path: root/english/News/weekly/2011/08/index.wml

#use wml::debian::projectnews::header PUBDATE="2011-05-17" SUMMARY="DebConf10 Final Report, DNS security extensions, <q>Build it</q> event report, why attend DebConf, making <q>testing</q> user-oriented"

<p>Welcome to this year's eighth issue of DPN, the newsletter for the
Debian community. Topics covered in this issue include:</p>
<toc-display/>


<toc-add-entry name="dc10">DebConf10 Final Report is out</toc-add-entry>

<p>
The DebConf organization team released the final report of the 2010 Debian
Conference, which was held in New York City, USA, at Columbia University.
According to the <a
href="http://blog.debconf.org/blog/debconf10/tbv_finalreport.dc">DebConf blog
entry</a>, <q>It's a 46-page document which gives the reader an idea about the
conference as a whole. It includes descriptions of talks, DebCamp and Debian
Day activities, personal impressions, attendee and budgeting numbers, the work
of various teams, social events, funny pictures and so on.</q>

There are two PDF versions of the final report available, which can be
downloaded from <a href="http://media.debconf.org/dc10/report/">the DebConf Media
website</a>.
</p>


<toc-add-entry name="dnssec">DNS security extensions now available for Debian's zone entries</toc-add-entry>

<p>
The Debian Project's <a href="$(HOME)/News/2011/20110512">\
<tt>debian.org</tt> and <tt>debian.net</tt> domains are now
secured</a> by the DNS Security Extensions (DNSSEC).
<q>This enables users with security aware DNS resolvers to
securely retrieve information from the domain name system</q>.
</p>


<toc-add-entry name="DW"><q>Build it</q> event report</toc-add-entry>

<p>Margarita Manterola sent a <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-women/2011/05/msg00036.html">report</a>
of the <a href="$(HOME)/News/2011/20110502"><q>Build
it</q> event</a> organized by the Debian Women project in collaboration
with the Open Hatch project and held on the <tt>#debian-women</tt> IRC
channel on Saturday May 7.
Both the sessions &mdash;&nbsp;scheduled at 11:00 UTC and 22:00 UTC to fit different
timezones&nbsp;&mdash; went very well with an audience of at least ten to fifteen
attendees. <a
href="http://meetbot.debian.net/debian-women/2011/debian-women.2011-05-07-22.02.log.html">\
A log is available</a> for those who couldn't be present at the
event, as well as a <a
href="http://wiki.debian.org/BuildingTutorial">Building Tutorial</a>
based on the log and already translated into Spanish &mdash; volunteers welcome
for further translations!
</p>


<toc-add-entry name="identica">Debian Identi.ca group reaches
10,000</toc-add-entry>

<p>
As noted by Kipngetich
Ibrahim Ngeno, the <a href="http://identi.ca/group/debian">Debian
group on Identi.ca</a> has reached <a
href="http://identi.ca/notice/72779036">10,000 members</a>.
Beside the Debian group, founded on January 2009, there is also an
official <a href="http://identi.ca/debian">Debian account</a> (from which
various news items and announcements are broadcast) and <a
href="http://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Publicity/Identica#accounts">some
accounts</a> and <a
href="http://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Publicity/Identica#groups">groups</a>
for specific teams.</p>

<p>The latest official Identi.ca Debian team account
is the <a href="http://identi.ca/debianwomen">Debian Women
account</a>.</p>


<toc-add-entry name="ftpmaster">Removal of <tt>alpha</tt> and <tt>hppa</tt> ports
from <tt>ftp-master.debian.org</tt></toc-add-entry>

<p>
J&ouml;rg Jaspert announced the <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2011/05/msg00005.html">\
removal of the <tt>alpha</tt> and <tt>hppa</tt> ports from <tt>ftp-master.debian.org</tt></a>.
Users of either of these two architectures should ensure that their <tt>sources.list</tt>
entries point to the new location of <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00011.html">alpha</a>
and <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00012.html">hppa</a>
ports, except for <q>Lenny</q> users, since these architectures will
still be officially supported until its End Of Life.
</p>

<toc-add-entry name="Debconf11program">Why attend DebConf</toc-add-entry>

<p>Stefano Zacchiroli wrote an <a
href="http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2011/05/debconf11_and_you/">\
interesting post about DebConf11</a> that explains why it
is a truly FOSS event: there is no <q>event organizer</q> company
behind DebConf &mdash; all the work is done by volunteers (the
DebConf Team). Also, a major part of the value of DebConf itself
derives from the program which is created by all DebConf participants by
submitting proposals for talks, BoFs, contests, and so on. To quote
Stefano: <q>Are you going to DebConf and willing to attend a conference
with a great program? Great, then start submitting a great event
yourself!</q>.</p>

