- wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

Linux migration proposal for Berlin rejected
by Peter Reutemann 16 Jun '13

16 Jun '13

'A petition to use more open source tools in the Berlin city administration that was proposed in the federal state parliament of the State of Berlin by the German Green Party has failed. The petition was rejected with the votes of the governing SPD/CDU coalition in the "digital administration" committee tasked with its evaluation. The Green Party's plan had included a migration to free and open source software on 25 per cent of the city administration's workstations and a comprehensive switch of all servers to Linux in a similar fashion to Munich's LiMux project.' -- source: http://h-online.com/-1888130 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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32bit support of 64bit crunchbang
by Peter Reutemann 14 Jun '13

14 Jun '13

For the crunchbangers among you... Getting 32-bit support going on a 64-bit crunchbang is a bit more fiddly than on an Ubuntu install (ia32-libs is labeled as "broken"). The following post explains how to be able to install ia32-libs after all: http://crunchbang.org/forums/viewtopic.php?pid=277918#p277918 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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Debian Says Remove Unofficial Debian-Multimedia.org Repository From Your Sources
by Peter Reutemann 14 Jun '13

14 Jun '13

Debian warns on its blog: "The unofficial third party repository Debian Multimedia stopped using the domain debian-multimedia.org some months ago. The domain expired and it is now registered again by someone unknown to Debian. (If we're wrong on this point, please sent us an email so we can take over the domain! This means that the repository is no longer safe to use, and you should remove the related entries from your source.list file." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/06/14/0219213 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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KDE Plasma Can Now Run On Wayland
by Peter Reutemann 13 Jun '13

13 Jun '13

"With the upcoming KDE 4.11, there's an initial Wayland backend through the KWin manager. The author notes on his blog: 'Once the system is fully started you can just use it. If everything works fine, you should not even notice any difference, though there are still limitations, like only the three mouse buttons of my touchpad are supported ;-)'" -- source: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/06/12/1427239/kde-plasma-can-now-run-on-w… 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 and Lego Mindstorms to be united by BrickPi
by Peter Reutemann 12 Jun '13

12 Jun '13

"The Raspberry Pi will be able to talk to Lego Mindstorms sensors and motors thanks to BrickPI and its closing-soon Kickstarter campaign. The open hardware and software designs are already available for makers to work with." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1887149 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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First Look At Ubuntu Touch, the Smartphone OS
by Peter Reutemann 11 Jun '13

11 Jun '13

"The first developer preview of Ubuntu Touch – aka 'Ubuntu for Phones and Tablets' – was unveiled just a few short months ago. And, just a few weeks back, it was announced that the team was shooting for having a fully functional (aka "can use it as your actual phone, on a daily basis") version by the end of May. May is now over, so Bryan Lunduke published some screenshots and analysis of the core features of the Ubuntu OS for smartphones and tablets." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/06/11/1455219/first-look-at-ubuntu-touch… 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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gnome/mate panel with two monitors
by Mark H. Jones 10 Jun '13

10 Jun '13

Another way I have found to move panels between monitors is to disable the monitor on which the panel is displayed, thus forcing the panel to be displayed on the other (primary) monitor. After this you can re-enable the secondary monitor and the panel stays on the primary. I'm not sure if this is common knowledge or not but thought I should share. Regards, Mark

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gnome/mate panel with two monitors
by Peter Reutemann 09 Jun '13

09 Jun '13

Hi there One thing that annoyed me in Gnome/Mate and multi-monitor setup was that I seemed to end up with the panels on the wrong monitor. I still had that issue with Linux Mint 14 and there didn't seem to be an obvious option in the monitor setup like "make this screen the primary one". However, today I came across a little tip of how you can move the panel between monitors manually: - uncheck the "expand" option in the panel's properties - grab one of the handles at the end and move the panel to the other screen - check "expand" again source: http://chrisjean.com/2009/11/03/move-gnome-panels-to-a-different-monitor-in… 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 Tweak ready for Ubuntu 13.04
by Peter Reutemann 09 Jun '13

