● 07.26.13

● Links 26/7/2013: Mozilla/Firefox and Jolla Phones

Posted in News Roundup at 4:32 pm by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxGNU/Linux

Desktop

• Although many people don’t realize it, value added resellers, or VARs, played a huge role in the rise of personal computers during the late 1980s and 1990s. These trusted distributors and advisors were among the early champions of newfangled computers that sat on desktops, early local area networks (LANs), and servers from companies like Compaq and AST.

Kernel Space

• Last week I had the pleasure to appear on Bloomberg West in an interview with Cory Johnson. It’s refreshing to see mainstream broadcast media embrace and understand the Linux story so well. Cory knew what he was talking about.

• Sharp’s directing of this tweet to The Ada Initiative does not sit easily beside her claim in a later post to LKML that “I’m not some crazy feminist ranting about cooties on Google+.” If she did not want to canvass the support of women, why send the tweet to an organisation of this nature?

• Had Sharp wanted to raise this issue without making her gender a factor, she would not have sought the support of an organisation like The Ada Initiative at any time. She would have raised it on the mailing list. And she would not have made it a PR issue.

• A few days after the discussion on the mailing list, Sharp issued what can only be described a gloating tweet. “I’m on to something. 199 retweets. Google plus: +333, 122 reshares. 9 major tech articles. 180 blog comments. People care”. It could be argued that not everything that is popular is also correct, but apparently such arguments are not part of Sharp’s make-up.

Applications

Instructionals/Technical

Games

• Development on Liege, John Rhee’s modern re-imagining of a classic 16-bit role-playing game, will expand to include PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, Linux and Wii U, according to updates on the Kickstarter page.

• Liege is a cross-platform, party-based tactical role-playing game where players explore the lives of ordinary characters placed in extraordinary circumstances. It’s currently planned as a three-story arc, with the first game launching in 2014.

Desktop Environments/WMs

K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt

• With Akademy behind me and the situation about “what is master” in kde-workspace resolved I decided to switch my work away from Wayland towards getting KWin on top of Qt 5 and KDE Frameworks 5. After a few days of hacking the compilation of KWin is re-enabled in the frameworks-scratch branch of the kde-workspace git repository.

Distributions

• Somehow I was never very comfortable with so called “lightweight” distros primarily because of the very limited functionalities they offer. I have tried out Slitaz, Puppy Linux, MacPup, etc. to name a few and finally settled for Openbox distros like Manjaro openbox, Archbang, Crunchbang, Sparkylinux, etc. In between, I tried e17 distros like Bodhi and Snowlinux as well. Actually all these were for a HP Pentium-IV PC with 1.5 GB RAM that I have. On that system, on conventional DEs like LXDE/XFCE, I face issues while watching movies and playing online videos in YouTube – things tend to drag a lot! Right now it has Manjaro Openbox Lite which works fantastic on it. Alongside, I was also looking for a system with more conventional DE and antiX’s name popped into my mind while browsing through Distrowatch top 100 list.

Debian Family

Derivatives

Canonical/Ubuntu

• Ubuntu is aiming to raise $32 million in crowdfunding to fund Ubuntu Edge, a mobile computer that can dual-boot between Android and Ubuntu GNU/Linux.

• Will Ubuntu Edge commit to using only free software? If the project succeeds and has $32 million available to spend, this is surely possible, but there is no indication in any of the promotional materials that this is part of the plan.

• As if crowdfunding a phone wasn’t a lofty enough goal, Canonical hopes to prevent the problems that Android has faced with mobile operators controlling the update process.

• Unlike the iPhone, it had a proper, slidedown keyboard. You could just about imagine writing an article on it. It ran a version of Linux and, unlike the closed-down operating systems on other phones, you could do proper nerdy things on it. It even had some nice, unusual hardware touches, like an FM transmitter, which meant you could play your music through a radio, if you had one to hand; that said, the built-in stereo speakers were superior to those on any other phone I had seen. Unfortunately, it was so heavy that if you couldn’t keep up the payments on your contract, you could easily take out a jeweller’s shop window with it.

• The Ubuntu Edge smartphone project has already raised a staggering amount of money in just a few days. Folks interested in helping bring a phone that dual boots Android and Ubuntu and which can function as a desktop PC to market have pledged more than $6 million toward a goal of $32 million in hopes of being among the first to get the phone.

• A smartphone-PC hybrid device, funded by the largest ever crowd funding drive is hoping to disrupt the smartphone industry, when it launches next year.

Flavours and Variants

• Now second alpha version of the flavours of Ubuntu 13.10 Saucy Salamander is available for download and testing. Images for the Kubuntu, Lubuntu, Ubuntu GNOME, UbuntuKylin and Xubuntu are available immediatly. This is an alpha release so it is not ready for installation on production machines.

Devices/Embedded

Phones

• Geeksphone has started taking pre-orders for its first commercial smartphone running Firefox OS. The Peak+ offers double the RAM and offers better battery and graphics performance than the original Peak developers phone, and it runs the latest Firefox OS 1.1 build.

• Spanish online phone seller and Telefonica partner Geeksphone began selling its Peak and Keon developer phones for Firefox OS in April, and quickly sold out. They remained that way until this week when Geeksphone set up a pre-sale promotional price of 149 Euros ($196) for an updated Peak model called the Peak+. Once these are gone, the Peak+ price will rise to an unstated higher price, and will be sold from its online store when the unlocked Peak+ begins shipping in larger numbers mid-September.

• Nokia’s MeeGo mobile operating system may be a thing of the past but it lives on in the new Jolla smartphone. Created by some of the folks behind the short-lived MeeGo, this handset, and Finnish startup with the same Jolla name, runs unique Sailfish software.

