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The March Of (In)Security
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 25 Apr '15

25 Apr '15

Bruce Schneier has said “Today's top-secret programs become tomorrow's PhD theses and the next day's hacker tools”. And not long after that, a graduate homework assignment. The NSA was desperate to prevent any exposure of its top-secret “QUANTUM” packet-injection technology. But all this effort was futile, because others had already invented the same thing, including China’s “Great Cannon”, which was used to attack GitHub recently. The only protection is end-to-end encryption. <https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/04/the_further_dem.html>

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X2Go: An Open Source Remote Desktop Solution For Linux
by Peter Reutemann 23 Apr '15

23 Apr '15

"X2Go is an Open Source remote desktop application for GNU/Linux that uses NX technology protocol. The main difference between X2Go and other remote desktop applications is it provides secure standalone remote desktop sessions via SSH. So, each session connected using X2Go is strongly encrypted and safe. X2Go allows you mainly to connect to Linux systems from Linux, Windows, or Mac OS systems. Also, many clients can simultaneously connect and use single X2Go server. It comes with two components, namely X2Go server and X2Go client. X2Go server is a system that is being accessed from a client system. And, the X2Go is a system which can be used to access the X2Go server. This Client will be able to connect to X2Go server(s) and start, stop, resume and terminate (running) desktop sessions. X2Go Client stores different server connections and may automatically request authentication data from LDAP directories. Furthermore it can be used as fullscreen loginscreen (replacement for loginmanager like xdm)." -- source: http://www.unixmen.com/x2go-an-open-source-remote-desktop-solution-for-linu… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Lubuntu 15.04 released
by Peter Reutemann 23 Apr '15

23 Apr '15

'The developers of the Lubuntu distribution have announced the availability of Lubuntu15.04. Lubuntu is built using packages from the Ubuntu repositories and features the LXDE desktop. This release of Lubuntu offers nine months of support and focuses on minor bug fixes as the development team prepares the distribution for a switch to the newer LXQt desktop environment. "New Features in Lubuntu 15.04: General bug fix release as we prepare for LXQt; Many LXDE components have been updated with bug fix releases; An update of the artwork (more icons, theme update, more compatibilities." Lubuntu is available in two editions, one edition for most desktop computers and an "Alternative" edition for computers featuring less than 400MB of RAM.' -- source: http://distrowatch.com/?newsid=08906 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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8 Linux file managers to try
by Peter Reutemann 23 Apr '15

23 Apr '15

"One of the most common administrative tasks that end users and administrators alike need to perform is file management. Managing files can consume a major portion of your time. Locating files, determining which files and folders (directories) are taking the most disk space, deleting files, moving files, and simply opening files for use in an application are some of the most basic—yet frequent—tasks we do as computer users. File management programs are tools that are intended to streamline and simplify those necessary chores." -- source: http://opensource.com/business/15/4/eight-linux-file-managers My gripes with Caja (MATE's equivalent of Nautilus) is that it cannot handle lots of files in a directory. A directory containing 10s of thousands of files will bring the file browser to a stand still for several minutes. Midnight commander takes less than a second for the same directory. Krusader is pretty good as well, with 1-2 seconds. Nice thing about Krusader: both panels can have multiple tabs, making it quite versatile. Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Fedora 23 to Use Wayland and Python 3 by Default, Will Be Released in Fall 2015
by Peter Reutemann 23 Apr '15

23 Apr '15

"The Beta version of the forthcoming Fedora 22 Linux computer operating system was released on April 21, as reported by Softpedia, but it is time now to look at some of the features to be implemented in the next major release of the Red Hat-sponsored distribution, Fedora 23. Therefore, among the highlights announced for Fedora 23, we can mention that the next-generation Wayland display server will be used by default for the Workstation edition, which will most probably be built around the GNOME 3.18 desktop environment. Python 3 will also be used by default in the Workstation edition, and a Vagrant image will be provided for Fedora 23 Atomic Host and Cloud spins. The Vagrant boxes have been designed to be compatible with the Oracle VirtualBox and KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine) virtualization software." -- source: http://news.softpedia.com/news/Fedora-23-to-Use-Wayland-and-Python-3-by-Def… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Debian 8.0 “Jessie” To Be Released This Weekend
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 23 Apr '15

23 Apr '15

Looks like the new version of Debian Stable is in imminent release... <http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Debian-Jessie-CD-Ready>

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Wi-Fi software security bug could leave Android, Windows, Linux open to attack
by Peter Reutemann 22 Apr '15

22 Apr '15

"In an e-mail today to the Open Source Software Security (oss-security) mailing list, the maintainer of wireless network client code used by Android, the Linux and BSD Unix operating systems, and Windows Wi-Fi device drivers sent an urgent fix to a flaw that could allow attackers to crash devices or even potentially inject malicious software into their memory. The flaw could allow these sorts of attacks via a malicious wireless peer-to-peer network name." -- source: http://bit.ly/1bjWGtn Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Development Activity In LibreOffice Versus OpenOffice
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 22 Apr '15

22 Apr '15

LWN has a comparison <http://lwn.net/Articles/637735/> of the relative health of the two main OpenOffice forks. Summary: in the last 4½ years, one project has done precisely two releases, while the other has managed over a dozen. In the last year, one has received contributions from just 16 developers, while the other has benefited from the work of around 16 times that number.

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meeting next Monday
by Peter Reutemann 21 Apr '15

21 Apr '15

Hi everyone We have a meeting coming up next Monday: "Due to the positive feedback on Baden Delamore's demonstration of Kali back in February, there will be a follow up to, delving deeper into the world of (in-)security." http://www.meetup.com/WaikatoLinuxUsersGroup/events/221426689/ 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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NCR Unveils Android For ATMs
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 16 Apr '15

16 Apr '15

NCR is offering an Android-based platform for operating cash machines, called “Kalpana”. Unlike the multiple gigabytes of RAM needed to run Windows, this one only needs a fraction of a gigabyte. The company is also claiming significantly lower maintenance costs. <http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/04/15/ncr_android_atm/> However, open-source or not, I’m still not convinced the question has been fully answered: what happens to devices running older versions once the vendor drops support?

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