- wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

Computer History 6/6
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 05 Mar '14

05 Mar '14

Some old classics there. But boy, have we come a long way since characters made out of spheres and cylinders...

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Computer History 4/6
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 05 Mar '14

05 Mar '14

And if you want to see how far computer graphics has come, try this one:

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Canonical Ports Chromium To The Mir Display Server
by Peter Reutemann 05 Mar '14

05 Mar '14

"Months after Intel ported the Chromium open-source web browser to Wayland, Chromium is now running on Ubuntu's Mir. The Mir display server port ended up being based on Wayland's Chromium code for interfacing with Google's Ozone abstraction framework. The Ubuntu developer responsible for this work makes claims that they will be trying to better collaborate with Wayland developers over this code." -- source: http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/03/05/1240226 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Google Won't Enable Chrome Video Acceleration Because of Linux GPU Bugs
by Peter Reutemann 04 Mar '14

04 Mar '14

"Citing 'code we consider to be permanently "experimental" or "beta,"' Google Chrome engineers have no plans on enabling video acceleration in the Chrome/Chromium web browser. Code has been written but is permanently disabled by default because 'supporting GPU features on Linux is a nightmare' due to the reported sub-par quality of Linux GPU drivers and many different Linux distributions. Even coming up with a Linux GPU video acceleration white-list has been shot down over fear of the Linux video acceleration code causing stability issues and problems for Chrome developers. What have been your recent experiences with Linux GPU drivers?" -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/14/03/04/1926233 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Bug In the GnuTLS Library Leaves Many OSs and Apps At Risk
by Peter Reutemann 04 Mar '14

04 Mar '14

"According to this article at Ars Technica, '[A] bug in the GnuTLS library makes it trivial for attackers to bypass secure sockets layer (SSL) and Transport Layer Security (TLS) protections available on websites that depend on the open source package. Initial estimates included in Internet discussions such as this one indicate that more than 200 different operating systems or applications rely on GnuTLS to implement crucial SSL and TLS operations, but it wouldn't be surprising if the actual number is much higher. Web applications, e-mail programs, and other code that use the library are vulnerable to exploits that allow attackers monitoring connections to silently decode encrypted traffic passing between end users and servers.' The coding error may have been present since 2005." -- source: http://it.slashdot.org/story/14/03/04/2150223 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Ars walkthrough: Using the ZFS next-gen filesystem on Linux
by Peter Reutemann 04 Mar '14

04 Mar '14

"There are lots of options for running ZFS, and very little of this walkthrough will really depend on your use of Ubuntu in particular or even Linux in general. You can always visit http://zfsonlinux.org directly for help with the initial installation if you prefer RHEL or Fedora or Arch or what have you--and if you're a BSD fan, ZFS is available from the base installer in either PC-BSD or in the latest 10.0 release of FreeBSD itself." -- source: http://bit.ly/1filf41 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Tor develops its own anonymous IM tool to hide chat from spying eyes
by Peter Reutemann 03 Mar '14

03 Mar '14

"The Tor Foundation is moving forward with a plan to provide its own instant messaging service. Called the Tor Instant Messaging Bundle, the tool will allow people to communicate in real time while preserving anonymity by using chat servers concealed within Tor's hidden network." -- source: http://goo.gl/BUjLY7 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Latvian hospital uses GNU/Linux
by Peter Reutemann 03 Mar '14

03 Mar '14

"The Children's Hospital in Riga, Latvia uses GNU/Linux for most of its tasks. Around 2003, the hospital deployed openSUSE on some of its machines and installed a basic HIS (Hospital Information System) on it. Later, they developed their own HIS, and moved their new services to Xen virtualization servers. (An HIS is a software used to manage all the data and operations of a hospital in an integrated fashion.) Currently, the hospital has about 600 workstations, and over half of them run Ubuntu." -- source: http://www.muktware.com/2014/02/latvian-hospital-uses-gnulinux/21851 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Raspberry Pi marks 2nd birthday with plan for open source graphics driver
by Peter Reutemann 03 Mar '14

