Linux | Steve Woods

GNU’s trick-or-treat at Windows 8 launch

28/10/2012 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech
Last Friday saw the launch of Windows 8, the latest “best Windows ever” release from the Beast of Redmond.

However, the launch was not without its problems for MS, as reported by the Free Software Foundation (FSF). The FSF crashed the Windows 8 launch event in New York City. A cheerful GNU and her team handed out DVDs loaded with Trisquel GNU/Linux (a Linux distribution that meets the FSF’s very strict definition of free. Ed.), FSF stickers and information about the FSF’s new pledge, which asks Windows users to upgrade not to Windows 8, but to GNU/Linux.

The FSF crew at NYC Windows 8 launch

Have a FSF sticker!

I must concur with the FSF’s conclusion: Windows 8 is a downgrade, not an upgrade since it compromises users’ freedom, security and privacy. Some of the ‘features’ of Windows 8 identified by the FSF that Microsoft won’t tell potential users about are:
- Restricts freedom: Windows 8 is proprietary software. At its core, it’s designed to control you as a user. You can’t modify Windows 8 or see how it is built, meaning Microsoft can use its operating system to exploit users and benefit special interests.
- Invades privacy: Windows 8 includes software that inspects the contents of your hard drive and Microsoft claims the right to do this without warning. These programs have misleading names like “Windows Genuine Advantage.”
- Exposes personal data: Windows 8 has a contacts cache that experts fear may store sensitive personal data and make users vulnerable to identity theft.
Amazon integration – the last thing I want from Ubuntu

20/10/2012 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech
The Inquirer yesterday carried a report in which Canonical, purveyors of Ubuntu Linux, claim that Amazon integration is what users want in Ubuntu.

Canonical released Ubuntu 12.10 on Thursday. This new release introduced tighter integration with Amazon in system search results – a move which has provoked criticism from the Ubuntu community. Canonical asserts that Amazon integration in Dash is something users expect and it will integrate other online services in future Ubuntu releases.

The move was defended by Steve George, Canonical’s Vice-President of communications and products, who told The Inquirer that: “Users increasingly expect to search. It is driven by two things, firstly the fact that online they search, so naturally they think about searching and the other thing is the total amount of content. […] The Dash has previously been restricted to only the things that were on your desktop, so where we are taking the Dash so we are trying to pull it so that everything – your personal cloud – all of your online and offline, everything you have in your universe around you, the Dash will be able to search that and find those things for you.”

Thanks for that Steve. I’ve been using Ubuntu happily on my laptop for two and a half years now, but if you’re going to clamber into bed with the likes of Amazon, I’m putting Debian on that machine when the long term support on my present Ubuntu install runs out.

Update 21/10/12: Bruno Girin has been in touch since I wrote this post and informed me there are 2 options for disabling the Amazon search – turning it off in the system settings and removing the package respectively – as follows:
1. Option 1: system settings -> privacy -> include online search results = off
2. Option 2: sudo apt-get remove unity-lens-shopping
GBeers – open source and beer

13/10/2012 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech

GNOME – enjoy with a beer!
Phoronix reports that 2 of my favourite things – beer and open source – are being combined in GBeers (GNOME + Beers = GBeers), a world-wide initiative for GNOME meet-ups with lightning talk presentations taking place while drinking beer. Madrid in Spain recently hosted the very first GBeers event. Other GNOME users and developers are being encouraged by the GNOME project to arrange GBeers in their own towns and cities.

The proposed format of GBeers events is one hour of lightning talks (with each talk lasting 5-10 minutes. Ed.) on unrestricted topics every month, with the talks possibly being recorded for internet distribution. A further possibility is for virtual GBeers through Skype or Google hang-outs.

GBeers have so far been organised in Madrid, Las Palmas, A Coruña, Seville (all Spain), Chicago (USA) and Lima (Peru). Further information about this initiative can be found on the GNOME Live Wiki.

