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GovHack Info
by Ben M 24 May '15

24 May '15

Hi all, You can catch Alisha and Jordan on Twitter if you want to get involved in govhack: @AlishaRyansT and @mrjwo or just register as a participant here: http://www.govhack.org/register-2015/ Cheers, Ben M.

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In the GNews
by Scott Junner 22 May '15

22 May '15

Here's all the news items we were able to gather during the last month. Lots of interesting stuff an links covering a diverse range of issues to do with Free and Open Source Software. GNEWS for May 2015 ------------------------------- April 15 Samsung's public-facing attitude has changed more in the past year than in the previous five combined. Driven by a sense of urgency coming from its falling smartphone sales, the Korean company has taken decisive steps to rectify its stagnant design, improve its marketing, and streamline its operations. It's also adopted a refreshingly collaborative approach when it comes to working with others. Today's Samsung seeks alliances, not adversaries. THis does not mean they've gone all free and open. But if they are looking at seeking aliances... who knows full story at http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/15/8419683/friendly-samsung ---------------------------------------------- April 15 EU also investigating Android shenanigans After five years of investigation, the European Commission (EC) has sent a formal statement of objections to Google, based on the company's business practices in that region. The main focus is on how Google promotes its own comparison shopping results over that of rivals. Android is in the spotlight too, however: the EC is launching a separate antitrust probe into Google's operating system, which powers more than 80 percent of the world's mobile devices. full story at http://www.zdnet.com/article/eus-three-gripes-with-android-what-you-need-to… -------------------------------------------- April 15 NVIDIA's New Hardware Is "VERY Open-Source Unfriendly" While NVIDIA's new GeForce GTX 900 series is dominating for Linux gamers with excellent performance with their $1000+ GPU as well as great Linux OpenGL/OpenCL performance out of their lower-cost GPUs with excellent power efficiency, that's only when using the proprietary driver... NVIDIA's newer GTX 900 / Maxwell hardware is less open-source friendly than their previous generations of hardware. Full story at http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=NVIDIA-Unfriendly-OSS-Ha… ------------------------------------------- Colabora announced they are working on LibreOffice Online which will be a cloud based alternative to Google Docs and Office 365. Full Story at http://fedoramagazine.org/libreoffice-online-announced-by-collabora/ -------------------------------------------- Emotet Banking Trojan is on the loose again. Kaspersky Labs say the trojan is being distributed via spam mailings that include malicious attachments or links. Usually ZIP archives containing the Emotet Loader. The files have long names so the user may not see the .exe extension in the email on a standard windows panel. If a link will be linked to executable. Targeting customers of German, Austrian and Swiss banks. http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/69560/the-banking-trojan-emotet… -------------------------------------------- VMware has announced two big open source projects to accelerate Enterprise Adoption of Cloud-Native applications. Project Lightwave for identity and access management and Project Photon a light-weight linux operating system optimized for cloud-native applications http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/marketwire/11G038888-001.htm ---------------------------------------- New Browser Midori 0.5.10 released. It's a lightweight browser that utilizes GTK2/GTK3 tool-kit and common to the Xfce desktop. Mostly bug fixes. http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Midori-0.5.10-Released&u… ----------------------------------------- Univention (manufacturer of Linux Enterprise distribution Univention Corporate Server) has published UCS Core Edition. Freely available for Business use so companies don't need to buy maintenance services. Replaces "free for personal use" LIcence. https://www.linux.com/community/blogs/130-distributions/824925-free-edition… ------------------------------------------- Tor project is recieving dunding from the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to improve Tor's hidden services. Tor plans to double the encryption strength of hidden services identity key and allow offline storage for that key. https://www.linux.com/news/software/applications/825026-how-tor-is-building… -------------------------------------------- Qubes 3.0 has been released. An installable Security focussed distro using a Compartmentalization approach. Fun for all the family. http://blog.invisiblethings.org/2015/04/23/qubes-30rc1-and-roadmap.html ----------------------------------------------------- Turing phone is being developed. Not AI but we can live in hope. Made of "Liquidmorphium" allow stronger than titanium and steel. aims to introduce new decentralized authentication technology with static key exchange. It comes with its master public key and unique private key pre-installed on it. On top of that, if you attempt to communicate with another Turning Phone, the two devices can directly verify their identity, without the need of authenticating each other with a third party. The result of all this fancy technology applied onto the phone? A secure network where users can exchange sensitive data including social security numbers or bank wiring instructions. http://news.softpedia.com/news/The-Turing-Phone-Is-Super-Durable-and-Ultra-… ----------------------------------------------- Citrix is now a corporate sponsor of Open Stack Foundation. http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2405182/citrix-joins-openstack-aim… ---------------------------------------- Distrowatch