- wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

ATM machine
by Ian Stewart 30 Oct '13

30 Oct '13

For those who remember the Bitkoin presentation at wlug a couple of years ago... It seems to be a currency that continues to develop. If you are in Vancouver you can now use the worlds first Bitkoin ATM. According to an article in today's The Guardian newspaper... "With the Bitkoin ATM, users scan their hand to confirm identity, then funds move to or from a virtual wallet on their smartphone." "The system limits transfers to $1,000 a day, in an effort to curb money laundering and other fraud." "Bitkoin is not a recognised currency in Canada, so Ottawa's anti-money laundering watchdog, the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre, does not monitor its trade." ... I don't know if Bitkoins are recognised as a currency in NZ, but I do know that the Waikato Uni's mail system that we are using currently blocks e-mails in which the word "Bitkoin" is spelt correctly! cheers, Ian.

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Ubuntu's Mark Shuttleworth Wins Austria's Big Brother Award
by Peter Reutemann 28 Oct '13

28 Oct '13

"Austria's Big Brother Awards awarded the coveted Big Brother Award to Ubuntu's founder Mark Shuttleworth for Ubuntu Dash's privacy reducing online extensions to local searches." -- source: http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/10/28/2210220 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 To Replace SysVinit, Switch To Systemd Or Upstart
by Peter Reutemann 28 Oct '13

28 Oct '13

"Debian has been one of the last holdouts using SysVinit over a modern init system, but now after much discussion amongst Debian developers, they are deciding whether to support systemd or Upstart as their default init system. The Debian technical committee has been asked to vote on which init system to use, which could swing in favor of using Upstart due to the Canonical bias present on the committee." -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/10/28/1621219 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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Using DSH (Distributed Shell) to Run Linux Commands Across Multiple Machines
by Peter Reutemann 25 Oct '13

25 Oct '13

"Systems Administrators know all too well the importance of being able to monitor and administer numerous machines in a short time, and preferably, with as little running around as possible. Whether it is a small cloud environment, or an enormous server cluster, the ability to centrally manage computers is essential. To partly accomplish this, I am going to show you how to use a nifty little tool called DSH that allows a user to run commands over multiple machines." -- source: http://www.tecmint.com/using-dsh-distributed-shell-to-run-linux-commands-ac… 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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xen 4.2 on ubuntu 13.04
by Jonathan Wood 25 Oct '13

25 Oct '13

Hi all I am trying to get my xen machine to pass through the usb devices to a windows vm and now I keep getting pt_pci_read_config: [00:05:0] Error: Failed to read register with invalid access size alignment. [Offset:0eh][Length:4] in my vm log can anyone please help

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Te Whare o Te Ata Monthly Linux Workshop
by Bruce Kingsbury 25 Oct '13

25 Oct '13

Just a reminder to all; I'm running my own independent Saturday Workshops. October 26, 2013 10:00 am – 2:00 pm *Te Whare O Te Ata* 60a Sare Cres Hamilton, 3214 07 8557804 A Linux-focused workshop where people can bring their PCs 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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Torvalds: Free OS X Is No Threat To Linux
by Peter Reutemann 24 Oct '13

24 Oct '13

"Apple is now offering upgrades to the latest version of OS X for free. When Linux inventor Linus Torvalds was asked whether this threatened Linux (presumably by someone who had only a passing knowledge of all the things 'free' can mean when applied to software) it gave him an opportunity for a passionate defense of open source. Torvalds also says that he'll keep programming until it gets 'not interesting,' which hasn't happened yet." -- source: http://apple.slashdot.org/story/13/10/24/1324234 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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PHP.net Compromised
by Peter Reutemann 24 Oct '13

24 Oct '13

"The open source PHP project site was compromised earlier today. The site appears to have been compromised and had some of its Javascript altered to exploit vulnerable systems visiting the website. Google's stop-badware system caught this as well and flagged php.net as distributing malware, warning users whose browsers support it not to visit the site. The comment by a Google employee over the hacker news thread (official Google webmaster forum thread) seems to suggest that php.net wasn't incorrectly flagged." -- source: http://it.slashdot.org/story/13/10/24/1858200 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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Torvalds: SteamOS Will 'Really Help' Linux On the Desktop
by Peter Reutemann 23 Oct '13

23 Oct '13

"Linus Torvalds has welcomed the arrival of Valve's Linux-based platform, SteamOS, and said it could boost Linux on desktops. The Linux creator praised Valve's 'vision' and suggested its momentum would force other manufacturers to take Linux seriously — especially if game developers start to ditch Windows. Should SteamOS gain traction among gamers and developers, that could force more hardware manufacturers to extend driver support beyond Windows. That's a sore point for Torvalds, who slammed Nvidia last year for failing to support open-source driver development for its graphics chips. Now that SteamOS is on the way, Nvidia has opened up to the Linux community, something Torvalds predicts is a sign of things to come. 'I'm not just saying it'll help us get traction with the graphics guys,' he said. 'It'll also force different distributors to realize if this is how Steam is going, they need to do the same thing because they can't afford to be different in this respect. They want people to play games on their platform too.'" -- source: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/10/23/184236 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 On a Nexus 7: "Almost Awesome"
by Peter Reutemann 23 Oct '13

23 Oct '13

"I installed Ubuntu Touch "1.0" on my first-generation Nexus 7 tablet and have been using it as my main tablet system for the last four days. Here's how it went. First off, the installation was surprisingly painless. I followed the official instructions and didn't encounter a single problem. That being said, the installation is really geared toward software developers, power users or people already comfortable on a Linux command line. If you're not in one of those categories, I recommend holding off for the time being. Once installed, Ubuntu Touch booted up rather quickly — in only just a few seconds (a fair bit faster than Android 4.x on the same tablet). And, immediately, I was presented with a short tutorial that appears the first time the system is booted, which, I might add, has got to be one of the slickest, least annoying tutorials I've seen. But... there were problems. The battery life was, to put it mildly, terrible. Performance has been mixed, and the OS was prone to what I call 'The Pulsating Seizure Feature' a few dozen times over the weekend. In a nutshell: launching apps (and, occasionally, moving between apps) can cause the device to freeze and begin flashing the screen rapidly." -- source: http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/13/10/22/1344209 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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