, I liked that distribution in my test of the Live version of Linux Mint KDE 18.2. I liked it so much that I decided to give it a go in installed mode. How was that? Let’s check.' -- source: http://linuxblog.darkduck.com/2017/09/to-linux-mint-kde-182-and-back.html 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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Vulnerabilities Discovered In Mobile Bootloaders of Major Vendors
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Android bootloader components from five major chipset vendors are affected by vulnerabilities that break the CoT (Chain of Trust) during the Android OS boot-up sequence, opening devices to attacks. The vulnerabilities were discovered with a new tool called BootStomp, developed by nine computer scientists from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Researchers analyzed five bootloaders from four vendors (NVIDIA, Qualcomm, MediaTek, and Huawei/HiSilicon). Using BootStomp, researchers identified seven security flaws, six new and one previously known (CVE-2014-9798). Of the six new flaws, bootloader vendors already acknowledged five and are working on a fix. "Some of these vulnerabilities would allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code as part of the bootloader (thus compromising the entire chain of trust), or to perform permanent denial-of-service attacks," the research team said (PDF). "Our tool also identified two bootloader vulnerabilities that can be leveraged by an attacker with root privileges on the OS to unlock the device and break the CoT."' -- source: https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/17/09/05/0257221 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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Android One Is Anything But Dead, Google Reaffirms With Xiaomi Mi A1
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Google executives shared the stage with Xiaomi chiefs at a media event in New Delhi on Tuesday as the Chinese phone maker unveiled its "new flagship" Mi A1 smartphone. Google's presence at the event was essential. Xiaomi's Mi A1 is the latest phone to be launched under Google's Android One program, a three-year-old initiative from Google, which in the past year has been presumed dead by many. It's anything but that, Google executives said. The Xiaomi Mi A1 smartphone features a 5.5-inch full-HD (1080x1920 pixels) display. It also offers a duo of 12-megapixel rear cameras, one with telephoto capability and 2X optical zoom feature. On the front, for the selfie enthusiasts is a 5-megapixel shooter. The dual-SIM capable Mi A1 smartphone houses a Snapdragon 625 octa-core SoC, 4GB of RAM, 64GB internal storage, IR blaster, a 3080mAh battery, a fingerprint scanner, modems for 4G LTE bands in its gold- and black-coloured thin, full-metal unibody form factor. It is priced at $235, and will be available in dozens of markets including Mexico, India, Indonesia, Russia, and Singapore.' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/17/09/05/1014235 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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With Android Oreo, Google Is Introducing Linux Kernel Requirements
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'As is easy to tell by comparing versions of Android from different handset manufacturers, developers are -- broadly speaking -- free to do whatever they want with Android, but with Oreo, one aspect of this is changing. Google is introducing a new requirement that OEMs must meet certain requirements when choosing the Linux kernel they use. Until now, as pointed out by XDA Developers, OEMs have been free to use whatever Linux kernel they wanted to create their own version of Android. Of course, their builds still had to pass Google's other tests, but the kernel number itself was not an issue. Moving forward, Android devices running Oreo must use at least kernel 3.18, but there are more specific requirements to meet as well. Google explains on the Android Source page: "Android O mandates a minimum kernel version and kernel configuration and checks them both in VTS as well as during an OTA. Android device kernels must enable the kernel .config support along with the option to read the kernel configuration at runtime through procfs."' -- source: https://linux.slashdot.org/story/17/09/03/1653227 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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78 Open Source Replacements for Expensive Applications
by Peter Reutemann 04 Sep '17

04 Sep '17

'Back when Datamation first started making lists of open source software that could replace expensive proprietary applications, most commercial software came in a box and required a flat fee for purchase. These days, with the advent of cloud computing and software as a service, most applications require a regular monthly or yearly subscription. Those subscriptions make it seem like software has become more affordable. After all, $10 or $20 a month doesn't seem like a lot. But when you add up those repeating fees, users often pay more under the new subscription plans than they did under the old flat-fee arrangements. If you use a lot of different applications, those fees can quickly add up. And it can be particularly hard to justify the expense for a piece of software that you only use once in a while. Open source software offers an alternative to paying those high fees. And in many cases, the open source options are as good as or better than the comparable commercial, proprietary solutions. In fact, in the most recent BlackDuck Future of Open Source Survey, the top reasons why people said they use open source software were because of the features, freedom from vendor lock-in and the quality of the solutions. Price and total cost of ownership weren't even on the list. In other words, people are using open source because the software is so good, and the fact that it is free is just a side benefit. The list below includes a variety of open source software for home users, SMBs and large enterprises. All of these applications can replace commercial products that can carry high prices. Even if buyers choose to purchase support or other services for their open source software, the open source options are generally much more affordable than the comparable proprietary solutions.' -- source: http://www.datamation.com/open-source/78-open-source-replacements-for-expen… 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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Almost-OT: Linux Comic
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 02 Sep '17

02 Sep '17

There is this peculiar subgenre of art featuring characters called “OS-tans”. These are personifications of operating systems. I’m not sure how their characters and adventures relate to the OSes for which they are named, but anyway here is one about a character named Linux: <https://bellacielo.deviantart.com/gallery/33067628/Linux-Comic-Complete>.

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The Most Epic Tech-Support Call In History
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 02 Sep '17

02 Sep '17

Scott Manley tells the story <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSSmNUl9Snw> of how the Apollo 14 mission was saved by a truly remarkable bit of computer hacking. You might be thinking: “Have you tried turning it off and on again?” Apollo 10 did that. And there were the computer crashes (“1202 alarm” and “1201 alarm”) during the Apollo 11 landing. But 14 was being stymied by an intermittently-shorting abort switch: if that triggered at the wrong time, the mission was over. And the software couldn’t be reprogrammed, since it was all woven (literally) into ROM. So a bright young guy named Don Eyles was woken up in the middle of the night, and over the space of a couple of hours he put together a sequence of manual patches to the writable memory to temporarily disable the abort switch at crucial moments, with further patches necessary to deal with the consequences of this elsewhere in the code. The astronauts had to follow the instructions and key in the numbers exactly as given. (Upload? What upload?) This included having to manually crank the descent engine up to full thrust at the right time, because the automatic program for doing so would not be working. Anyway, as history records, they successfully made it down to the lunar surface, and back home again. Mission accomplished.

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