reports Back Box release. Pen Testing and forensic analysis distro based on Ubuntu http://distrowatch.com/?newsid=08919 --------------------------------------- A stink has arrisen over Valves move to sell game mods. A group has formed to create an Open Source game launcher called Project Ascension. The aim is to consolidate many different stores for comparison. http://news.softpedia.com/news/Valve-s-Mods-Blunder-Prompts-Reddit-Communit… https://www.reddit.com/r/Project_Ascension/ ------------------------------------------ Interesting topic of discussion regarding Goole Play Book store. Pirate copies of books are being sold through the Google store. And you can too. http://yro.slashdot.org/story/15/05/10/1922218/how-to-set-up-a-pirate-ebook… ------------------------------------ Firefox 38.0.5 Beta has been released by Mozilla. No security fixes and a few new updates. Updates to Firefox Hello function (video calls to other WebRTC powered browsers.). And using services of Propietry third party software so users can save content for later viewing on other platforms. http://news.softpedia.com/news/Firefox-38-0-5-Beta-Arrives-with-Proprietary… --------------------------------- How to become a valued OpenStack contributor (for devs) http://opensource.com/business/15/5/interview-adrian-otto-rackspace --------------------------------- GNU Guix adds 718 new packages. GNU Guix is a purely functional package manager for Guix System Distribution which is the GNU operating system. http://savannah.gnu.org/forum/forum.php?forum_id=8273 ------------------------------ Price Drop on the Raspberry Pi B+ (4 x USB, lower power, ethernet) http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/05/raspberry-pi-model-b-price-cut-to-ju… ----------------------------- Interesting discussion on Slashdot regarding Online Voting. http://yro.slashdot.org/story/15/05/14/1530259/online-voting-should-be-veri… ------------------------------ The in-vehicle wireless charging technology adopted by Ford, Chrysler, Dodge, RAM, and Toyota has been released to the public domain without royalties or licenses. http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/15/05/14/1249220/wireless-charging-tech-… ---------------------------- The U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill on Wednesday that would end spy agencies' bulk collection of Americans' telephone data, setting up a potential showdown with the U.S. Senate over the program, which expires on June 1. The House voted 338-88 for the USA Freedom Act, which would end the bulk collection and instead give intelligence agencies access to telephone data and other records only when a court finds there is reasonable suspicion about a link to international terrorism. http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/13/us-usa-security-nsa-vote-idUSKBN0… Of course there are plenty of sceptics about the news. ----------------------------- HP laptops and PCs pre-loaded with Ubuntu are to go on sale in Russia from the middle of May, Canonical has announced. http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2015/05/hp-launch-ubuntu-laptops-pcs-in-russia ------------------------------ Popular virtualization platforms relying on the virtual Floppy Disk Controller code from QEMU (Quick Emulator) are susceptible to a vulnerability that allows executing code outside the guest machine. http://news.softpedia.com/news/11-Year-Old-Bug-in-Virtual-Floppy-Drive-Code… ------------------------------- Hardware News C.H.I.P is a project currently on KickStarter to build a $9 computer with built in wifi and bluetooth so you can connect to keyboard and mouse wirelessly. WTF? 1GHz Processor, 512MB RAM, 4GB storage. Open Source Operating System with Open Source Hardware. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-worlds-first-9-com… --------------------------- Slashdot Discussion: Australian Law could criminalize the teaching of encryption. But not yet in effect. The Defence and Strategic Goods List (goods considered important to national defence and security) casts such a wide net over what is classified Dual use that potentially even division could be called a weapon. http://it.slashdot.org/story/15/05/20/0536206/australian-law-could-criminal… Further links in the discussion. -------------------------------- GovHack - More on that elsewhere http://www.govhack.org/melbourne2015/ Buzzconf is a local mini/un-conference looking for presenters Broad technology focus, but organizer is ammeniable to Free software ethos. If anyone is interested in support for presenting a free software talk just reach out to us. Ballan, Victoria Australia http://buzzconf.io/ ### GPL Compliance call to action to request source How Ubiquiti Networks Is Creatively Violating the GPL releasing kernel source, but not _the actual_ source not releasing u-boot code their claim: alright to refuse to provide source code to GPL-licensed software if "This decision was taken with the security of the users in mind" Call to action: Write to Ubiquiti requesting the source - their email addresses are support(a)ubnt.com and info(a)ubnt.com Send me an email telling me what you've done. My email address is riley(a)openmailbox.org http://libertybsd.net/ubiquiti/ ### EFF in the news Whether you’re a local journalist or citizen watchdog, add Automated Vehicle Occupancy/Passenger Detection to your vocabulary https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/another-surveillance-technology-watch… EFF Busts a phony Podcasting Patent https://www.eff.org/press/releases/eff-busts-podcasting-patent-invalidating… EFF Fighting Automakers Over Whether You Own Your Car Some time ago the EFF asked for a DMCA exemption to be put in place so car owners would be free to inspect and modify the code running on their vehicles ... recently U.S. automakers filed opposition comments through trade associations Add our names to petition (international