09 Jun '13

"Version 0.8.5 fixes a number of bugs under Ubuntu 13.04. The developers recommend that users of the latest Ubuntu version should upgrade their version of Ubuntu Tweak as soon as possible." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1884492 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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Calibre ebook manager converts DOCX documents
by Peter Reutemann 09 Jun '13

09 Jun '13

"The latest version, 0.9.34, of the open source cross-platform ebook manager Calibre can convert the DOCX format that is used in Microsoft Word. It also includes a new driver and an improved ebook viewer." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1884766 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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IPv6 and facebook.com, health.govt.nz
by Bruce Kingsbury 08 Jun '13

08 Jun '13

I'm using IPv6 through a SixXS tunnel and apart from two sites it works well. The two problem sites are as mentioned above, Facebook is just insanely slow for the first connection and I'm not sure why, health.govt.nzis completely unreachable for me because they filter icmpv6. I've discussed this with various people and I'm fairly confident that the problem is not at my end. So, any thoughts on how I might configure my system (debian 6) to prefer IPV4 for just those two sites but use ipv6 for everything else?

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NSA spies on you through Google, Facebook, Skype, and soon--Dropbox
by Bryan Baldwin 07 Jun '13

07 Jun '13

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/06/us-tech-giants-nsa-data

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Raspberry Pi gets new installation system
by Peter Reutemann 06 Jun '13

06 Jun '13

"To make the first-time experience with Raspberry Pi better, the foundation has helped create NOOBS to make it simple to get up and running with a selection of Linux distributions and to easily restore a system." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1883638 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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One Week With GNOME 3 Classic
by Peter Reutemann 06 Jun '13

06 Jun '13

"Stephen Gallagher, Security Software Engineer at Red Hat has completed his week long experiment running GNOME 3 Classic. Stephen writes: 'While I was never as much in love with GNOME 2 as I was with KDE 3, I found it to be a good fit for my workflow. It was clean and largely uncluttered and generally got out of my way. Now that Fedora 19 is in beta and GNOME Classic mode is basically ready, I decided that it was my duty to the open-source community to explore this new variant, give it a complete investigation and document my experiences each day.' I'll leave Stephen's opinion on the new Classic Mode to the Slashdot reader to discover, but I will say that it does touch on the much debated GNOME Shell Activities Overview, and the gnome-2-like Classic mode's Windows List on the taskbar." -- source: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/06/06/2011227/one-week-with-gnome-3-class… 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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Arch Linux developers warn of update problems
by Peter Reutemann 05 Jun '13

05 Jun '13

"The Arch Linux developers are warning users that their next update will require manual intervention to prevent system breakage. Arch is moving some directories into the /usr directory in a trend begun by the Fedora developers." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1882975 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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Changes to Radio NZ website
by Michael McDonald 01 Jun '13

01 Jun '13

Readers may be interested in reading this account of the latest changes to Radio NZ website. http://richardhulse.blogspot.co.nz/ Michael

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PC request fulfilled
by Ian Young 31 May '13

31 May '13

No more calls please, we have a lender. Ian Stewart has kindly offered a box on loan.

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Linux Mint 15 'Olivia' Is Out
by Peter Reutemann 30 May '13

30 May '13

"The Linux Mint blog today announced the full release of Linux Mint 15 'Olivia.' Here are the release notes and a list of new features. As before, it's available with either MATE or Cinnamon as a desktop environment. The included version of MATE has been upgrade to 1.6, which saw many old and deprecated packages replaced with newer technologies. Cinnamon has gone to 1.8, which improved the file manager, added support for 'desklets' (essentially desktop widgets), and completed the transition away from Gnome Control Center to Cinnamon's own settings panel. Other new features of Linux Mint 15 include improved login screen applications (one of which is an HTML greeter that supports HTML5, CSS, JavaScript, and WebGL), a tool developed from the ground up to manage software sources in Mint, and a vastly improved driver manager. The project's website sums it up simply: 'Linux Mint 15 is the most ambitious release since the start of the project.'" -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/05/29/1749205/linux-mint-15-olivia-is-out 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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loaner PC please
by Ian Young 30 May '13

