- wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

Why Linux-Based Steam Machines Won’t Have A “Suspend” Function
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 19 Aug '15

19 Aug '15

Current proprietary game consoles typically have a “sleep” mode, to allow faster startups than booting from a complete power-off. It turns out <http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/08/steam-machines-wont-have-a-suspend-fu…> that Valve’s Steam machines are unable to offer such a facility, for quite a subtle technical reason <http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=7855261&cid=50329207>: it’s because, when the Linux kernel wakes up from sleep, it forgets about all the USB devices it saw before, and rediscovers them all as though for the first time. This prevents applications (i.e. games) from preserving the state of devices like game controllers.

1 0

No Meeting On 24th?
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 19 Aug '15

19 Aug '15

Is there a WLUG meeting on the fourth Monday of this month?

2 3

IBM’s New “LinuxONE” Ubuntu Mainframe
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 18 Aug '15

18 Aug '15

<http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/08/ubuntu-coming-to-main…> ... can "scale up to 8,000 virtual machines or hundreds of thousands of containers—currently the most of any single Linux system" ... And it won’t be limited to 26 drive letters.

1 0

Windows 10 From a Linux User's Perspective
by Peter Reutemann 13 Aug '15

13 Aug '15

"I've spent quite a bit of time testing out Windows 10 on a secondary computer. And like any operating system upgrade, the change takes a bit to get used to. Since I feel more comfortable with Linux distributions than with Windows, I thought it would be interesting to see what Microsoft has done since Windows 7 and 8. In this article, I'll walk you through how I see Windows 10. What it did well, where it falls flat on its face and how this appears to a hardcore Linux enthusiast." -- source: http://www.linuxtoday.com/infrastructure/windows-10-from-a-linux-users-pers… 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/

1 0

Te Whare O Te ATA (Fairfield) computer lab
by Roderick Aldridge 11 Aug '15

11 Aug '15

Disappointing news about the computer lab in the annexe at Te Whare O Te Ata Fairfield/Chartwell Community House. The trustees have decided to use the annexe as a classroom. Manager Mike Rarere says the only practical option for the lab machines is for some of them (probably 6 or fewer) to be in the main lounge. The lounge schedule means that we could only have regular scheduled sessions on Monday and Friday mornings. Do you want to be involved in running this? It should be easier to do, although it is only a fraction of the former setup. Roderick Aldridge.

3 2

LibreOffice under the hood: progress to 5.0
by Peter Reutemann 08 Aug '15

08 Aug '15

"Today we release LibreOffice 5.0.0, a new foundation for ongoing work over the next months and years. It also has a fine suite of new features for people to enjoy - you can read and enjoy all the great news about the user visible features from so many great hackers, but there are, as always, many contributors whose work is primarily behind the scenes, and a lot of work that is more technical than user-facing. That work is, of course, still vitally important to the project." -- source: https://people.gnome.org/~michael/blog/2015-08-05-under-the-hood-5-0.html Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

3 2

EFF Releases Privacy Badger an Addon That Algorithmically Blocks Online Trackers
by Peter Reutemann 07 Aug '15

07 Aug '15

"Online tracking has become a pervasive invisible reality of the modern web. Most sites you load are likely to be full of ads, tracking pixels, social media share buttons, and other invisible trackers all harvesting data about your web browsing. These trackers use cookies and other methods to read unique IDs associated with your browser, the result being that they record all the sites you visit as you browse around the internet. This sort of tracking is invisible to most web users, meaning they never get the option to agree to or opt-out of it. Today the EFF has launched the 1.0 version of Privacy Badger, an extension designed to prevent these trackers from accessing unique info about you and your browsing." -- source: http://yro.slashdot.org/story/15/08/07/0139241 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/

1 0

Bye-Bye 32 Bits?
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 06 Aug '15

06 Aug '15

The Fedora project <http://phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Fedora-i686-Non-Blocking> has noticed that very few of its users seem to be on 32-bit systems nowadays. This was shown by a kernel bug that went undetected for two months, that prevented 32-bit x86 systems from even booting. Time to relegate 32-bit machines to the junk pile?

2 2

New attack on Tor can deanonymize hidden services with surprising accuracy
by Peter Reutemann 03 Aug '15

03 Aug '15

"Computer scientists have devised an attack on the Tor privacy network that in certain cases allows them to deanonymize hidden service websites with 88 percent accuracy. Such hidden services allow people to host websites without end users or anyone else knowing the true IP address of the service. The deanonymization requires the adversary to control the Tor entry point for the computer hosting the hidden service. It also requires the attacker to have previously collected unique network characteristics that can serve as a fingerprint for that particular service. Tor officials say the requirements reduce the effectiveness of the attack. Still, the new research underscores the limits to anonymity on Tor, which journalists, activists, and criminals alike rely on to evade online surveillance and monitoring." -- source: http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/07/new-attack-on-tor-can-deanonymize-h… 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/

1 0

Maybe don't smash your phone just yet
by Ian Young 30 Jul '15

30 Jul '15

Random browsing on the interwebs. Is this the year of a free cellphone OS? Alas I fear not. But we can dream. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/07/27/android_phone_text_flaw/ https://dot.kde.org/2015/07/25/plasma-mobile-free-mobile-platform Mentioned on the blog of Barry Kauler of Puppy Linux. Currently latest entry. http://bkhome.org/news/ Maybe you want an Android PC? http://www.slashgear.com/jide-tries-again-remix-mini-does-android-pc-153931… http://www.androidpolice.com/2015/07/17/jide-tech-is-back-on-kickstarter-wi…

2 2