03 Mar '14

'The Raspberry Pi Foundation, with help from chipmaker Broadcom, is laying out a path toward an open source graphics driver for the tiny computer. Broadcom today "announced the release of full documentation for the VideoCore IV graphics core, and a complete source release of the graphics stack under a 3-clause BSD license," Raspberry Pi creator Eben Upton wrote in a blog post.' -- source: http://bit.ly/1kKjhP2 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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The first Ubuntu 14.04 'Trusty Tahr' beta
by Peter Reutemann 03 Mar '14

03 Mar '14

"The first Beta of Trusty Tahr (to become 14.04 LTS) has now been released for testers and early adopters. This beta features images for Edubuntu, Kubuntu, Lubuntu, Ubuntu GNOME, Ubuntu Kylin, Ubuntu Studio, Xubuntu and the Ubuntu Cloud images. These are not to be used as stable systems but please do test for bugs to report. Always ensure your system is up to date before reporting bugs." -- source: http://lwn.net/Articles/588871/ Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Android Presentation
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 26 Feb '14

26 Feb '14

I suppose it’s time to start thinking about my presentation on Android development on 24th March. I’ll bring a couple of my own devices (must remember a USB cable as well...). If I can have access to the demo machine about an hour before the presentation, I can install the Android SDK on it—I normally put that just in my own user directory. However, I’ve found I have trouble accessing connected devices unless I launch the ADB server as root. I can pull down various bits of sample code off GitHub and developer.android.com. I’ve been able to do Java compilations with OpenJDK as a replacement for Sun JDK. I assume we can project the desktop machine display for everyone to see, but I’m not so sure how we do that with an Android device. (My devices may speak some version of MHL, if that helps.) Or we could run sample apps on an emulator on the desktop machine?

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Saturday Linux workshop
by Bruce Kingsbury 20 Feb '14

20 Feb '14

I'll be running another Saturday Linux Workshop tomorrow; February 22nd, 2014 10:00 am - 2:00 pm *Te Whare O Te Ata* 60a Sare Cres Hamilton, 3214 07 8557804 This is a GNU/Linux-focused workshop where people can bring their PCs, Pi's, Android devices etc for trouble-shooting and to learn or try out new skills. All visitors welcome - light lunch provided - gold coin donation appreciated

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Ubuntu store apps won't work across mobile and desktop in 14.04
by Peter Reutemann 14 Feb '14

14 Feb '14

One of Canonical's main goals in bringing Ubuntu to mobile devices is to create a converged platform across smartphones, tablets, and PCs. As such, a developer should be able to write an app that has a single code base yet runs on all three types of devices, presenting a different interface to the user on each form factor. ... Technically, this has already been achieved [with Unity 8]. ... The current goal is to get Unity 8 on the desktop in 14.10, "but we are always assessing our roadmap and reviewing what is realistic," Bacon wrote.' -- source: http://bit.ly/1jdrISm Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Wine On Android Starts Allowing Windows Binaries On Android/ARM
by Peter Reutemann 13 Feb '14

13 Feb '14

"Wine on Android is happening slowly but surely ... Wine is now in a state to be able to run your favorite Windows (x86) game on your Android-powered ARM device, assuming the game is Windows Solitaire. Wine has been making progress on Android to allow simple applications to run on Wine, but they have run into some challenges, as noted in the annual talk at FOSDEM." -- source: http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/14/02/10/0251201 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Godot Game Engine Released Under MIT License
by Peter Reutemann 12 Feb '14

12 Feb '14

"Godot is a fully featured, open source, MIT licensed, game engine. It focuses on having great tools, and a visual oriented workflow that can deploy to PC, Mobile and Web platforms with no hassle. The editor, language and APIs are feature rich, yet simple to learn. Godot was born as an in-house engine, and was used to publish several work-for-hire commercial titles. With more than half a million lines of code, Godot is one of the most complex Open Source game engines at the moment, and one of the largest commitments to open source software in recent years. It allows developers to make games under Linux (and other unix variants), Windows and OSX." -- source: http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/02/10/2332205 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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What Are the Weirdest Places You've Spotted Linux?
by Peter Reutemann 11 Feb '14

11 Feb '14

"Bryan Lunduke recently pulled together a collection of the weirdest places he's found Linux, from installations in North Korea and the International Space Station to a super-computer made out of Legos and computer engineer Barbie. Seen any weird places for Linux not mentioned in this list?" -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/14/02/11/174210 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Red Hat Hires CentOS Developers
by Peter Reutemann 11 Feb '14