30 May '13

Hello all, Just wondering whether anybody has to hand a going PC with IDE and SATA I could borrow for a relative's use for a week or so? He is computer savvy and equipped with live CDs for the mission which involves checking and blanking sundry hard drives. Alas, I appear to have gone into a kind of computer Bermuda Triangle where machines that were working when last run mysteriously pass away, and the couple I had meeting requirements appear to have become scrap metal. Anybody? Or perhaps alternatively a working motherboard w/cpu no longer required. ~ Ian Y

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Drupal.org User Accounts Compromised
by Peter Reutemann 29 May '13

29 May '13

"The Drupal.org team released a bulletin this evening notifying users of a breach in their infrastructure. From the bulletin: 'The Drupal.org Security Team and Infrastructure Team has discovered unauthorized access to account information on Drupal.org and groups.drupal.org. This access was accomplished via third-party software installed on the Drupal.org server infrastructure, and was not the result of a vulnerability within Drupal itself. This notice applies specifically to user account data stored on Drupal.org and groups.drupal.org, and not to sites running Drupal generally. Information exposed includes usernames, email addresses, and country information, as well as hashed passwords... All Drupal.org passwords are both hashed and salted, although some older passwords on some subsites were not salted.' Users are encouraged to update their Drupal.org passwords and the passwords of any accounts that could be linked via the compromised information." -- source: http://it.slashdot.org/story/13/05/29/2237230/drupalorg-user-accounts-compr… 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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Live Linux distribution shows off Wayland
by Peter Reutemann 29 May '13

29 May '13

"A Linux distribution that uses Wayland's reference compositor Weston as the default for handling its graphical user interface has been released by a developer who is only known by his screen name, "nerdopolis". Icons in the top menu bar allow users to start a terminal and Qt 5's demo browser, both of which run as native Wayland software components. Other icons start programs that are designed for X11 and use XWayland to run under the Wayland compositor; among these applications is KDE's Kicker start menu, which can be launched via the icon at the left side of the top bar." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1872444 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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presentation on crunchbang
by Peter Reutemann 29 May '13

29 May '13

Hi there In case anybody is interested... I've uploaded Monday night's presentation on CrunchBang to our elgg site: http://elgg.wlug.org.nz/file/view/2725/presentation-on-crunchbang-linux-270… 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 4.1.0 Beta 1 arrives with over a thousand changes
by Peter Reutemann 29 May '13

29 May '13

"The first beta of LibreOffice 4.1.0 includes over 1000 improvements and bug fixes, including security improvements from Coverity's scan of the code base. The release also includes the new Sidebar UI in an experimental state." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1872242 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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Foxconn reportedly building a Firefox OS smartphone
by Peter Reutemann 28 May '13

28 May '13

"Foxconn and Mozilla are planning a media event at which they will announce the new partnership around the Firefox OS mobile operating system. Devices are expected to be announced at the event, including, possibly, a tablet." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1871994 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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Vastly Improved Raspberry Pi Performance With Wayland
by Peter Reutemann 28 May '13

28 May '13

"While Wayland/Weston 1.1 brought support to the Raspberry Pi merely a month ago, work has recently been done to bring true hardware-accelerated compositing capabilities to the RPi's graphics stack using Weston. The Raspberry Pi foundation has made an announcement about the work that has been done with Collabora to make this happen. X.org/Wayland developer Daniel Stone has written a blog post about this, including a video demonstrating the improved reactivity and performance. Developer Pekka Paalanen also provided additional technical details about the implementation." -- source: http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/05/27/227242 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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meeting tonight
by Peter Reutemann 28 May '13

28 May '13

Hi there There is a wlug meeting tonight, with the following topics: - CrunchBang 11 - what's this: Peter Reutemann - Ubuntu 13.04 - what's new: Ian Stewart - Discussion: re-design of wlug.org.nz website http://elgg.wlug.org.nz/event_calendar/view/733/meeting 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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Tizen with GNOME 3 shell shown by Intel
by Peter Reutemann 26 May '13