option): https://act.eff.org/action/fight-for-your-right-to-repair-your-car https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/automakers-say-you-dont-really-own-yo… USPTO Demands EFF Censor Its Comments On Patentable Subject Matter statement of how the USPTO does not appear to be living up to what the courts are saying in the wake of the Alice ruling redacted: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150403/14555030543/uspto-demands-eff-ce… origional: https://www.eff.org/files/2015/03/18/eff_comments_regarding_ interim_eligibility_guidance.pdf ### Government European Commission Will Increase Use of Open Source Software eg for internal development "OSS shall be the preferred choice and used whenever possible" and "facilitate participation in external OSS communities" http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/informatics/oss_tech/strategy/strategy_en.htm http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/informatics/oss_tech/index_en.htm India Mandates Use of Open Source Software In Government Promising but not as good as it sounds, the policy is the manditory bit: "endeavour to adopt Open Source Software" "suppliers to consider OSS along with CSS" "in case of urgent / strategic need, Closed Source Software (CSS) may be permitted" "Suppliers will need to provide justification for exclusion of OSS in their response" http://trak.in/tags/business/2015/03/30/open-source-software-mandatory-govt… http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/policy_on_adoption_of_oss.… UK force MS to adopt open standards, part of their "digital by default agenda" 5 departments already publishing in odf "has confirmed it will start supporting the Open Documents Format (ODF) in the next update to Office 365" "has not confirmed whether this update will be available worldwide, or just in the UK" http://www.itproportal.com/2015/03/30/microsoft-will-adopt-open-document-st… https://governmenttechnology.blog.gov.uk/2015/03/27/making-documents-format… https://www.gov.uk/government/news/further-progress-made-on-open-standards First Alpha of Public Sector Linux Deployment System in Sweden Linux deployment system for the public sector. Making setting up workstations, DHCP, DNS and user data in LDAP, logins using Kerberos and centralized storage easy. https://github.com/SverigeLinux/ https://www.internetfonden.se/om/the-internet-fund/ India's Net Neutrality Campaign Picks Up Steam, Sites Withdraw From Internet.org Airtel Zero is a platform that allows customers to access mobile applications for free, similar to internet.org "More than 100,000 people have emailed India's telecom regulator demanding that the government protect net neutrality" "large monetized apps can afford to pay more than consumers" "[will we have a free internet] or will we get a collection of 100 services who pay a telecom operator" ClearTrip said "it was against their core DNA, and that was impossible to pretend there is no conflict of interest." "NDTV is committed to net neutrality and is therefore exiting from the internet.org initiative." Internet.org’s list of 38 sites includes Wikipedia... might be a good candidate for net nutralit pressure. "regulators in Chile, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Canada have prohibited zero-rating, while their counterparts in Germany, Austria and Norway have publicly stated that zero-rating violates network neutrality" http://www.huffingtonpost.in/2015/04/15/internetorg-withdrawal_n_7071532.ht… http://www.huffingtonpost.in/2015/04/12/fight-for-net-neutrality_n_7049902.… http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-32298536 http://www.hindustantimes.com/technology-topstories/mr-zuckerberg-facebook-… ### General open source news Mozilla response to Day Against Drm campaign far from ideal, but the "Additional Resources" section includes many Cory Doctorow articles so very balanced https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-on-digital-rights-managemen… DuckDuckGo, donated $125,000 towards open source projects in annual donation. SecureDrop, Privacy Badger (from the EFF), GPGTools, TAILS (a Debian-based Linux distribution focused on using the Internet anonymously) and Girl Develop It (a program which helps to get more women involved in open source software development) http://www.networkworld.com/article/2913632/opensource-subnet/duckduckgo-fo… http://www.networkworld.com/article/2900499/opensource-subnet/duckduckgo-an… Debian Project Leader Election Results Neil McGovern winning by a conclusive margin... with source. http://lwn.net/Articles/640358/ Interview with New Debian Project Leader Neil McGovern https://www.linux.com/news/software/applications/829303-new-debian-project-… wireless (but contact) charging technology has been released to the public domain Open Dots standard (used by Ford, Chrysler, Dodge, RAM, and Toyota) design guides, schematics, application notes, standards and test protocols are provided in full online so that manufactures can self-certify To join the consortium, potential members simply submit a signed copy of the membership agreement http://www.technologytell.com/apple/149966/auto-industry-first-get-wireless… http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150512005129/en/Global-Auto-Industr… http://opendotsalliance.org MAME Changing License To Fully Libre call for past contribuitors to vote on libe licence expand both its pool of supporters and its utility to developers and historians did use a modified BSD license that prohibits, among other things, commercial use of the code and deter "misuse of MAME in illegal ways," but it also kept museums that charged entry fees from using MAME in their exhibits or legal license owners from using MAME to rerelease old games MAME now incorporate MESS (handhelds, phones, set-top-boxes, consoles, computers, development boards) http://gamasutra.com/view/news/243598/MAME_is_going_open_source_to_be_a_lea… Oculus Rift Linux Development Halted with no timeframe for resumption