11 Feb '14

"Karanbir Singh and a handful of other CentOS developers are now full-time Red Hat employees, working in-house on the CentOS distribution with more transparent processes and methods. None of the CentOS developers will be working on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The CentOS project would become another distribution and community cared for by Red Hat, like Fedora, and Red Hat CTO Brian Stevens says the company is planning its future around OpenStack, not just Linux." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/14/02/11/157217 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Growing the Linux Community
by Peter Reutemann 11 Feb '14

11 Feb '14

"An unfortunate truth of the Linux community is that sometimes the most enthusiastic proponents of desktop Linux are the biggest hindrance to adoption on a wider scale. Nothing illustrates this point clearer than reading through the comments of posts that are either suggesting change or are simply disparaging the concept. Two such articles were recently published, David Gewirtz, writing for ZDNet lists five reasons he would rather run Windows 8 than Linux at the end of January, and Jack Wallen suggests talking about Linux in a language we can all understand on TechRepublic, also a ZDNet site. Neither article is that interesting in itself, but the comment stream of each reveals much about the state of the community." -- source: http://ostatic.com/blog/growing-the-linux-community Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Kingsoft Office For GNU/Linux Looks As Good As MS Office, Performs Even Better!
by Danial Jose 09 Feb '14

09 Feb '14

Hi All, I installed Kingsoft Office on my Ubuntu powered laptop and found it pretty good. There are three applications in the suite as below - - Kingsoft Writer – MS Word alternative - Kingsoft Spreadsheet – MS Excel alternative - Kingsoft Presentation – MS PowerPoint alternative Kingsoft Office is very much compatible with new versions of MS Office. I tried to open many .docx and .xlsx files in Kingsoft Office, and I can say that compatibility is around 95% even for the complex documents. Best part is that the user interface of Kingsoft Office is very similar to MS Office including the Ribbon interface. In fact, you can think of Kingsoft Office almost a clone of MS Office. This will reduce the learning curve for the new users who have recently migrated from Windows to GNU/Linux. One more useful feature is that multiple documents can be opened in Tabs so there is no need of switching between multiple windows. Don't believe me? Try out the Kingsoft Office yourself! http://wps-community.org/download.html "If you like our product, tell your friends, if you don't, please tell us! > (^_^)" http://wps-community.org/forum/ http://goo.gl/LwaMwe http://goo.gl/dyisOc http://goo.gl/hfMGHG Cheers, Danial José

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Adobe Flash Remote Code Execution Flaw Exploited In the Wild
by Peter Reutemann 09 Feb '14

09 Feb '14

"Adobe has released an emergency patch for a critical vulnerability affecting Flash Player for Windows, Linux, and OS X, the exploitation of which can result in an attacker gaining remote control of the victims' systems. The flaw is being actively exploited in the wild, but apart from crediting its discovery to researchers Alexander Polyakov and Anton Ivanov of Kaspersky Labs, no details about the ongoing attack has been shared." -- source: http://it-beta.slashdot.org/story/14/02/05/1421229 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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bmon: Real-time Network Traffic Monitor (Console) for Ubuntu Linux
by Peter Reutemann 07 Feb '14

07 Feb '14

Was looking for a "graphical" network traffic monitor (of live traffic) for the console today and came across "bmon". More info and screenshot in the following blog post: http://www.hecticgeek.com/2012/03/bmon-real-time-network-traffic-ubuntu-lin… What is your favorite tool? Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Ubuntu Could Get a New File Manager as Development Model Shifts
by Peter Reutemann 04 Feb '14

04 Feb '14

"For some time now, the folks at Canonical, and particularly Mark Shuttleworth, have been discussing delivering Ubuntu with a development model that keeps the OS converged for use on desktop, mobile and server devices. We've been waiting to see granular evidence of how this kind of unified development might work, and a new discussion forum post titled Default File Manager with Unity8 in Future Desktops provides an example. It lays out requirements for a new file manager to be developed for Unity 8 for desktops and laptops. This would actually be the Ubuntu Touch file manager, now in development." -- source: http://ostatic.com/blog/ubuntu-could-get-a-new-file-manager-as-development-… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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LibreOffice 4.2 Busts Out GPU Mantle Support and Corporate IT Integration
by Peter Reutemann 30 Jan '14

