path: root/english/News/weekly/2003/16/index.wml

#use wml::debian::weeklynews::header PUBDATE="2003-04-22" SUMMARY="DPL^2, DWN, Newbies, Freebies, W3C, Multiarch, ReiserFS, Lawyers, Debconf, Pebble, Conferences, X86-64, UTF-8"
# $id: index.wml,v 1.8 2003/02/26 09:08:24 joey Exp $

<p>Welcome to this year's 16th issue of DWN, the weekly newsletter for the
Debian community.  Steven Frank took a <a
href="http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1107-997082.html">look</a> at patents and
Free Software and estimated the danger of the recent <a
href="http://opensource.org/sco-vs-ibm.html">lawsuit</a> against IBM.
Bruce Perens also <a href="http://perens.com/Articles/Patents.html">\
examinated</a> patents and Free Software.  The European Parliament is likely to
ratify a Software Patent Directive in May.  The <a
href="http://swpat.ffii.org/">ffii</a> is calling for people to <a
href="http://petition.ffii.org/eubsa/en">sign</a> their proposed amendments.</p>

<p><strong>Resumé from Bdale Garbee.</strong> On the last day of Bdale's
leadership of Debian he sent in a final <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce-0304/msg00008.html">\
report</a> about his term and in which he also talks about the
future.  Bdale will continue to
give <a href="http://www.gag.com/~bdale/talks/">talks</a> about Debian and
several events are already being negotiated.  His future focus will be the IA64 port
of Debian and keeping it healthy.  He remains concerned about the health of <a
href="http://www.spi-inc.org/">SPI</a>, and SPI's relationship to Debian.</p>

<p><strong>DWN translation in Alioth.</strong> Ignacio García Fernández <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-www-0304/msg00175.html">reported</a>
about the effort to translate DWN into his native tongue.  Over the
previous months the Spanish translation of DWN became a group task.  Now that <a
href="http://alioth.debian.org/">alioth</a> is available, the team thought that
it could be a good idea to use it and started the <a
href="http://alioth.debian.org/projects/dwn-trans/">dwn-trans</a>
project.  It intends to be language independent so could be
utilised by the other translation efforts for DWN as well.</p>

<p><strong>Bits from the new Project Leader.</strong> Martin Michlmayr sent
his first <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce-0304/msg00009.html">\
message</a> as Debian Project Leader.  He thanked Manoj and Bdale for their
work and encouraged anyone to feel free to contact him with ideas or concerns.  Martin is
concerned about the next release, because at the moment there are
many open release-critical bugs.  Furthermore the new <a
href="http://raw.no/d-i/getting_started.html">debian-installer</a>
project still requires a significant amount of work.</p>

<p><strong>Improving the Speed of GNU/Linux Applications.</strong>
Cameron Laird has written an <a
href="http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-perf/?ca=dgr-lnxw83FasterLinux">\
article</a> about two different approaches to increasing the performance of
applications: the easy way and the hard way.  The easy approach is to give
the user more feedback on the progress of the application, since this allows
the user to feel more content with waiting.  The hard way is more
difficult since it requires algorithm tuning and careful measurement of the
used tools and libraries in order to speed up the process itself.  The old
Unix rule applies: first make it correct, than optimize for speed.</p>

<p><strong>Total Computer Newbies meet Debian.</strong> Charles Williams wrote
a <a href="http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=3213">usability study</a>
about a family that had decided it wanted GNU/Linux installed on their new
computer.  In the <a href="http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=3293">\
second part</a> of the article the author describes what happened after the installation
and after the users spent some time using their Debian
system.</p>

<p><strong>Debian Freebies illegal?</strong> In our <a
href="$(HOME)/News/weekly/2003/13/">April 1st issue</a> we reported about a
new <a href="http://www.usk.de/JuSchG/">law</a> in Germany that intends to
save young people from suffering from violent computer games but which is likely
to affect the Debian project as well.  Michael Banck received a <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-events-eu-0304/msg00045.html">\
response</a> from a journalist who advised us to apply for child-safe
classification for the entire Debian CD that some Debian people plan to give
away at upcoming exhibitions.  It only costs EUR&nbsp;1000.</p>