Hat tip: Roy Schestowitz.
Language and open source

08/10/2012 Steve WoodsLanguage, Linux, Open Source, Tech

I’m intrigued by the way we advocates of free and open source software (FOSS) are viewed and described by the world outside our circle. Frequently, the terms are very loaded, e.g. ‘zealot’.

A report today in The Register Channel on Scottish NHS IT procurement and a decision to waste millions on Microsoft Windows 7 is no exception. Mark Taylor, CEO of Sirius, a major UK open source supplier, is quoted and referred to as a ‘firebrand’.

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, firebrand‘s first recorded use was in the 13th century, when it was originally “a piece of burning wood“. Its meaning was extended to over subsequent centuries to include “one that creates unrest or strife“.

Synonyms for firebrand are: demagogue, exciter, agitator, fomenter, incendiary, inciter, instigator, kindler, provocateur, rabble-rouser.

I’ve met and spoken to Mark on a number occasions and the last thing one can describe him as is a firebrand or any of its above synonyms. Admittedly, he has a business to run, but he’s also concerned that the UK spending on ICT amounts to an eye-watering £20 billion per year. That’s three times more than is spent on the army. Most of that £20 billion is spent on proprietary software and its suppliers, in the course of which vast amounts of taxpayers’ money are exported to MS’ coffers in Redmond, USA.

Both Mark and I feel that FOSS would be a better alternative and there’d then be more money for the NHS to spend on patient care – a far better use of resources. If that makes us ‘firebrands’, then we’ll wear the label with pride.
Linux Kernel 3.7 Will Support All ARM Platforms

07/10/2012 Steve WoodsLinux, Tech

Tux – the Linux kernel mascot
It was recently announced that when it is released in some 6 months’ time, the forthcoming Linux 3.7 kernel will incorporate support for multiple ARM System on Chips (SoCs) platforms, Softpedia reports.

Having all ARM platforms supported by a single kernel package is a good news for everyone from end users to hardware manufacturers who base their kit on ARM chips and the Android operating system.

“This is a pretty significant branch. It’s the introduction of the first multiplatform support on ARM”, said kernel developer Olof Johansson on the Linux kernel Git commit page. “And with this (and the later branch) merged, it is now possible to build one kernel that contains support for highbank, vexpress, mvebu, socfpga, and picoxcell”.

When Linux kernel 3.7 is released (the latest Linux kernel release at the time of writing is 3.6. Ed.), it will initially provide support the following ARM platforms: VExpress, Highbank, SoC FPGA, Picoxcell and Mvebu, although support for more ARM platforms will be added to subsequent kernel releases.

Hat tip: Roy Schestowitz
Local youngsters get chance to win a Raspberry Pi

24/09/2012 Steve WoodsBristol, Linux, Open Source, Tech

Although my postal address says Easton, I’ve lived in Bristol’s Lawrence Hill ward for 35 years now and was delighted to see there was a competition to win a Raspberry Pi in the latest edition of Up Our Street, the quarterly regeneration and community matters magazine produced by Easton and Lawrence Hill Management.

The Raspberry Pi is of course a small Linux computer available at pocket money prices and aimed at young people who wish to learn programming.

Raspberry Pi in a case

To be eligible for the competition, entrants must be under 25 years of age and live in either Lawrence Hill or Easton ward in Bristol.

Entries stating why you would like to win the Raspberry Pi should be sent by email to stacy (at) eastonandlawrencehill.org.uk by the closing date of 30th November and should also include your name, date of birth and address.
Today is Software Freedom Day

15/09/2012 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech

Today, 15th September, is Software Freedom Day, an annual worldwide event to promote the role that free and open source technology can play in the modern world, where our everyday lives are increasingly dependent upon technology. At the time of writing, there are over 200 teams in 60 countries putting on events of which the closest to us in Bristol is being organised by the Herefordshire LUG.