30 Jan '14

"In catching up with MS Office, the new LibreOffice 4.2 now has full Windows 7/8 integration including Aero peek, thumbnails, jumplists, and recent documents all from the taskbar. In addition, one weak area for LibreOffice has been enterprise network support and the lack of active directory tools: LibreOffice now has GPO and active directory support for system administrators to deploy and manage LibreOffice over corporate networks. LibreOffice also includes an expert configuration Window to assist power users and system administrators when deploying to hundreds of workstation at a time." -- source: http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/01/30/1654234 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Re: [wlug] wlug Digest, Vol 271, Issue 17
by Mark H. Jones 30 Jan '14

30 Jan '14

> Actually, it is documented in xkeyboard-config(7). The following should > work: > > setxkbmap -options shift:both_capslock > > The Colemak layout can be obtained with: > > setxkbmap -layout 'us(colemak)' > > I would put the above into /etc/default/keyboard (if on a Debian like > system) as > > XKBLAYOUT="us" > XKBVARIANT="colemak" > XKBOPTIONS="shift:both_capslock" > > (untested but that is what I gather from the man file). > > Cheers > Michael. Perfect - now it takes effect before GDM starts. No more switching layouts to enter my login password after a reboot. Thanks Michael.

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Re: [wlug] How to Kill the Caps Lock on your Linux Desktop
by Mark H. Jones 29 Jan '14

29 Jan '14

A while ago I switched to the Colemak keyboard layout which replaces the Caps Lock key with an additional backspace. Most of the time not having Caps Lock was fine but occasionally I find myself having to write whole words in capitals (esp. when programming) which was a pain. If you're using the Gnome desktop environment (or if you load gnome-settings in the background for those using a tiling window manager) you can set the Caps Lock to be toggled by pressing both Shift keys simultaneously. For me this was a huge productivity booster. To do this via Gnome: open the system settings -> Keyboard -> Layout Settings -> Options -> Miscellaneous compatibility options and tick "Both Shift-Keys together toggle Caps Lock" If anyone knows how to achieve this via command line, without gnome-settings, please share.

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How to Kill the Caps Lock on your Linux Desktop
by Peter Reutemann 28 Jan '14

28 Jan '14

"I really liked being free of the intrusive Caps Lock, since I'm not a very good typist; I look down at the keys a lot, and if I've hit the lock by mistake it can be half a line or more before I notice. Anyway, with Disable suddenly unavailable I did some searching and found that the function of the Caps Lock key could be replaced by adding a script to xmodmap." -- source: http://www.linux.com/learn/tutorials/758968 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Does Anyone Make a Photo De-Duplicator For Linux? Something That Reads EXIF?
by Peter Reutemann 24 Jan '14

24 Jan '14

"Imagine having thousands of images on disparate machines. many are dupes, even among the disparate machines. It's impossible to delete all the dupes manually and create a singular, accurate photo image base? Is there an app out there that can scan a file system, perhaps a target sub-folder system, and suck in the images-- WITHOUT creating duplicates? Perhaps by reading EXIF info or hashes? I have eleven file systems saved, and the task of eliminating dupes seems impossible." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/14/01/23/2227241 Worthwhile reading the comments, mentioning various tools. Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Passing of Michael McDonald
by Ian McDonald 24 Jan '14

24 Jan '14

Hello all I'm sorry to let you know that Dad passed away on the 12th January and I know many of you knew him. Over the years he enjoyed his time at WLUG going to many meetings, helping with Ubuntu install days etc. He was a strong believer in open source and converted hundreds of machines to Linux and other open source software such as Firefox, LibreOffice. Ian

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Pear OS gone
by Peter Reutemann 23 Jan '14

23 Jan '14

'David Tavares, founder of Pear OS, apparently messaged the other day on Google+ that the Ubuntu-based distribution would no longer be available for download. According to Softpedia.com, "Mr. Tavares sold the Pear OS distribution to an undisclosed company that will develop the Linux-based operating system for its own products."' -- source: http://ostatic.com/blog/pear-departure-bodhi-fundraiser-and-mageia-4-rc Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Scientists detect “spoiled onions” trying to sabotage Tor privacy network
by Peter Reutemann 22 Jan '14