<p><strong>Implementing W3C Recommendations?</strong> Thomas Bliesener <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg00976.html">noted</a> that
almost the whole Debian website meets the HTML standards except some online
documentation which seems to be caused by a <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/188117">\
problem</a> with debiandoc2html.  However, some packages ship documentation that
is non conforming and some produce HTML code which is not standards-compliant.
Ray Dassen <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg00980.html">\
explained</a> that having our documentation conform to W3C standards and
recommendations is desirable, but not a binding requirement.</p>

<p><strong>Multiarchitecture Binary Packages.</strong> Barak Pearlmutter <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01035.html">remembered</a>
that some years ago, NeXT modified GCC and the rest of the GNU toolchain to
allow them to produce multi-architecture binaries, so that a single binary
executable could run on both m68k and i386 platforms.  They also had a tool
that could strip out hunks for unwanted architectures.  He proposed to
resurrect this code and build 11+ architectures into each architecture-binary
Debian package.</p>

<p><strong>Maintainers and RC Bugs.</strong> Andrew Suffield <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce-0304/msg00007.html">\
created</a> a sorted (most release-critical bugs first) list of maintainers
who have excessive numbers of old RC bugs open against their packages.  Bugs
less than 30 days old are not considered. The list is sorted using
a score proportional to the age and severity of each bug.  It is fairly
likely that some of these are bugs which should have been closed.</p>

<p><strong>Debian violating Copyright of ReiserFS?</strong> Hans Reiser, the
author of <a href="http://www.reiserfs.org/">ReiserFS</a>, <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01295.html">asked</a>
Debian to explain why the credits and attributions from the reiserfs utilities
had been removed in violation of the copyright.  He explained that clauses
were included forbidding the removal of credits, although he never expected
Debian to be a culprit.  Jarno Elonen <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01317.html">pointed out</a>
that these extra clauses are located in the <code>README</code> file rather
than the <code>COPYING</code> file and the reiserfs maintainer probably
inadvertently overlooked them.  Ben Collins <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01332.html">noted</a> that
this could render ReiserFS non-free.</p>

<p><strong>Debian for Lawyers Sub-project.</strong> Jeremy Malcolm <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01285.html">proposed</a> a
new sub-project called <a
href="http://people.debian.org/~terminus/debian-lex/">Debian-Lex</a>, which
would target Debian at lawyers.  This would contain some obvious selections from
the existing pool such as OpenOffice.org, Evolution and Gnotime, but it would
also need some other packages that aren't yet in Debian such as SQL-Ledger
(which will be packaged soon).  Jeremy also intends to put together a database
schema that will serve as the basis for a legal client and matter database.
There was <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01291.html">support</a> for
the idea, although there was some <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01328.html">discussion</a>
over the Debian-Lex name.</p>

<p><strong>Management of Configuration Files with Debconf.</strong> Colin Walters <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01145.html">demanded</a>
that packages do not use debconf to manage their configuration files.  He pointed
out that <a href="$(HOME)/doc/debian-policy/ch-files.html#s11.7.3">policy</a>
requires that local changes must be preserved during a package upgrade.  When
a package defaults to managing its configuration files with debconf, local
changes can be destroyed without the user knowing.  Joey Hess also <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01248.html">demanded</a>
that debconf not be used for notes that properly belong in
<code>README.Debian</code>.  He <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01289.html">knows</a> that
some packages do things right, but even if 10&nbsp;% of packages misuse debconf the
whole system looks bad.  Joey's <a
href="http://kitenet.net/~joey/debconf-debconf/">debconf presentation</a>
might be a good starting place to learn about the proper use of debconf.</p>

<p><strong>Building a Firewall with Pebble.</strong>  Glenn Stone <a
href="http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6787">described</a> how to
use <a href="http://www.nycwireless.net/pebble/">Pebble</a>, a Debian-lite
distribution to get a homemade firewall up and running.  He described
installation and setup on an old Dell 486D/50, with 16&nbsp;MB of RAM.  Pebble is
only 17&nbsp;MB compressed and the final system ended up being 81&nbsp;MB on the disk.
Glenn thought this would be a good way to build a firewall on a budget.  It
also makes adding extras like a mini-web server or mail proxy as simple as an
<code>apt-get install</code> command.</p>