https://www.oculus.com/blog/powering-the-rift/ ### Android Arc Welder Android apps to run on (Windows, Macs and) Linux http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-32160263 https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/arc-welder/emfinbmielocnlhgmfkkmk… OnePlus (carrier) has introduced its own OS, an Android fork called OxygenOS. its goal with OxygenOS "is to provide faster, more meaningful updates and a better-integrated range of services... oh nevermind reduce its dependence on Cyanogen gesture shortcuts you can input while the screen is off http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/4/8344931/oneplus-one-oxygenos-rom-download-… https://blog.oneplus.net/2015/04/oxygenos-is-here-2/ ### Newly Open Sourced Valve Bootstrapped Source 2 Engine On an Open-Source Vulkan Driver Vulkan is the new graphics API Valve developers were quickly able to resolve issues and progress the driver in a turn-key manner thanks to relying on an open-source driver "The engine developers do not know the driver and hardware architecture like the driver team does but being able to step across the Vulkan interface in the debugger enabled the teamto see what the driver was doing with the workload and more often than not isolate an issue in either their back-end, or the driver, or both" http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=valve-lunarg-vulkan&num=1 BioWare Announces Open-Source Orbit Project Orbit is a Java based framework for building distributed online services (MMOPGs) last-generation used in Dragon Age Keep and Dragon Age: Inquisition http://blog.bioware.com/2015/03/30/launching-into-orbit/ https://github.com/electronicarts/orbit http://orbit.bioware.com/orbit-prerequisites.html The Naval Oceanographic Office (NAVO) has spent 16 years developing the Pure File Magic Area Based Editor (PFMABE) software suite This software, and accompanying source code (Win & Linux), has been released to the public domain... requires registration, so not that open. http://pfmabe.software/ http://shoals.sam.usace.army.mil/PFMABE.aspx Netflix Open-Sources FIDO - Fully Integrated Defense Operation (Automated Security Incident Response system) http://www.networkworld.com/article/2918673/security/netflix-opensources-se… http://techblog.netflix.com/2015/05/introducing-fido-automated-security.html https://github.com/Netflix/Fido DARPA open sources Memex/SourcePin build a system that sees the web more like a human user with a browser, and therefore actually behaves like a human user by using a browser to crawl the web, to the point of being able to scroll down a page, or even hover over an object on the page to reveal more content current search aren’t adequate for in-depth searches, not to mention they only capture around five per cent of the internet “That’s our ambitious goal: to enable a new kind of search engine, a new way to access public web content.” http://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2015/04/10/darpa-memex-search-go… http://www.darpa.mil/opencatalog/ http://www.darpa.mil/opencatalog/MEMEX.html ### Security Fluendo MP3 plugin for GStreamer vulnerability A maliciously crafted MP3 file can lead to a potentially exploitable crash in FF https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/security/advisories/mfsa2015-31/ 'Let's Encrypt' Project Strives To Make Encryption Simple a free, automated and open security certificate authority for the public’s benefit the Linux Foundation will now be hosting it http://www.linuxfoundation.org/news-media/announcements/2015/04/linux-found… http://www.itbusinessedge.com/blogs/it-unmasked/the-linux-foundation-starts… https://letsencrypt.org/howitworks/technology/ Venom' security vulnerability in qemu and fixed (patch the bug before it was publicly disclosed) Xen, KVM, and Oracle's VirtualBox, include the buggy code http://www.zdnet.com/article/venom-security-flaw-millions-of-virtual-machin… http://www.zdnet.com/article/venom-the-anti-toxin-is-here/ http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2015-3456 http://venom.crowdstrike.com/ ### an unbelievable amount of Microsoft news Microsoft Open Technologies Is Closing, MS not so affraid of the GPL these days. Origionally a division called "Microsoft Open Technology Programs Office" to manage integration with technologies such as Chef, Puppet, and Docker. Which does seem to be unnesicary with a MS Fellow attending CheffConf for eg. contributed to projects such as Apache Cordova, Cocos2d-x, OpenJDK, and dash.js collaborating with the industry on standards... more questionable positive spin on negative news? maybe. http://betanews.com/2015/04/17/microsoft-open-technologies-is-closing-is-th… Visual Studio 2015 can target Linux out of the box https://www.visualstudio.com/products/vs-2015-product-editions http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Visual-Studio-2015-Linux… Mono 4 Linq, Collections, RegularExpressions, ComponentModel and more http://www.mono-project.com/docs/about-mono/releases/4.0.0/ An Open Source Windows Is ‘Definitely Possible at ChefConf Microsoft Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich talked briefly about the prospect of some or all of Windows going open source Might do than Android: “If you open source something but it comes with a build system that takes rocket scientists and three months to set up, what’s the point?” http://www.wired.com/2015/04/microsoft-open-source-windows-definitely-possi… Microsoft releases PowerShell DSC for Linux it's like cheff/puppet but with the directory slashes back to front support for CentOS, Debian GNU/Linux, Oracle Linux, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, and Ubuntu Server http://blogs.msdn.com/b/powershell/archive/2015/05/06/powershell-dsc-for-li… http://blogs.msdn.com/b/powershell/archive/2015/04/27/dsc-resource-kit-move… https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn249912.aspx Microsoft Launches Visual Studio Code, with Linux support screenshot of Ubuntu at a MS conference