22 Jan '14

"Computer scientists have identified almost two dozen computers that were actively working to sabotage the Tor privacy network by carrying out attacks that can degrade encrypted connections between end users and the websites or servers they visit." -- source: http://bit.ly/1hKCdw4 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Fwd: [nzpug] Re: python users in Hamilton
by Bruce Kingsbury 22 Jan '14

22 Jan '14

This might be of interest to WLUG too; ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: William Mckee <will(a)artcontrol.me> Date: 22 January 2014 13:53 Subject: Re: [nzpug] Re: python users in Hamilton To: "nzpug(a)googlegroups.com" <nzpug(a)googlegroups.com> Hello I have been organizing some Python classes to start happening in Hamilton. These will be every Wednesday from 6pm till 8pm at ‘Te Whare o Te Ata’ Community House, 60A Sare Crescent, Fairfield, Hamilton, New Zealand (map<https://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=%E2%80%98Te+Wh…> ) The first class will be held on 12th February 2014. It's a great spot - 10 computers (and a pi!) are running Debian. All skill levels welcome. Free of charge. Come along and meet fellow python people and let's build some awesome software. Thanks, William Mckee On 18/10/2013 2:07 PM, "Eric Light" <eric(a)ericlight.com> wrote: > Myself and two others from Gravity Computing are likely to get there! We > don't do Python commercially, but we've been dabbling. :-) > On 18/10/2013 1:20 PM, "Chris O'Halloran" <cmoman(a)gmail.com> wrote: > >> Hi Bruce >> >> I suggest you suggest a time and place and we'll see if can get a show of >> hands of potential attendees. >> >> Enough people have commented on this thread that there is definitely some >> interest. >> >> Is there a project available at your venue to do "show and tell" >> >> Cheers, >> >> Chris >> >> >> On 17 October 2013 15:11, William Mckee <will(a)artcontrol.me> wrote: >> >>> Hello. >>> I am interested in helping out and getting something happen in Hamilton >>> with Python classes/meetups. >>> Currently I spent the majority of my days working on projects in IPython >>> Notebook in a Linux environment. >>> It would be great to meet you Bruce (and anyone else) and discuss. >>> Here's my github: https://github.com/wcmckee >>> >>> Thanks, >>> William Mckee >>> >>> -- >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >>> Groups "New Zealand Python User Group" group. >>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >>> an email to nzpug+unsubscribe(a)googlegroups.com. >>> To post to this group, send email to nzpug(a)googlegroups.com. >>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/nzpug. >>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >>> >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "New Zealand Python User Group" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to nzpug+unsubscribe(a)googlegroups.com. >> To post to this group, send email to nzpug(a)googlegroups.com. >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/nzpug. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >> > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "New Zealand Python User Group" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to nzpug+unsubscribe(a)googlegroups.com. > To post to this group, send email to nzpug(a)googlegroups.com. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/nzpug. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "New Zealand Python User Group" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to nzpug+unsubscribe(a)googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to nzpug(a)googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/nzpug. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.

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FreeBSD 10.0 Released
by Peter Reutemann 21 Jan '14

21 Jan '14

"FreeBSD 10.0 has been released. A few highlights include: pkg is now the default package management utility. Major enhancements in virtualization, including the addition of bhyve, virtio, and native paravirtualized drivers providing support for FreeBSD as a guest operating system on Microsoft Hyper-V. Support for the high-performance LZ4 compression algorithm has been added to ZFS and TRIM support for SSD has been added to ZFS. clang is the default compiler. This release has official Raspberry Pi support. For a complete list of new features and known problems, please see the online release notes and a quick FreeBSD installation video is here. FreeBSD 10.0-RELEASE may be downloaded via ftp or via a torrent client that supports web seeding." -- source: http://bsd.slashdot.org/story/14/01/20/1731239 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Proposal for Android Presentation
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 20 Jan '14