<p><strong>Call for Debian Conference Topics.</strong>  With two Debian
conferences taking place later this year, <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-user-0304/msg03306.html">a
call</a> went out for ideas on which topics and parts of Debian those who
might attend would like to see covered by talks and/or workshops.  The
coordinator of Debian's <a
href="$(HOME)/events/2003/0710-linuxtag">LinuxTag</a>
involvement would love to be flooded with ideas to add to his list and for
which speakers could be sought.  Ideas for <a
href="$(HOME)/events/2003/0718-debconf">Debian Conference 3</a>
can be added to the <a href="http://www.debconf.org/debconf3/todo.php">to
do</a> list in the hope that somebody will submit a talk on that subject.</p>

<p><strong>Update on Debian for x86-64.</strong> Arnd Bergmann <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg00978.html">reported</a>
that the toolchain and basic utilities for x86-64 work.  He made <a
href="http://www.arndb.de/debian/">available</a> biarch packages that are able
to produce code for the new architecture as well as for i386.  These packages
should work as a drop-in replacement for the single-arch i386 packages in
Debian/sid.  They were tested in <a href="http://bochs.sourceforge.net/">\
Bochs</a>, an IA-32 and x86-64 PC emulator.</p>

<p><strong>Missing Support for UTF-8?</strong> Nikolai Prokoschenko <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01347.html">noted</a> that
recently released font packages only contain latin1 characters and not, for
example, Russian which he needs.  Manoj Srivastava <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01399.html">replied</a>
with a note about how Free Software works: If it scratches your itch, fix it and
send patches.  Henrique de Moraes Holschuh <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-0304/msg01412.html">added</a> that
he would create a sub-project "Debian-desktop-RU" that had all defaults
tweaked so that it would work properly.</p>

<p><strong>Security Updates.</strong> You know the drill.  Please make sure
that you update your systems if you have any of these packages installed.</p>

<ul>
<li><a href="$(HOME)/security/2003/dsa-288">OpenSSL</a> --
    Decipher vulnerability.
<li><a href="$(HOME)/security/2003/dsa-289">rinetd</a> --
    Denial of service.
<li><a href="$(HOME)/security/2003/dsa-290">sendmail-wide</a> --
    DoS and arbitrary code execution.
<li><a href="$(HOME)/security/2003/dsa-291">ircII</a> --
    DoS and arbitrary code execution.
<li><a href="$(HOME)/security/2003/dsa-292">mime-support</a> --
    Temporary file race conditions.
</ul>

<p><strong>New or Noteworthy Packages.</strong> The following packages were
added to the unstable Debian archive recently or contain important updates.</p>

<ul>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/bootcd-mkinitrd">bootcd-mkinitrd</a>
    -- bootcd extension to create an initrd-image usable for bootcd.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/web/cherrypy">cherrypy</a>
    -- Python-based tool for developing dynamic web sites.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/libdevel/cvm-dev">cvm-dev</a>
    -- Credential Validation Modules (development files, documentation).
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/devel/dbus-1">dbus-1</a>
    -- Simple inter-process messaging system.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/duplicity">duplicity</a>
    -- Encrypted bandwidth-efficient backup.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/devel/eclipse-source">eclipse-source</a>
    -- Eclipse source code.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/science/fastlink-doc">fastlink-doc</a>
    -- [Biology] Some papers about fastlink.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/sound/fluidsynth">fluidsynth</a>
    -- Real-time software synthesizer based on the Soundfont2 specifications.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/foomatic-filters">foomatic-filters</a>
    -- Linuxprinting.org printer support.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/games/geki2">geki2</a>
    -- Vertical shoot'em-up.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/games/geki3">geki3</a>
    -- Horizontal shoot'em-up.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/glark">glark</a>
    -- Pattern matching tool similar to grep.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/sound/gnupod-tools">gnupod-tools</a>
    -- Collection of Perl-scripts for iPod.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/admin/gringotts">gringotts</a>
    -- Store passwords in an encrypted file.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/net/hostapd">hostapd</a>
    -- 802.11x access daemon for hostap driver.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/base/initscripts">initscripts</a>
    -- Standard scripts needed for booting and shutting down.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/kde/kde-amusements">kde-amusements</a>
    -- The K Desktop Environment (Games and Toys).
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/games/mordor">mordor</a>
    -- Multi User Dungeon game server.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/multitail">multitail</a>
    -- Views multiple logfiles windowed on console.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/net/pork">pork</a>
    -- Console-based AOL Instant Messenger client.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/mail/quickml">quickml</a>
    -- Very-easy-to-use mailing list system.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/net/sonar">sonar</a>
    -- Console chat via ICMP (ping) echo-request packets.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/mail/sqwebmail-de">sqwebmail-de</a>
    -- German translations for the SqWebMail webmail service.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/x11/ttf-dustin">ttf-dustin</a>
    -- Various TrueType fonts from dustismo.com.
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/devel/xt-aterm">xt-aterm</a>
    -- Data type (Tree) for exchange in distributed applications.
</ul>