GitHub Atom supplies the shell, and Google Chromium the runtime http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/29/microsoft-shocks-the-world-with-visual-stu… https://code.visualstudio.com/Download but proving it hasn't changed it's spots: .Net OSS concerns patent promise seems set to allow them to win an Oricle-v-Google style case. Rather than granting a right to use the necessary patents, the recipient gets a promise. http://www.ifross.org/artikel/4-shifty-details-about-microsofts-open-source… Microsoft Increases Android Patent Licensing Reach http://betanews.com/2015/04/24/microsoft-continues-earning-money-from-linux… http://www.zdnet.com/article/310-microsoft-patents-used-in-android-licensin… ### Releases Hurd kernel 0.6 32-bit x86 machines message dispatching improvments, libz and libbz2 compression, fakeroot tool improvments, integer hashing improvments, init server has been split into startup server and a SysV-style init http://lwn.net/Articles/640668/ Debian 8 released improvements to UEFI support, browsable view of all source code & code search, systemd updates to apache, gimp, libre office http://www.linuxtoday.com/infrastructure/debian-8.0-jessie-debuts-after-two… Debian GNU/Hurd 2015 released Redy to run image snapshot of Debian "sid" at the time of the stable Debian "jessie" release with the Hurd kernel. https://lists.debian.org/debian-hurd/2015/04/msg00047.html http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian-cd/hurd-i386/debian-hurd-2015/ Ubuntu 15.04 Vivid Vervet Always on menu option in unity. Ubuntu Core (snappy) for embeded/cloud. Ubuntu Make for android/go/dart/more. systemd Updates to nVidia, libre office, open stack, qemu, docker and more. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/VividVervet/ReleaseNotes Ubuntu on a fridge (and network Switches) http://www.eweek.com/networking/snappy-ubuntu-linux-now-used-in-networking-… MuseScore 2.0 Released new UI, top features include linked parts (good for pieces with many instruments), guitar tablature, flexible chord symbols, and fret diagrams http://musescore.org/en/musescore-2.0-released Nano 2.4 fully functional undo system (now enabled by default), vim-compatible file locking, linter support, formatter support, syntax highlighting flexibility, and many fixes http://musescore.org/en/musescore-2.0-released GNOME 3.16 Released gnome calendar, gnome books, builder gnome ide, updated glib, updated notifications and ui elements https://help.gnome.org/misc/release-notes/3.16/ Firefox 37 Released & Firefox 38 Security improvements, disabled insecure TLS version fallback, developer security panel, rating widget, download manager backend revamp, updated WebRTC Include Digital Rights Management (DRM) tech for playing protected content in the HTML5 video tag, tab-based preferences, Ruby annotation (pronunciation or meaning) support https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/03/31/new-firefox-releases-now-available/ Security improvment found vulnerable: Malicious header can be crafted so that SSL certificate verification can be bypassed for the specified alternate server. As a result of this, warnings of invalid SSL certificates will not be displayed and an attacker could potentially impersonate another site through a man-in-the-middle "We plan to re-enable this feature once we've had time to fully investigate the issue," https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/security/advisories/mfsa2015-44/ https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/38.0/releasenotes/ https://stacy.makes.org/thimble/MTUxMzI5MjI4OA==/what-is-drm http://techcrunch.com/2015/05/12/mozilla-launches-a-new-firefox-version-wit… GCC 5.1 released C11 support by default, C++14 support, C++11 support in libstdc++, OpenMP 4.0, Intel Cilk Plus multi-threading, new ARM processor support, Intel AVX-512 handling, Optimizer Improvements https://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-5/changes.html http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=GCC-5-Coming-This-Month https://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-announce/2015/msg00000.html Qt Creator 3.4.0 Released C++ refactoring, autocomplete sig/slots, experimental Qt Test and Qt Quick Tests, 63 bit android support. http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Qt-Creator-3.4-Released https://blog.qt.io/blog/2015/04/23/qt-creator-3-4-0-released/ KDE Ships Plasma 5 & Plasma 5 as the default desktop on OpenSUSE Tumbleweed Power management improvments and stats, Bluetoot improvments and app, new and improved Plasma Widgets (and Press and Hold), Plasma Media Center, Towards Wayland Support Kdenlive, Telepathy Chat, KAccounts, and more https://www.kde.org/announcements/plasma-5.3.0.php https://www.kde.org/announcements/plasma-5.2.2-5.3.0-changelog.php https://news.opensuse.org/2015/05/16/tumbleweed-moves-to-plasma-5-3-and-a-n… https://dot.kde.org/2015/04/28/plasma-5.3 http://www.linuxveda.com/2015/05/16/plasma-5-becomes-default-desktop-of-ope… OpenBSD 5.7 Released Improved hardware support, network & security improvements, installer update, updates to OpenSMTPD, OpenSSH, LibreSSL and many more http://www.openbsd.org/57.html release song: http://www.openbsd.org/lyrics.html#57 gradle 2.4 released performance improvements https://gradle.org/gradle-2-4-the-fastest-yet/ Ubuntu MATE 15.04 Arrives MATE Tweak switching profiles, Tilda was added by default, http://ubuntuportal.com/2015/05/ubuntu-mate-15-04-arrives-with-mate-desktop… Rust 1.0 released "make it easier to build reliable, efficient systems... a “drop-in replacement” for C." todos: API breaking changes are largely out of scope ... improvements to compile times, work on new APIs and language features http://lwn.net/Articles/644671/rss http://blog.rust-lang.org/2015/05/15/Rust-1.0.html GOG has announced the open beta for GOG Galaxy, an entirely optional launcher (a la Steam) Crossplay-enabled games offer online play between GOG and Steam http://www.gog.com/galaxy