20 Jan '14

Possible things I can talk about in an Android presentation: * Using Android: UI conventions, vendor customization * Structure of Android: Linux kernel, use of processes and user IDs, Toolbox Shell * Programming Android: app (APK) structure, Java & Dalvik, Bionic runtime, privilege model, SDK, NDK (for C/C++ code), platform APIs, OpenGL-ES * Hacking Android: AOSP, alternative ROMs This can be whittled down. :)

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WLUG AGM: tonight
by Peter Reutemann 20 Jan '14

20 Jan '14

Hi everyone The Waikato Linux Users Group Incorporated will hold the AGM tonight at 7pm. Agenda: - President's Report - Treasurer's Report - Adoption of updated charter - Election of 2014 Committee - Consumption of pizza Depending on how quick we tick off the points on the agenda, Ian might give a short presentation on Map Tiles and Bash. Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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OpenBSD Moving Towards Signed Packages
by Peter Reutemann 19 Jan '14

19 Jan '14

"It's official: 'we are moving towards signed packages,' says Theo de Raadt on the misc@ mailing list. This is shortly after a new utility, signify, was committed into the base tree. The reason a new utility had to be written in the first place is that gnupg is too big to fit on the floppy discs, which are still a supported installation medium for OpenBSD. Signatures are based on the Ed25519 public-key signature system from D. J. Bernstein and co., and his public domain code once again appears in the base tree of OpenBSD, only a few weeks after some other DJB inventions made it into the nearby OpenSSH as well." -- source: http://bsd.slashdot.org/story/14/01/19/0124202 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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WLUG AGM: tomorrow
by Peter Reutemann 19 Jan '14

19 Jan '14

Hi everyone The Waikato Linux Users Group Incorporated will hold the AGM on tomorrow at 7pm. Agenda: - President's Report - Treasurer's Report - Adoption of updated charter - Election of 2014 Committee - Consumption of pizza Depending on how quick we tick off the points on the agenda, Ian might give a short presentation on Map Tiles and Bash. Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Linux workshop and raspberry jam!
by Bruce Kingsbury 18 Jan '14

18 Jan '14

Just a reminder to all; I'll be running a Saturday Workshop and Raspberry Jam again this year, on the fourth Saturday of every month. Which means the next one is; January 25, 2014 10:00 am – 2:00 pm *Te Whare O Te Ata* 60a Sare Cres Hamilton, 3214 07 8557804 This is a GNU/Linux-focused workshop where people can bring their PCs, Pi's, Android devices etc for trouble-shooting and to learn or try out new skills. And William Mckee will be along to talk about our new Python classes that are starting this year. All visitors welcome, light lunch provided, gold coin donation appreciated

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Charter amendments
by Michael Ryan 17 Jan '14

17 Jan '14

> I'm a bit worried about the last bullet-point of Section 4: > > "Attempting to exploit or misuse the society or members of the society for pecuniary gain" > > I'm not a lawyer, but on face value, this seems to include into "ground for expulsion" a very wide range of arguably legitimate behaviours such as: > > Inviting a fellow member to be a partner in a tech startup > Offering one's services to another member as a prospective employee or contractor > Getting technical help via the WLUG mailing list regarding (say) Apache or PostgreSQL, to help him/her develop a for-profit website > > Can someone offer clarification? > > Cheers > David I agree - there are a number of existing rules that are quite specific where I think greater generality would work better. Because of the potential for unfairness I was tempted to make the provisions about expulsion more detailed also - expanding on the right of the member proposed to be expelled, to be able to respond to allegations - but decided the situation of an expulsion was most unlikely to arise and didn't presently warrant more complexity in the charter. In this particular provision, "misuse" is fairly clear as involving an improper intention, but "exploit" is not so objectionable. Making a profit from the exploiter's association with WLUG - the "for pecuniary gain" bit - might merely involve describing a useful relationship, or might for example involve pretending to have an endorsement. It would be better to lose the effect of the specific description in that line by substituting it with, say, "Bringing the society into disrepute" (which I believe would apply to my example, if the good name of WLUG was being associated with some private financial punt). Any comments? I've also found another amendment that could be made - in Rule 7 the word "earlier" should be inserted in the first sentence of the fourth paragraph before "resign", so the sentence reads "Officers and committee members whether elected or appointed shall hold office until the next Annual General Meeting or, earlier, resign or are removed by the committee under Rule 4." "earlier" is intended to apply to both resignation and removal. It avoids the alternative amendment of hanging off the end of the sentence an addition saying "whichever happens first". Regards Michael Ryan Ryan Law Solicitors ph (07) 889 8041 fax (07) 889 8709 DX GA24027 P.O. Box 104 Morrinsville, New Zealand ph (07) 884 0002 fax (07) 884 0039 DX GA24502 P.O. Box 77 Te Aroha, New Zealand This communication is confidential and may contain privileged or copyright material. If you are not the intended recipient, please do not use, disclose, copy or retain it. If you have received it in error, we apologise and would appreciate your advising us by return email and your deleting the email and any printed form you may have made of it. We do not guarantee the integrity of this communication, or that it is free from errors, viruses, or interference arising from its method of transmission.