<p><strong>Orphaned Packages.</strong> 21 packages were orphaned this week and
require a new maintainer.  This makes a total of 196 orphaned packages.  Many
thanks to the previous maintainers who contributed to the Free Software
community.  Please see the <a href="$(HOME)/devel/wnpp/">WNPP pages</a> for
the full list, and please add a note to the bug report and retitle it to ITA:
if you plan to take over a package.</p>

<ul>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/devel/bg5cc">bg5cc</a>
     -- Big-5 wide-characters rectifier.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189818">Bug#189818</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/bg5ps">bg5ps</a>
     -- Utility to print Chinese Big5/GB documents using TrueType fonts.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189816">Bug#189816</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/cce">cce</a>
     -- Console Chinese Environment - display Chinese (GB) on console.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189523">Bug#189523</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/ccf">ccf</a>
     -- Chinese encodings (GB/Big5/HZ) conversion filter.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189529">Bug#189529</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/cedictb5">cedictb5</a>
     -- Chinese/English dictionary data file (Big5).
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189524">Bug#189524</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/cedictgb">cedictgb</a>
     -- Chinese/English dictionary data file (GB).
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189531">Bug#189531</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/cedicttools">cedicttools</a>
     -- Various tools to use with the CEDict data.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189530">Bug#189530</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/x11/cxterm-common">cxterm</a>
     -- Chinese terminal emulator for the X Window System.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189817">Bug#189817</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/net/dnrd">dnrd</a>
     -- Proxy DNS daemon
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189659">Bug#189659</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/doc/doc-linux-zh-s">doc-linux-zh-s</a>
     -- Linux HOWTOs and mini-HOWTOs in Simplified Chinese in HTML.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189525">Bug#189525</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/net/icmpush">icmpush</a>
     -- ICMP packet builder.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189625">Bug#189625</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/otherosfs/lpkg">lpkg</a>
     -- Newton MessagePad PDA Package Loader.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189526">Bug#189526</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/net/ptknettools">ptknettools</a>
     -- Selection of Internet service clients written in Perl/Tk.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189809">Bug#189809</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/slmon">slmon</a>
     -- Simple S-Lang based system performance monitor.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189810">Bug#189810</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/libs/libsphinx2g0">sphinx2</a>
     -- Speech recognition library.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189693">Bug#189693</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/libs/t1lib1">t1lib</a>
     -- Type 1 font rasterizer library.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189694">Bug#189694</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/ttfprint">ttfprint</a>
     -- Utility to print Chinese text using truetype fonts.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189528">Bug#189528</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/x11/xautolock">xautolock</a>
     -- Start a program if the X session is idle for some time.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189522">Bug#189522</a>)</li>
<li> <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/text/zh-sgmltools">zh-sgmltools</a>
     -- Wrapper for SGMLtools to process Chinese.
     (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/189527">Bug#189527</a>)</li>
</ul>

<p><strong>Want to continue reading DWN?</strong> Please help us create this
newsletter.  We still need more volunteer writers who investigate the Debian
community and report about events in the community.  Please see the <a
href="$(HOME)/News/weekly/contributing">contributing page</a> to find out how
to help.  We're looking forward to receiving your mail at <a
href="mailto:dwn@debian.org">dwn@debian.org</a>.</p>

#use wml::debian::weeklynews::footer editor="Matt Black, Martin 'Joey' Schulze"