<p>In addition, this year the Debian Project is <a
href="$(HOME)/News/2011/20110515">inviting newbies and non-regular attendees to come to
DebConf</a>. For these two categories of participants an extra travel fund will be available.
Any Debian Developer or Maintainer who has never been to DebConf, or who last participated
in 2007 or before, can apply for this special funding. To put forward your request, or to
recommend other members of the Project, send an email to the <a
href="mailto:newbies@debconf.org">DebConf Newbies
Team</a> before June 18, including an estimate of travel costs, where
you are leaving from, the amount you will not be able to fund yourself, and the dates of
arrival and leaving.
If you plan to participate in DebConf, don't forget to register via the <a
href="http://debconf11.debconf.org/register.xhtml">DebConf registration system</a>.</p>


<toc-add-entry name="rolling">Making <q>testing</q> user-oriented</toc-add-entry>

<p>
After the <a href="http://cut.debian.net/">CUT proposal</a>, a new word
popped up in the discussion aiming to make <q>testing</q> user-oriented:
<a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-release/2011/04/msg00208.html">\
rolling</a>.
Even though some people <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00105.html">\
objected</a> or even <a
href="http://loldebian.wordpress.com/2011/05/04/rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrolling/">\
laughed</a> at first, others tried to <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00111.html">\
gather the main ideas</a> and began to propose serious <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00275.html">\
mechanisms for implementing them</a>.
The various proposals are still up for discussion.
One of the main interesting goals would be to provide more up to date
software to our users, allowing them to provide earlier feedback
before <q>stable</q> is released; and one of the biggest perceived risks is that
developers may lose focus on the <q>stable</q> release itself.
There actually could be some solutions to provide <q>rolling</q>
as a pseudo-suite, avoiding disruption to the release process and
allowing developers to bypass the <q>testing</q> migration process to
provide fixes in <q>rolling</q> directly.
</p>


<toc-add-entry name="twid">Further interviews</toc-add-entry>

<p>
Since the last issue of the Debian Project News, a
new issue of the <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/ThisWeekInDebian"><q>This week in
Debian</q> podcast</a> has been published: with
<a
href="http://frostbitemedia.libsyn.com/this-week-in-debian-episode-26">Phillip
Newborough</a>, from the CrunchBang distribution.
</p>

<p>
There has also been one further <q>People behind Debian</q> interview: with
<a href="http://raphaelhertzog.com/2011/05/06/people-behind-debian-steve-langasek-release-wizard/">Steve
Langasek</a>, release wizard and member of the technical committee.
</p>


<toc-add-entry name="other">Other news</toc-add-entry>

<p>
Ana Guerrero mentioned that <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00056.html">\
Qt3 is looking for new maintainers</a>.
You're invited to <a
href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=625502">\
step up to adopt it</a> or help to figure out <a
href="http://wiki.debian.org/qt3-x11-freeRemoval">\
what to do with packages depending on Qt3</a>.
</p>

<p>
Fernando Gonz&aacute;lez de Requena Redondo, who has spent the last
two years carrying out an <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00019.html">\
ethnographic survey of Debian</a>, presented
a master thesis on the subject: <q>The spaces of community: a
preliminary ethnographic study on the Debian Project</q>.
His <a
href="http://e-spacio.uned.es/fez/view.php?pid=bibliuned:500405">\
more than 150-page report</a> (in Spanish) is available
from the institutional repository of the UNED.
</p>

<p>Florian Weimer noted that people no longer use <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00021.html">\
corporate accounts to send mails to the Debian project mailing list</a>,
as they did in the past, wondering if it results from corporate pressure
or mailing list policy. Russ Allbery replied that it is probably a matter
of the <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00022.html">\
ease of getting a personal mailbox</a> and of the increased 
awareness &mdash;&nbsp;compared to ten years ago&nbsp;&mdash; of on-line identity.
Tony Travis added that he prefers to use a private email address
to have the <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00025.html">\
freedom to express opinions</a> which could be in conflict with 
<q>corporate</q> policy.
</p>


<p>Martin Zobel-Helas wondered if <a
href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00462.html">Debian should implement RFC4941 as
default for the next stable release, <q>Wheezy</q></a>. <a
href="http://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc4941.txt">RFC4941</a> describes an
extension to IPv6 stateless address autoconfiguration for interfaces whose
interface identifier is derived from an IEEE identifier; without this,
IPv6 configured via router advertisement uses the hardware address of the
Ethernet card to determine the IPv6 address, raising privacy issues as
users could be tracked via their devices.</p>

<toc-add-entry name="newcontributors">New Debian Contributors</toc-add-entry>

	<p>
7 applicants have been
<a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00008.html">accepted</a>
	as Debian Maintainers and
11 people have <a href="http://udd.debian.org/cgi-bin/new-maintainers.cgi">started
        to maintain packages</a> since the previous issue of the Debian
	Project News. Please welcome
Liang Guo, Nicolas Boulenguez, Nicolas Lopez de Lerma Aymerich,
Olivier Sallou, Sven Eckelmann, Thomas Krennwallner, YunQiang Su,
Alexander Holupirek, Vsevolod Velichko, Emilien Klein, Ming-Ting Yao Wei, 
Tobias Hansen, Torquil Macdonald S&oslash;rensen,
Madhu Donepudi, Stephan Gerhard, Stefan Tomanek, Vladimir Kotov
and Tobias Winchen
into our project!</p>