26 May '13

"Tizen, the mobile operating system that has yet to see a device launched with it, is already widening its reach to laptops. Tizen, a Linux Foundation project with Intel and Samsung collaborating on development, is due to appear on smartphones in the latter part of the year with Tizen 2.1, which uses a Linux base layer with a user interface built using Enlightenment libraries to run HTML5-based apps. At the Tizen Developers Conference held this week though, Intel showed an early version of what will become part of Tizen 3.0 later in the year. Tizen Experts recorded a video of the Intel Tizen variant running on an i7 Ultrabook." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1868948 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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Network Engineering Q&A Site Launched
by Peter Reutemann 26 May '13

26 May '13

"Stack Exchange launched a new site for network engineers. It's in question and answer style, content is tagged for filtering and subscribing to topics. A voting system supports quality of posts, leading to so called reputation scores which determine moderation capabilities of the users. It's now 18 days in beta, at this early stage users decide which way it will go, from quality and kind of contributions up to the future design of the site. People there discuss mainly professional subjects such as the best dual-provider design for the enterprise, when to choose fiber instead of copper cabling, and efficient ways for troubleshooting switching loops." -- source: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/05/26/1243208 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 Raspberry Pi remix reborn as Pidora
by Peter Reutemann 23 May '13

23 May '13

"Seneca College has released Pidora 18, its Fedora remix optimised for the Raspberry Pi mini-computer. It features a special headless mode that makes it easy to install the distribution over the network." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1867999 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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LinuxTag: LiMux firmly established in Munich
by Peter Reutemann 23 May '13

23 May '13

'Peter Hofmann, the leader of Munich's Linux migration project, has denied rumours that the LiMux client will be "decommissioned" when the initiative runs out at the end of the year. "The City of Munich has no intention to switch", he said at the LinuxTag conference in Berlin on Wednesday. The basic instruction given by Munich's City Council in 2003 was to create more independence and autonomy for Munich's IT, said Hofmann. This task won't be completed when the project runs out in October, he explained, adding that further adjustments will be needed in the specialised application and server areas.' -- source: http://h-online.com/-1867920 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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Skype for Linux 4.2 brings interface improvements
by Peter Reutemann 22 May '13

22 May '13

"Microsoft's Skype division has released a new version of its proprietary voice, video and text messaging client for Linux that includes user interface improvements and fixes a number of bugs including a crashing problem when using the call window." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1867112 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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Arduino launches Wi-Fi board and ready-to-roll robotics platform
by Peter Reutemann 21 May '13

21 May '13

"Arduino has launched a new family of development boards and its first full robotics platform. The Arduino Yún is a Wi-Fi enabled board running Linux and the Arduino Robot is the company's first robotics platform that is fully functional out of the box." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1866147 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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Tails 0.18 can install packages on the fly
by Peter Reutemann 21 May '13

21 May '13

"The latest version of the live Debian Linux distribution for anonymity and privacy especially in repressive environments is now available with on the fly package updating and support for the latest obfuscation bridges." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1866479 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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Development plans for Ubuntu 13.10
by Peter Reutemann 21 May '13

21 May '13

"Among the topics discussed by the developers at Ubuntu Developer Summit 13.05 were the planned new features for Ubuntu 13.10. The next version of the distribution, code-named "Saucy Salamander", could include early versions of Ubuntu's Mir display server and have the Qt-based Unity Next desktop environment for testing. However, the default configuration will continue to include the graphics stack of Ubuntu 12.10 with X11, Compiz and Unity 7. By 2014, Canonical plans to unify the code base for Ubuntu's smartphone, tablet and PC desktops, based on Mir and Unity Next." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1866071 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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Jolla Announces First Meego Phone Available By End 2013
by Peter Reutemann 20 May '13