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Amendments to the charter
by Michael Ryan 15 Jan '14

15 Jan '14

I've attached in .pdf format my suggestions for amendments to the present charter. It's best viewed in colour; the amendments are in blue. For anyone interested, I have the original text version available in latex format. Most of the amendments are additions I suggest be included in the charter, either to clarify matters capable of being mis-interpreted or simply not clear; some are amendments previously adopted by the group but not yet registered with the Registrar of Incorporated Societies. Comments and further amendments are welcome. Regards Michael Ryan Ryan Law Solicitors ph (07) 889 8041 fax (07) 889 8709 DX GA24027 P.O. Box 104 Morrinsville, New Zealand ph (07) 884 0002 fax (07) 884 0039 DX GA24502 P.O. Box 77 Te Aroha, New Zealand This communication is confidential and may contain privileged or copyright material. If you are not the intended recipient, please do not use, disclose, copy or retain it. If you have received it in error, we apologise and would appreciate your advising us by return email and your deleting the email and any printed form you may have made of it. We do not guarantee the integrity of this communication, or that it is free from errors, viruses, or interference arising from its method of transmission.

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WLUG AGM: Monday 20th Jan 2014
by Rene Bartosh 12 Jan '14

12 Jan '14

Hi everyone The Waikato Linux Users Group Incorporated will hold the AGM on January 20th at 7pm. Agenda: - President's Report - Treasurer's Report - Adoption of updated charter - Election of 2014 Committee - Consumption of pizza Regards Rene

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OpenSUSE Forums Defaced, Email Addresses Leaked
by Peter Reutemann 08 Jan '14

08 Jan '14

"The openSUSE Forums were hijacked yesterday. An alleged Pakistani hacker who goes by handle H4x0r HuSsY reportedly exploited a vulnerability in the vBulletin 4.2.1 software SuSE uses to host the forum. vBulletin is a proprietary forum software. The openSUSE team notes that user passwords were not compromised. 'Credentials for your openSUSE login are not saved in our application databases as we use a single-sign-on system (Access Manager from NetIQ) for all our services. This is a completely separate system and it has not been compromised by this crack. What the cracker reported as compromised passwords where indeed random, automatically set strings that are in no way connected to your real password.' It's shocking to learn that SUSE/openSUSE are using proprietary forum software vBulleting as well as proprietary single sign on solution." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/14/01/08/1656231 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Ubuntu developer builds Pirate Bay torrent search into operating system
by Peter Reutemann 07 Jan '14

07 Jan '14

"With support from Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth, a third-party Ubuntu developer is building a torrent search project that may be enabled by default in future versions of the operating system." -- source: http://bit.ly/1cOblWw Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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SteamOS 1.0 is Here, Based on Debian 7.1
by Peter Reutemann 29 Dec '13

29 Dec '13

'SteamOS 1.0 was made available for download today through Valve-owned steampowered.com. In the SteamOS FAQ, we discover that SteamOS 1.0 is based on Debian 7.1 stable. Some of the changes for Steam include backporting eglibc 2.17 from Debian testing, updating the kernel to 3.10.11, and auto-updates from the Valve SteamOS repos. Valve chose Debian because they felt it "is the best way for Valve to deliver a fully custom SteamOS experience" to its customers.' -- source: http://ostatic.com/blog/steamos-1-0-is-here-based-on-debian-7-1 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Explore Linux Heritage With Beautiful Data Visualizations
by Peter Reutemann 27 Dec '13

