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Linus Torvalds Hopes Intel's AVX-512 'Dies A Painful Death'
by Peter Reutemann 13 Jul '20

13 Jul '20

'"Linux creator Linus Torvalds had some choice words today on Advanced Vector Extensions 512 (AVX-512) found on select Intel processors," reports Phoronix: In a mailing list discussion stemming from the Phoronix article this week on the compiler instructions Intel is enabling for Alder Lake (and Sapphire Rapids), Linus Torvalds chimed in. The Alder Lake instructions being flipped on in GCC right now make no mention of AVX-512 but only AVX2 and others, likely due to Intel pursuing the subset supported by both the small and large cores in this new hybrid design being pursued. The lack of seeing AVX512 for Alder Lake led Torvalds to comment: I hope AVX512 dies a painful death, and that Intel starts fixing real problems instead of trying to create magic instructions to then create benchmarks that they can look good on. I hope Intel gets back to basics: gets their process working again, and concentrate more on regular code that isn't HPC or some other pointless special case. I've said this before, and I'll say it again: in the heyday of x86, when Intel was laughing all the way to the bank and killing all their competition, absolutely everybody else did better than Intel on FP loads. Intel's FP performance sucked (relatively speaking), and it matter not one iota. Because absolutely nobody cares outside of benchmarks. The same is largely true of AVX512 now - and in the future... After several more paragraphs, Torvalds reaches his conclusion. "Stop with the special-case garbage, and make all the core common stuff that everybody cares about run as well as you humanly can." Phoronix notes that Torvalds' comments came "just weeks after he switched to AMD Ryzen Threadripper for his primary development rig."' -- source: https://linux.slashdot.org/story/20/07/12/1729255 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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Whither Dotnet Core?
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 10 Jul '20

10 Jul '20

From <https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/09/net_core_still_a_microsoft/>, people are wondering why there isn’t a greater uptake of Microsoft’s cross-platform, open-source versions of Dotnet and C#: "What's up with non-.NET developers thinking C# is a Windows only, corporate bloatware language? It's not 2005 any more." Yeah, but it’s not clear why we would want *cross-platform* bloatware ...

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“I Am Not A Number!”
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 10 Jul '20

10 Jul '20

>From <https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/09/bork/>: Your updated gas balance is: £NaN “We want ... calculation.” “You won’t get it!” “By hook or by crook, we will.”

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Chrome and Firefox Are Getting Support For the New AVIF Image Format
by Peter Reutemann 10 Jul '20

10 Jul '20

'The new lightweight and royalty-free AVIF image format is coming to web browsers. Work is almost complete on adding AVIF support to Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox. From a report: The new image format is considered one of the lightest and most optimized image compression formats, and has already gained praise from companies such as Netflix, which considers it superior to existing image formats such as JPEG, PNG, and even the newer WebP. The acronym of AVIF stands for AV1 Image File Format. As its name hints, AVIF is based on AV1, which is a video codec that was developed in 2015, following a collaboration between Google, Cisco, and Xiph.org (who also worked with Mozilla). At the time, the three decided to pool their respective in-house video codecs (VPX, Thor, and Daala) to create a new one (AV1) that they planned to offer as an open-source and royalty-free alternative to all the commercial video codecs that had fragmented and clogged the video streaming market in the late 2000s and early 2010s.' -- source: https://news.slashdot.org/story/20/07/09/202235 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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Google Creates “Open Usage Commons”
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 09 Jul '20

09 Jul '20

From <https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/08/google_trademarks_open_usage_commons/>, Google is creating an organization specifically to deal with trademark issues, entirely separate from code. FSF Europe’s Alexander Sander says: “Trademarks issues are becoming more and more relevant for Free Software. This development is mainly due to the fact that Free Software is increasingly and successfully used in the commercial sector.” True, that. Consider the stoush between Debian and Mozilla over the “Firefox” trademark and branding, and the consequent creation of the “Iceweasel” fork. (Looks like that was eventually resolved amicably.) However, note this counterpoint from the Linux Foundation: "Under US trademark law you are not able to effectively separate ownership of a project mark from control of the underlying open source project."