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Re: [free-software-melb] [free-software-melb-announce] Audio stream for tonight's meet-up
by Alex Fraser 21 May '15

21 May '15

I'm listening to this live on the way home on the train. Good times :-) On 21 May 2015 3:45 pm, "Ben Sturmfels" <ben(a)stumbles.id.au> wrote: > Hi Folks, > > Thanks to Lilly's encouragement, we're going to try publishing a live > audio stream of tonight's meeting, starting 6pm (GMT +10). > > http://freesoftware.org.au/melbourne/streaming/ > > This is our first attempt, so it may not work. If it doesn't work, we > will probably just give up and move on with the meeting. Please don't > wait around for hours in case we fix it. :) > > Regards, > Ben > > _______________________________________________ > Free-software-melb-announce mailing list > Free-software-melb-announce(a)lists.softwarefreedom.com.au > > http://lists.softwarefreedom.com.au/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/free-software-… > > Free Software Melbourne home page: http://www.freesoftware.asn.au/melb/ >

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Re: [free-software-melb] [riseup] your web browser is not your friend
by Aníbal Monsalve Salazar 20 May '15

20 May '15

On Tue, 2015-05-19 15:20:51 -0700, newsletter(a)lists.riseup.net wrote: > > Essential browser extensions > -------------------------------------------------------- > > Your web browser is not your friend: it allows your behavior to be > tracked as you browse the web, often leaks personal information, and > is a festering sore of endless security problems. > > This is not by accident, but by design. Despite their marketing, the > browser companies care more about making advertisers happy than your > privacy or security. > > For example, there was a huge debate in the 1990s [1] about the > privacy implications of third-party cookies, which is why the official > cookie technical specification required [2] that these type of > "surveillance" cookies be disabled by default. Guess what? Nearly all > browsers ignored this requirement under pressure from ad companies > [3]. Fast-forward to 2010: after a Mozilla engineer disabled > third-party cookies by default, advertisers became rabid and > "coincidentally" Mozilla executives ordered the change reversed > immediately [4]. After that, the browser companies quietly issued a > new cookie standard which allowed third-party cookies to be enabled by > default. > > The cookie debacle is just one example. If any of the browser > companies gave two shits about your security or privacy, then they > would kill off foreign http-referers, Flash, Java applets, and > third-party cookies (among many other obvious changes). Google has a > very good browser security team, but their hands are tied by policy > decisions that keep advertisers happy. > > So, basically, we are fucked. Despite that, you can make your web > browser experience a little bit better and more secure by following > Riseup's handy guide to essential web browser extensions: > > https://help.riseup.net/en/better-web-browsing > > [1] Shah, R. C., & Kesan, J. P. (2009). Recipes for cookies: how > institutions shape communication technologies. > http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=565041 > > [2] https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2109 > > [3] Bruner, R. E. (1997, May). Advertisers win one in debate over > "cookies": Netscape move may settle sites concern over controversial > targeting tool > http://adage.com/article/news/advertisers-win-debate-cookies/405/ > > [4] Soghoian, C. (2010). Thoughts on Mozilla and Privacy. > http://paranoia.dubfire.net/2010/12/thoughts-on-mozilla-and-privacy.html The sysadmins of riseup.net are Debian developers. I know some of them. Another good guide is at: https://help.riseup.net/en/security/message-security/openpgp/best-practices which was written by Daniel Kahn Gillmor, a Debian developer.

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Mozilla respond to drm issue
by Ben Minerds 14 May '15

14 May '15

Hi all, Jumping the gun a little on the Gnews, but exciting to see some response from Mozilla (no doubt from community pressure like ours). https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-on-digital-rights-managemen… thanks all, Ben M

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An open letter to Mozilla regarding EME in FireFox
by Ben M 06 May '15