20 May '13

"Jolla, the Finnish company that continued Nokia's work on the MeeGo mobile platform, announced details of its first smartphone on Monday. Availability for the Jolla device is expected by year end and can be pre-ordered now; the phone will be priced at no more than €399 (US $512.26). The Jolla hardware looks similar to that of Nokia's Lumia, with a clean, button-less front face that houses the 4.5-inch touchcscreen. The phone will use a dual-core processor and support 4G LTE in some regions. Internal storage tops out at 16 GB, but can be expanded via microSD card. The phone also includes an 8 megapixel rear camera with auto focus. The phone is also 'Android app compliant' which, in a move similar to that of BlackBerry, can help with available apps at launch." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/05/20/1345232/jolla-announces-first-meeg… 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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upcoming meeting
by Peter Reutemann 19 May '13

19 May '13

Hi there The next wlug meeting is next week on Monday, with the following topics: - CrunchBang 11 - what's this: Peter Reutemann - Ubuntu 13.04 - what's new: Ian Stewart - Discussion: re-design of wlug.org.nz website http://elgg.wlug.org.nz/event_calendar/view/733/meeting 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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NetBSD 6.1 Has Shipped
by Peter Reutemann 19 May '13

19 May '13

"The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 6.1, the first feature update of the NetBSD 6 release branch. It represents a selected subset of fixes deemed important for security or stability reasons, as well as new features and enhancements. NetBSD is a free, fast, secure, and highly portable Unix-like Open Source operating system. It is available for a wide range of platforms, from large-scale servers and powerful desktop systems to handheld and embedded devices. Its clean design and advanced features make it excellent for use in both production and research environments, and the source code is freely available under a business-friendly license. NetBSD is developed and supported by a large and vibrant international community. Many applications are readily available through pkgsrc, the NetBSD Packages Collection." -- source: http://bsd.slashdot.org/story/13/05/19/054239/netbsd-61-has-shipped 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 Mint 15 "Olivia" gets release candidate
by Peter Reutemann 19 May '13

19 May '13

'The Linux Mint developers have announced a release candidate for Linux Mint 15. The "most ambitious release since the start of the project" includes a custom control centre application, a new screensaver tool and a number of other features.' -- source: http://h-online.com/-1864900 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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Exploit for local Linux kernel bug in circulation - Update
by Peter Reutemann 19 May '13

19 May '13

"Back in April, the Linux kernel developers fixed an incorrectly declared pointer in the Linux kernel. However, it appears that they overlooked the potential security implications of such a bug – particularly the fact that it is possible to gain access to almost any memory area using a suitable event_id. The developers only got into gear and declared the bug as an official security hole (CVE-2013-2094) after an exploit was released that proves that normal, logged-in users can gain root access this way. " -- source: http://h-online.com/-1863892 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 Developers Revisit Replacing Firefox With Chromium
by Peter Reutemann 16 May '13

16 May '13

"Expressed shortcomings of switching to Google's Chromium open-source web-browser is that data migration from Firefox isn't too obvious, extensions don't migrate between browsers, Chromium isn't supported on all architectures (e.g. PowerPC), the browser doesn't work with the Orca screen reader and doesn't integrate well for accessibility reasons, there is no native PDF plug-in, and Chromium is said to have worse performance under memory pressure. There were also some concerns expressed about differences with WebApps in Chromium. ... It looks like the switch to Chromium will happen in the name of a better user experience for the desktop with Chrome/Chromium now arguably surpassing Firefox in its features and performance while pushing Chromium as the default leads to a more consistent experience across Ubuntu form factors from phones/tablets to the desktop." -- source: http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/05/16/2037212 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 camera module now available
by Peter Reutemann 16 May '13

16 May '13

"After being in development since late last year, the Raspberry Pi camera module is available to purchase and the software to support it is now built into Raspbian." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1863706 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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50 million Apache OpenOffice downloads in a year
by Peter Reutemann 16 May '13

16 May '13

"Just a few days after the one year anniversary of the release of the first version of OpenOffice from the Apache Foundation (Apache OpenOffice 3.4) on 8 May 2012, the project can now boast 50 million downloads of the open source office suite. More than 80% of these downloads have come from Windows users, with the rest of the downloads spread between Mac OS X and Linux. Over time, the percentage of Windows users has slightly increased at the expense of Mac OS X, with Linux usage hovering steady under 5%." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1864812 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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Crunchbang mirror
by Ian Young 16 May '13

16 May '13

Anybody know of a mirror for Crunchbang? They used to list one but it's all torrents now. From time to time various kindly people have offered mirrors, but the surviving ones I've found lately are no longer current.