27 Dec '13

"A favorite hobby of mine is exploring the history of Unix and Linux, so its no surprise that I find this graph, named the GNU/Linux Distribution Timeline (GLDT for short) on Wikimedia fascinating. The graph clearly shows how the big three distributions, Debian, Slackware, and Red Hat, have branched out to over five hundred other distributions, including Ubuntu, openSUSE, Mandriva, Knoppix, and many, many others." -- source: http://ostatic.com/blog/explore-linux-heritage-with-beautiful-data-visualiz… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Minty Day in the Linuxsphere
by Peter Reutemann 27 Dec '13

27 Dec '13

"I'm still lazily using Mint 15, quite happily (until I read these reviews, that is), but others in the blogosphere have been singing the praises of the recently released Mint 16. Most interestingly has been the reported "superb performance" of Mint 16 KDE. Other called Mint 16 Cinnamon "P-p-p-perfect!" Perhaps it's reports like these causing Jim Lynch to ask if Mint is the most popular distribution out there." -- source: http://ostatic.com/blog/minty-day-in-the-linuxsphere Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Scientists Extract RSA Key From GnuPG Using Sound of CPU
by Peter Reutemann 19 Dec '13

19 Dec '13

"In their research paper titled RSA Key Extraction via Low-Bandwidth Acoustic Cryptanalysis, Daniel Genkin, Adi Shamir and Eran Tromer et al. present a method for extracting decryption keys from the GnuPG security suite using an interesting side-channel attack. By analysing the acoustic sound made by the CPU they were able to extract a 4096-bit RSA key in about an hour (PDF). A modern mobile phone placed next to the computer is sufficient to carry out the attack, but up to four meters have been successfully tested using specially designed microphones." -- source: http://it.slashdot.org/story/13/12/18/2122226 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Fedora 20 Released
by Peter Reutemann 18 Dec '13

18 Dec '13

"The Fedora Project has announced the release of Fedora 20, code named Heisenbug (release notes). Fedora 20 is dedicated to Seth Vidal, the lead developer of Yum and the Fedora update repository, who recently died in a road accident. Gnome is the default DE of Fedora, and so it is for Fedora 20. However unlike Ubuntu (where they had to create different distros for each DE) Fedora comes with KDE, XFCE, LXDE and MATE. You can install the DE of your choice on top of base Fedora." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/12/17/1614254 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Munich Open Source Switch 'Completed Successfully'
by Peter Reutemann 13 Dec '13

13 Dec '13

"Munich's switch to open source software has been successfully completed, with the vast majority of the public administration's users now running its own version of Linux, city officials said today. In one of the premier open source software deployments in Europe, the city migrated from Windows NT to LiMux, its own Linux distribution. LiMux incorporates a fully open source desktop infrastructure. The city also decided to use the Open Document Format (ODF) as a standard, instead of proprietary options. Ten years after the decision to switch, the LiMux project will now go into regular operation, the Munich City council said." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/12/12/1813202 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Ubuntu Touch OS Finally Finds a Smartphone Partner
by Peter Reutemann 11 Dec '13

11 Dec '13

"Canonical has been very bold over the past years about expressing plans to bring Ubuntu to new kinds of devices, ranging from smartphones to TVs to tablets. It also recently went on a widely publicized campaign to get an Ubuntu phone crowdfunded. Now, in what may represent a milestone for the company, Mark Shuttleworth has told CNET that Ubuntu Touch OS has won its first smartphone partner. The partner focused on the Linux-based mobile operating system isn't named, but we will reportedly see high-end phones next year." -- source: http://ostatic.com/blog/report-ubuntu-touch-os-finally-finds-a-smartphone-p… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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Canonical Moving Away From GNOME Control Center
by Peter Reutemann 11 Dec '13

11 Dec '13

"This announcement comes from the ubuntu-desktop mailing list. Due to GNOME Control Center already being a heavily patched version in Ubuntu, Canonical is planning to found their own fork called Unity Control Center. This would be a fork with a limited lifespan and later on they would move to something called Ubuntu System Settings, an in-house project. For now, a PPA has been set up to test the new fork." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/12/11/1814220 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174

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