06 May '15

May 6, 2015 To Andreas Gal, We are a group of Free Software advocates from Melbourne Australia and supporters of the Mozilla Foundation and its goals. While we would usually hold Mozilla in high esteem, on this International Day Against DRM we feel compelled to join the FSF and Defective By Design in condemning Mozilla's decision to include proprietary mechanisms (Encrypted Media Extensions) in Firefox. We understand that you are trying to do what makes content owners comfortable lest they not allow their content on your browser; you have outlined this in the article "DRM and the Challenge of Serving Users". However it seems that your focus is on the short term, compromising your values to retain existing users, rather than protecting them in the longer term. That article significantly neglects any mention of the harms caused by such proprietary technologies, and how they lead users to inflict this harm upon themselves. When data passes through a machine that cannot be inspected by us, its nominal owners, we’ve lost essential freedoms to our personal and social lives. When this loss of freedom is enabled by a foundation we've learned to know and trust, it is particularly disappointing. Firefox has, through inclusion of these restrictive technologies, lost a key differentiator over competing browsers. This puts at risk the support you have gained from being the most open and free solution for the web. We wish for Mozilla to stand with us in this fight against anti-features. The Mozilla Manifesto's second principle is: "The Internet is a global public resource that must remain open and accessible". That laudable statement seems at odds with delaying support for some free software HTML5 video playback features, while acting to support DRM in the browser so quickly. The plugin functionality users currently enjoy has benevolent uses, and was not implemented with the specific intent to assist in the development of DRM technologies. EME, on the other hand, has a single purpose, hostile to the user and to free society and the Free Software movement. The seventh principle in the Manifesto, "Free and open source software promotes the development of the Internet as a public resource", should compel you to strongly reconsider the decision to implement EME. We agree with your statement that "In the past Firefox has changed the industry". We also remember that it did not do so by implementing anti-features that "become the norm". Perhaps supporting or promoting alternatives would be more productive. Putting any company and its closed formats above the users freedoms by implementing EME damages uptake on those very alternatives. What efforts has Mozilla undertaken to counter this harm? How does implementing EME encourage content providers to do the right thing? What kind of example does it set? It also seems that companies like Netflix encourage and supply dedicated programs and devices rather than promoting the browser option in the long run. In the article you mention that "until an alternative system is in place, Firefox users should be able to choose". We ask what Mozilla has done to promote or support alternatives promoting freedom? In the spirit of the final principle of your Manifesto, "Magnifying the public benefit aspects of the Internet is an important goal, worthy of time, attention and commitment" we ask that you give this matter the time, attention and commitment that is needed for the free society we are all working toward. Yours sincerely, Free Software Melbourne The text of this letter is available online at: http://freesoftware.org.au/wiki/advocacy/LetterToMozilla

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Letter to Mozilla
by Ben M 05 May '15

05 May '15

Hi all, Just wanted to say thanks for all the feedback, great to have so many views and voices included in the final piece. I've made a few more subtle changes to include feedback from the list but assume it's ready to go tomorrow. I've also strengthened the wording referring to our support of Mozilla generally in respect other feedback from the list. Thanks also to Scott and Les for fleshing out the reasons we are writing to Mozilla and not the WC3 (apart from the FSF recommending it). Because we are aligned with Mozilla and want to stick with them, not because we're threatening to jump ship (maybe next time we could word it a bit better in that respect). We want to see the best in our friends. Unfortunately I just couldn't seamlessly integrate "walk with the Devil" no matter how hard I tried. Thanks again to all, Ben M

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Updated letter to Mozilla for Day Against DRM
by Ben M 02 May '15

02 May '15

Hi all, Thanks for the feedback for our "Day Against DRM" letter to Mozilla. I have made a new revision based on that and have posted it to the wiki. There's still about a week to go so any further feedback or refinements welcome. http://freesoftware.org.au/wiki/advocacy/LetterToMozilla Ben M

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Re: [free-software-melb] Updated letter to Mozilla for Day Against DRM
by Michael Verrenkamp 01 May '15

01 May '15

"What's happening here is that Mozilla has created a ramp for people to switch to a DRM-riddled video service in the browser. How is that a greater freedom? They have the freedom to have their freedoms taken away, sure... but that's the kind of backwards thinking which has resulted licenses such as the FreeBSD license." I completely agree, this is why things like the GPL are so important. They don't promote absolute freedom for everyone, it is made to benefit the vast majority but not absolutely every single individual in the current situations. It is more like a constitution for a good society rather than a free-for-all that we somewhat have in the proprietary space funnily enough. It isn't just about popularity it is also about encouraging both users and service providers with a motive to do good rather than just seek an instant flawed solution to the problem. "They'll remember who their real friends are. Or not. We have no control. But we can be unreasonable, uncompromising, real friends." When it comes to being a real friend that can help out - it involves being 'caustic' in nature, without a little discomfort there will be no progress. Most people fear change no matter the ultimate goal. -- Sent from my GNU/Linux-Libre box. Run free. http://www.gnu.org/distros/free-distros.html Come Visit Free Software Australia - http://freesoftware.org.au/ jabjabs(a)fastmail.com.au

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GNEWS from last meeting
by Scott Junner 30 Apr '15