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Over 100 Wi-Fi Routers Fail Major Security Test -- Protect Yourself Now
by Peter Reutemann 09 Jul '20

09 Jul '20

'Tom's Guide: Using its own analytical software, the [Fraunhofer Institute] tested the most recently available firmware for 117 home Wi-Fi models currently sold in Europe, including routers from ASUS, D-Link, Linksys, Netgear, TP-Link, Zyxel and the small German brand AVM. The models themselves were not physically tested. A full list of the tested models and firmware is on GitHub. The institute was not able to examine the firmware of 10 more models, mostly from Linksys. The report notes (PDF) that many firmware updates are issued without fixing known flaws. So what can you do? You can make sure that the next router you buy automatically installs firmware updates. You can check to see whether your current router does so, or makes it fairly easy to install firmware updates manually. You should also make sure that the administrative password for your router has been changed from the factory default password. (Check the list of default passwords at https://www.routerpasswords.com.) You should also check its administrative interface to make sure that UPnP and remote access are disabled. And if your router was first released more than 5 years ago, consider buying a newer model unless it meets all of the above criteria. Alternatively, you could try to "flash" your older router to run more secure open-source router firmware such as OpenWrt, DD-WRT or Tomato. "The worst case regarding high severity CVEs [widely known flaws] is the Linksys WRT54GL powered by the oldest kernel found in our study," the report said, noting that this model uses the 2.4.20 kernel from 2002. "There are 579 high severity CVEs affecting this product." "That particular model last had its firmware updated in January 2016, one of the oldest firmwares in the study," adds Tom's Guide. "The Linksys WRT54GL was first released in 2005 and is still sold today, even though it handles Wi-Fi protocols only up to 802.11g. However, the WRT54G series is possibly the best-selling family of Wi-Fi routers ever..."' -- source: https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/20/07/08/2058240 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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Google and Canonical Bring Flutter Apps To Linux and the Snap Store
by Peter Reutemann 09 Jul '20

09 Jul '20

'Google is partnering with the Ubuntu Desktop team at Canonical to bring Linux support to its open source UI framework Flutter. Today's Linux alpha announcement also means Flutter developers can now deploy their apps to the Snap Store. Flutter group product manager Tim Sneath argues this is a big milestone because UI frameworks rarely become versatile and powerful enough for an operating system to depend on. He pointed to Windows being written in C++ rather than .NET, even for applets like the Calculator. Sneath also believes this shows Canonical is willing to invest in a first-class way to build apps for Linux, making Flutter on Linux an official part of Ubuntu. Additionally, enterprises can feel confident about picking Flutter -- it's more evidence of its longevity and technical excellence, Sneath said.' -- source: https://linux.slashdot.org/story/20/07/08/1722203 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 Company SUSE Outbids Competitors for Fast-growing Startup Rancher Labs
by Peter Reutemann 09 Jul '20

09 Jul '20

'SUSE, a Linux distribution company controlled by private equity firm EQT, has agreed to acquire Rancher Labs, a start-up with technology that helps organizations run software in virtual containers across many servers. From a report: The companies announced the deal Wednesday but didn't disclose the terms. Two people familiar with the deal said SUSE is paying $600 million to $700 million. The transaction suggests that even during a recession, demand remains high for technology that can enable companies to operate more efficiently. Talks between the companies began in the spring, and the process became competitive with additional bids, Ursheet Parikh, a partner at Rancher backer Mayfield Fund, told CNBC on Tuesday. There were "lots of Zoom calls," Parikh said. In the past few years, with the rise of start-ups such as Docker, containers became a trendy alternative to more traditional virtualization technology for running applications on each computer server in a company data center. Amazon, Microsoft and other cloud providers came out with services that developers can use to place code in containers, and in 2017 SUSE introduced its own service for managing containers. The companies haven't finalized integration plans as the deal still faces regulatory approval.' -- source: https://linux.slashdot.org/story/20/07/08/147202 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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Mozilla Suspends Firefox Send Service While It Addresses Malware Abuse
by Peter Reutemann 09 Jul '20

09 Jul '20

'Mozilla has temporarily suspended the Firefox Send file-sharing service as the organization investigates reports of abuse from malware operators and while it adds a "Report abuse" button. The browser maker took down the service today after ZDNet reached out to inquire about Firefox Send's increasing prevalence in current malware operations. Since last year, several malware operations have hosted payloads on the service. This includes ransomware gangs like REvil/Sodinokibi, financial crime crews like FIN7, the Zloader and Ursnif banking trojans operations, and government surveillance groups targeting human rights defenders. Reasons include the fact that Firefox Send doesn't have an Report Abuse mechanism, all file uploads are encrypted (useful to dodge malware scanners), and the Firefox URL is whitelisted in most orgs (useful for bypassing email filters).' -- source: https://news.slashdot.org/story/20/07/08/1811228 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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LibreOffice Getting More Commercial?
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 08 Jul '20

08 Jul '20

Seems that a major policy announcement is coming up from The Document Foundation (the outfit behind LibreOffice) on July 15th. In the meantime, some hints have (unintentionally) leaked out <https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/07/libreoffice_community_protests_at_in…>, such as the about-box in LO 7.0 saying “The personal edition is supported by volunteers and intended for individual use”.

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