Free and open source software gives you, the user, access to the source code. This ensures that you can know (or get checked) what exactly a piece of software will do. It avoids nasty surprises, spyware and all kinds of problems that we can’t be absolutely sure are avoided in closed software. Proprietary software keeps the source code locked away from public scrutiny, meaning that there is no way to know exactly what the software actually does and no way to trust it to safeguard your human rights. Transparent technologies are about ensuring you can trust the results and operation of your technology.

As an increasing proportion of the world’s population starts using technology, getting online and developing the next major life-changing event of the future (such as the birth of the internet was for many of us), it is vital to ensure open, transparent and sustainable approaches are considered best practice. This is important to a future where technology empowers everyone equally, where knowledge is forever and where our basic human freedoms are strengthened – not hampered – by technology.

Software Freedom Day is a global celebration of why transparent and sustainable technologies are now more important than ever.

NB: This post originally appeared on the Bristol Wireless blog.
Is there still a need for nice?

10/09/2012 Steve WoodsLanguage, Linux, Open Source, Tech

Some time last week, the collective minds of Bristol Wireless were hunched over their pints down the pub when someone asked: “Is there still a point to nice?”

For those unfamiliar with nice, it’s a means on a Unix/Linux system of giving a process more or less CPU time than other processes. A niceness of −20 is the highest priority and 19 or 20 is the lowest priority. The default niceness for processes is inherited from its parent process, usually 0.

For an idea of how it works, here’s the nice man page:

Name

nice – run a program with modified scheduling priority

Synopsis

nice [OPTION] [COMMAND [ARG]…]

Description

Run COMMAND with an adjusted niceness, which affects process scheduling. With no COMMAND, print the current niceness. Nicenesses range from -20 (most favorable scheduling) to 19 (least favorable).

-n, –adjustment=N
add integer N to the niceness (default 10)

–help
display this help and exit

–version
output version information and exit

NOTE: your shell may have its own version of nice, which usually supersedes the version described here. Please refer to your shell’s documentation for details about the options it supports.

Author
Written by David MacKenzie.

Reporting Bugs

Report nice bugs to bug-coreutils@gnu.org
GNU coreutils home page: http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/
General help using GNU software: http://www.gnu.org/gethelp/
Report nice translation bugs to http://translationproject.org/team/

Copyright
Copyright © 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html.

This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it. There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

See Also
nice(2)

The full documentation for nice is maintained as a Texinfo manual. If the info and nice programs are properly installed at your site, the command

info coreutils aqnice invocationaq

should give you access to the complete manual.

Anyway, the main discussion centred around whether processes still needed to have their niceness adjusted (‘reniced’ in the correct terminology) in these days of processors and amounts of RAM that have capacities many multiples of the systems upon which Unix and Linux were originally designed to run, although no real conclusions were reached, apart from one instance mentioned: that of a process just starting up and slowing the whole system to a crawl. Perhaps readers would like to leave their opinions – if any – in the comments below.

Putting on my language hat and looking at Wikipedia, it seems the etymology of nice is as follows. The name “nice” comes from the fact that the program’s purpose is to modify a process niceness value. The true priority, used to decide how much CPU time to concede to each process, is calculated by the kernel process scheduler from a combination of the niceness values of different processes and other data, such as the amount of I/O done by each process.

The term “niceness” itself originates from the idea that a process with a higher niceness value is “nicer” to other processes in the system, as it allows the other processes more CPU time.

Update: 27/09/12: Alex Butcher of Bristol & Bath LUG has suggested ionice is a more useful tool than nice.
MultiSave – a great LibreOffice extension

30/08/2012 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech

As mentioned on the free/open source software for translation page, both LibreOffice and OpenOffice (the project from which it forked) can have their functionality increased by plug-ins known as extensions.

Of the extensions I’ve tried so far, my favourite has to be MultiSave. MultiSave enables a file to be saved in up to 3 formats at once: ODF, MS Office and PDF.

The MultiSave extension in action

As I always work in ODF, but usually return work in MS Office format and submit my invoices as PDFs, you can imagine how much time this has saved me.

Give it a try! I recommend it.

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