30 Apr '15

My deepest apologies for not posting this earlier. I am not worthy of forgiveness. Here is the GNEWS. The Award for the Advancement of Free Software is given annually to an individual who has made a great contribution to the progress and development of free software, through activities that accord with the spirit of free software. This year, it was given to Sébastien Jodogne for his work on free software medical imaging with his project Orthanc. One of Jodogne's nominators said, "The Orthanc project started in 2011, when Sébastien noticed in his work as a medical imaging engineer that hospitals are very exposed to lock-in problems when dealing with their medical imaging flows....Freely creating electronic gateways between imaging modalities (autorouting), between medical departments, or even between hospitals remains a challenging task. But the amount of medical images that are generated, analyzed, and exchanged by hospitals is dramatically increasing. Medical imaging is indeed the first step to the treatment of more and more illnesses, such as cancers or cardiovascular diseases." ---------------------------------------------- Kat Walsh joins FSF board of directors A lawyer with extensive background in the free culture movement, Walsh brings a wealth of experience with law and licensing to the FSF board. In particular, her skills will help support and oversee the FSF's licensing work on the GNU General Public License (GPL) as well as the LGPL and GFDL. Kat worked as a staff lawyer at Creative Commons, where she was on the team that drafted the last major revision to the family of Creative Commons licenses, completed in November 2013 with the release of the 4.0 licenses. An active contributor to Wikipedia, Walsh was elected to the board of directors of the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) for three terms between 2006 and 2013 and served as the organization's chair from 2012 to 2013. ---------------------------------------- Netflix is trying to weave digital rights management into HTML5. DefectivebyDesign.org currently have a campaign running to work with World wide web consortium (W3C) to make sure that does not happen. They would like our signatures on a petition. You can do that digitally by going to http://www.defectivebydesign.org/no-drm-in-html5 The Defective by Design website was mysteriously unavailable today so I could not get information on the action day. -------------------------------------------------------------- Embedded linux conference happened on March 23 - 25. You can get your hands on notes and videos from that conference at http://events.linuxfoundation.org/events/embedded-linux-conference There's talk notes on UAV's and Connected Cars, Robotics and Open Hardware, along with the regular way-too-deep-for-me hyper techie linux system kernal freaky stuff. Lots of stuff. Well worth a peruse if you think computers are fun. ---------------------------------------------------- GNU Mailman mailing list manager project aims to release its 3.0 suite in April, during the sprints following PyCon North America. Mailman 3 is a major rewrite that includes a new user membership system, a REST API, an archiver replacement for Pipermail, and a better web interface for subscriptions and settings — but it carries with it a few new dependencies as well. Brave system administrators can try out the fifth beta version now Full announcement and links for downloads found at https://mail.python.org/pipermail/mailman-announce/2014-December/000197.html ------------------------------------------------------ Since opening its doors in 2008, GitHub has grown to become the largest active project-hosting service for open-source software. But it has also attracted a fair share of criticism for some of its implementation choices—with one of the leading complaints being that it takes a lax approach to software licensing. That, in turn, leads to a glut of repositories bearing little or no licensing details. The company recently announced a new tool to help combat the license-confusion issue: a site-wide API for querying and reporting license information. Full story at https://lwn.net/Articles/636261/ --------------------------------------- Your (Australian) Internet Service Provider (ISP) could soon start handing out your personal information to corporations. http://action.sumofus.org/a/corporate-isp-abuse/?akid=9883.831468.iLt0Vq&rd… Google Code to shut down in August http://pipedot.org/story/2015-03-12/google-code-shutting-down Gitorious to shut down in May https://about.gitlab.com/2015/03/03/gitlab-acquires-gitorious/ XFCE release 4.12 brings refinement and improvements http://www.xfce.org/about/news/?post=1425081600 0 A.D. Alpha 18 Rhododactylos released http://wildfiregames.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=19709 Mesa 10.5 Release Brings Skylake Support, OpenGL 4 partially implemented http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Mesa-10.5-Released DRI3 Support Finally Added To AMD's Radeon X.Org Driver "For users means improved window resizing, improved synchronization of rendering, and slightly better security" http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Radeon-DRI3-DDX-Present "Hello Barbie" Listens To Children Via Cloud https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35XCUbscziE http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/action/shut-down-hello-barbie User-Focused Security: End-to-End Encryption Extension for Yahoo Mail (fork of Google's End-to-End browser extension) http://yahoo.tumblr.com/post/113708033335/user-focused-security-end-to-end-… Ubuntu 10.04 LTS 5 year support ends at the end of the month. Kaspersky outs hard drive infecting malware http://www.bit-tech.net/news/bits/2015/02/17/equation-group/1 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/03/12/nsas_on_drugs_infosec_bods_unveil_s… https://puri.sm/posts/purism-avoids-common-nsa-drive-firmware-virus/ Software Freedom Conservancy Funds GPL Suit Against VMWare http://linux.slashdot.org/story/15/03/05/1721231/software-freedom-conservan… New Zealand Spied On Nearly Two Dozen Pacific Countries http://yro.slashdot.org/story/15/03/04/1748223/new-zealand-spied-on-nearly-… Feds Admit Stingrays Can Disrupt Cell Service of Bystanders http://www.wired.com/2015/03/feds-admit-stingrays-can-disrupt-cell-service-… UK Gov't Asks: Is 10 Years In Jail the Answer To Online Pirates? http://yro.slashdot.org/story/15/03/08/134235/uk-govt-asks-is-10-years-in-j… China takes Under the Dome anti-pollution film offline http://m.bbc.com/news/world-asia-31778115 Other interesting topics I had in mind, but weren't particularly newsworthy specifically for March: AMDGPU kernel driver for Radeon R9 3XX and above. NVIDIA Alerts Nouveau: They're Starting To Sign/Validate GPU Firmware Images http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTc5ODA

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