<toc-add-entry name="dsa">Important Debian Security Advisories</toc-add-entry>

	<p>Debian's Security Team recently released
	advisories for these packages (among others):
<a href="$(HOME)/security/2011/dsa-2231">otrs2</a>,
<a href="$(HOME)/security/2011/dsa-2232">exim4</a>,
<a href="$(HOME)/security/2011/dsa-2233">postfix</a>,
<a href="$(HOME)/security/2011/dsa-2234">zodb</a>,
<a href="$(HOME)/security/2011/dsa-2235">icedove</a>,
<a href="$(HOME)/security/2011/dsa-2236">exim4</a>, and
<a href="$(HOME)/security/2011/dsa-2237">apr</a>.
	Please read them carefully and take the proper measures.</p>

        <p>Debian's Backports Team released advisories for these packages:
<a href="http://lists.debian.org/20110503063614.GB4795@glandium.org">iceweasel</a> and
<a href="http://lists.debian.org/20110510170109.GA3651@downhill.g.la">exim4</a>
(<a href="http://lists.debian.org/20110514143158.GC1984@downhill.g.la">twice</a>).
        Please read them carefully and take the proper measures.</p>

        <p>Debian's Stable Release Team released advisories for these packages:
<a href="http://lists.debian.org/1305055836.6748.570.camel@hathi.jungle.funky-badger.org">clive</a> and
<a href="http://lists.debian.org/1305055890.6748.577.camel@hathi.jungle.funky-badger.org">pianobar</a>.
        Please read them carefully and take the proper measures.</p>


<p>Please note that these are a selection of the more important security
advisories of the last weeks. If you need to be kept up to date about
security advisories released by the Debian Security Team, please
subscribe to the <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-security-announce/">security mailing
list</a> (and the separate <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-backports-announce/">backports
list</a>, and <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-stable-announce/">stable updates
list</a> or <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-volatile-announce/">volatile
list</a>, for <q>Lenny</q>, the oldstable distribution) for announcements.</p>


<toc-add-entry name="nnwp">New and noteworthy packages</toc-add-entry>

<p>
270 packages were added to the unstable Debian archive
recently. <a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/newpkg">Among
many others</a> are:</p>

<ul>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/collabtive">collabtive &mdash; web-based project management software</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/crtmpserver">crtmpserver &mdash; high performance RTMP/RTSP streaming server</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/edisplay">edisplay &mdash; fast image manipulation programs (image viewer)</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/exabgp">exabgp &mdash; BGP route injector</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fonts-horai-umefont">fonts-horai-umefont &mdash; Japanese TrueType font, Ume-font</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fonts-pagul">fonts-pagul &mdash; TrueType font for the Sourashtra language</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fonts-yozvox-yozfont">fonts-yozvox-yozfont &mdash; Japanese proportional handwriting OpenType font</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fookebox">fookebox &mdash; web-based jukebox frontend to MPD</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/goldencheetah">goldencheetah &mdash; set of analysis tools for cycling performance</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/jsonbot">jsonbot &mdash; framework for building bots for IRC, XMPP and the web</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/kate-syntax-go">kate-syntax-go &mdash; syntax files to highlight Go in Kate</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/mangler">mangler &mdash; Ventrilo compatible client for Linux</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/nautilus-image-manipulator">nautilus-image-manipulator &mdash; resize and send images from Nautilus</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/nwchem">nwchem &mdash; high-performance computational chemistry software</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/paprass">paprass &mdash; manager of electronic documents</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/pcsxr">pcsxr &mdash; Sony PlayStation emulator</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/vim-syntax-go">vim-syntax-go &mdash; syntax files to highlight Go in Vim</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/wavesurfer">wavesurfer &mdash; sound manipulation program</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xnbd-client">xnbd-client &mdash; network block device client with support for live migration</a></li>
<li><a href="http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xnbd-server">xnbd-server &mdash; network block device server with support for live migration</a></li>
</ul>


<toc-add-entry name="wnpp">Work-needing packages</toc-add-entry>

	<p>Currently <a href="$(DEVEL)/wnpp/orphaned">\
301 packages are orphaned</a> and <a href="$(DEVEL)/wnpp/rfa">\
145 packages are up for adoption</a>: please visit the complete 
	list of <a href="$(DEVEL)/wnpp/help_requested">packages
	which need your help</a>.</p>


<toc-add-entry name="continuedpn">Want to continue reading DPN?</toc-add-entry>

<p>Please help us create this newsletter.  We still need more volunteer writers
to watch the Debian community and report about what is going on. Please see the
<a href="http://wiki.debian.org/ProjectNews/HowToContribute">contributing
page</a> to find out how to help. We're looking forward to receiving your mail
at <a href="mailto:debian-publicity@lists.debian.org">debian-publicity@lists.debian.org</a>.</p>


#use wml::debian::projectnews::footer editor="Tiago Bortoletto Vaz, Mark Caglienzi, Francesca Ciceri, Jeremiah C. Foster, David Pr&eacute;vot, Alexander Reichle-Schmehl, Alexander Reshetov, Justin B. Rye"
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