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Unity 8, Mir To Be Experimental Choice In Ubuntu 13.10
by Peter Reutemann 16 May '13

16 May '13

"For those Linux enthusiasts wishing to toy with the Mir Display Server and Canonical's next-generation Unity 8 interface, they will be made optionally available for desktop users with the Ubuntu 13.10 release due out in October." -- source: http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTM3MzY 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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New Yorker opens Strongbox - a Tor-based anonymous drop site
by Peter Reutemann 15 May '13

15 May '13

"The magazine's anonymous drop site is based on DeadDrop, developed by the late Aaron Swartz. Anonymity is in part ensured by only accepting connections via the Tor project's network. ... The project is available to fork fromGitHub. Although the project was designed to make secure dead-drop systems available to all, at this point the developers do say that expertise is needed to safely deploy it and the actual code still needs more work. With the first implementation now running at the New Yorker, the software will see practical use and hopefully fulfil its design goals." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1863768 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 to stop Brainstorm
by Peter Reutemann 14 May '13

14 May '13

'The collaborative ideas site is to finally close, having been left behind by changes to how Canonical design the Ubuntu operating system. Meanwhile, the company is to return the "Community" button to the top of its pages.' -- source: http://h-online.com/-1862298 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 plans dogfood-capable phones by the end of May
by Peter Reutemann 12 May '13

12 May '13

"Canonical's developers are going to dogfood the Ubuntu phone just as soon as some important features get added to the current installable images. Ubuntu VP Rick Spencer is setting out to get that done by the end of May." -- source: http://h-online.com/-1859877 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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LinuxDevices.com Vanishes From the Web
by Peter Reutemann 10 May '13

10 May '13

"Embedded Linux pioneer LinuxDevices.com departed from the web earlier this week. The site became a collateral casualty of the aquisition of eWEEK by Quinstreet in February 2012, as part of a bundle of Ziff Davis Enterprise assets. Quinstreet immediately fired all the LinuxDevices staffers and ceased maintaining the site. A few days ago, the site's plug was finally pulled and it is now gone from the Web, save for a few pages on the WayBack Machine. For more than a decade, LinuxDevices played a pivotal role in serving and fostering an emerging embedded Linux ecosystem, and it was well respected by the embedded Linux community at the time it was acquired by QuinStreet. Unfortunately, the site did not mesh well with QuinStreet's B2B market focus. Fortunately, its spirit remains alive and well at LinuxGizmos.com, a site recently launched by LinuxDevices founder Rick Lehrbaum." -- source: http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/05/09/2243250/linuxdevicescom-vanishe… 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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CrunchBang - Debian + Openbox
by Peter Reutemann 09 May '13

09 May '13

"CrunchBang is a Debian GNU/Linux based distribution offering a great blend of speed, style and substance. Using the nimble Openbox window manager, it is highly customisable and provides a modern, full-featured GNU/Linux system without sacrificing performance. The primary aim of the CrunchBang project is to produce a stable distribution offering the best possible out-of-the-box Openbox experience. To achieve this goal, CrunchBang pulls many base packages directly from Debian's repositories, which are well-known for providing stable and secure software. Packages from CrunchBang's own repositories are then customised and pinned to the system to produce what is known as the CrunchBang distro." -- source: http://crunchbang.org/about 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 Developing Its Own Package Format, Installer
by Peter Reutemann 08 May '13

08 May '13

"While complementing Debian APT/DPKG, Canonical is now developing their own package format. The new package format has promised highlights of having no dependencies between applications, each package would install to its own directory, root support wouldn't always be required, and overall a more self-contained and easier approach for developers than it stands now for Debian/Ubuntu packages. The primary users of the new packaging system would be those distributing applications built on the Ubuntu Touch/Phone SDK. The initial proof-of-concept package management system is written in Python and uses JSON representation." -- source: http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/05/08/2038243/ubuntu-developing-its-own-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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