Android

• Yesterday Google released the new version of Android (still called Jelly Bean, but the version number moved to 4.3) – sticking to the twice a year upgrade cycle. Just like the last year it is Nexus 7 which introduced the 4.3 experience to the world. Nexus 7 is already one of the hottest selling gadgets around and the latest hardware makes it one of the best tablets in that form factor.

Free Software/Open Source

• OpenDaylight operates under the auspices of the Linux Foundation, no stranger itself to running large scale collaborative projects. Jim Zemlin, executive director of the Linux Foundation, told Enterprise Networking Planet that OpenDaylight is now accelerating at a rapid rate.

• Apparently, the notion of free software has not killed off job opportunities in the software space. Open source software is in fact creating numerous job opportunities, if the multitude of companies hiring at this week’s OSCON (O’Reilly Open Source Convention) are any indication.

• A walk through the convention floor in Portland features numerous companies advertising their need for more people. “This conference in two words? ‘We’re hiring,’” said conference attendee Tim Bray, the XML co-inventor who now is a developer advocate at Google. “Everybody’s got a ‘we’re hiring’ booth.” Bray sees it as a symptom of an improved economy and open source becoming mainstream.

• The top picks of free security and encryption software are revealed today by software review website Boffin. The list was compiled after numerous software were tested for competency, quality and reliability.

• An open-source software project aims to give software developers a simple way to wrap encryption into their applications to thwart online surveillance efforts.

• While the world of enterprise open source finds its foothold in this highly transitional era within the tech sector, consumer-facing tech giants exceeded many of Wall Street’s expectations for Q2. Both Apple and Facebook, currently facing scrutiny for not innovating quickly enough in the age of mobile, held their ground with an increase in iPhone sales and mobile ad revenue, respectively. Still, Wall Street is anxious for Apple and Facebook to step up their game. Here we explore the future business opportunities for Apple devices and Facebook services in the booming mobile sector.

• George de Bono, GM General Manager for the Middle East Turkey and Africa (META) region at Red Hat, is one of a growing number of operators in this space excited about Africa’s adoption of open source and growing awareness of the benefits related to this technology.

• Red Hat is a US-based global provider of open source solutions and listed on America’s S&P 500 stock market Index.

SaaS/Big Data

CMS

• Open source CMS ImpressPages is up to version 3.4, and the latest release features a new file browser, the ability to build custom layouts, and the development team has committed to monthly updates from here.

FSF/FSFE/GNU/SFLC

• The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today launched a fundraising initiative for Replicant (http://replicant.us), a fully free Android distribution and the first mobile operating system (OS) to run without relying on proprietary system code. Replicant’s small volunteer developer team is focused on improving their OS, while also expanding it to work on more devices. Donations will primarily be used to buy new devices for development and testing — a critical need — but will also help fund infrastructure and promotion for the project.

Project Releases

• OpenXava is an AJAX Java Framework for Rapid Development of Enterprise Web Applications. In OpenXava you only have to write the domain classes in plain Java to get a web application ready for production.

Public Services/Government

• That was said about Huawei when there was concern about data-leaks and backdoors, but it is currently being said about using M$’s stuff because M$ like many US corporations is in bed with NSA and spying on the world. Obviously, if you don’t want to make things easy for spies, you should not use that other OS.

• Instead use Free/Libre Open Source Software like Debian GNU/Linux. With accessible source-code, it’s harder for the NSA to snoop. This is on top of all the other benefits of FLOSS such as low cost, flexibility, rapidity of development and encouragement of small/local business development and employment. Governments globally should be pumping up their own economies, not USA.

• In what appears to be open-season on the NSA and Tech Companies, Bloomberg has joined in with a report of their own, implicating that Microsoft provides US intelligence agencies with information about bugs in its popular software before it publicly releases a fix. In other words, Microsoft grants special access to the likes of the NSA to poke around in the nearly 1 Billion users of Microsoft software via newly discovered bugs—long before Microsoft report it to the public and eventually patch the bug.

• What this means in practice is that intelligence agencies like the NSA and CIA could potentially be granted near complete access and control to every single machine running Microsoft Windows, including your PC and mine, but also the PCs of nearly every government agency in Malaysia. Potentially, every now and then, the NSA and CIA could be snooping around the data of our local government officials thanks to good ol’ Microsoft, and no one would be none the wiser.

Licensing

• If you are considering a development project that uses an open source software license, this guide will introduce you to the basic types available.

Programming

• A week away from August, below are our programming language ranking numbers from June, which represent our Q3 snapshot. The attentive may have noticed that we never ran numbers for Q2; this is because little changed. Which is not to imply that a great deal changed between Q1 and Q3, please note, but rather than turn this into an annual exercise snapshots every six months should provide adequate insight into the relevant language developments occuring over a given time period.

• Tom Preston-Werner cites the MIT License for its brevity, compared to the wordy GNU General Public License, and the permissiveness of its terms

Leftovers

• The train that derailed and crashed into a wall as it sped around a curve in northwest Spain Wednesday night is a harrowing reminder of what can go wrong at high speeds. At least 80 people died in the crash, and 178 were injured.

Health/Nutrition

• It turns out that a diet of potatoes, rice milk and pasta is bad for pussy. Veterinarians in Australia who cared for a violently ill vegan kitten are warning pet owners not to “force ideologies” on their pets, the Herald Sun reports.

Security

• Stomping on the brakes of a 3,500-pound Ford Escape that refuses to stop–or even slow down–produces a unique feeling of anxiety. In this case it also produces a deep groaning sound, like an angry water buffalo bellowing somewhere under the SUV’s chassis. The more I pound the pedal, the louder the groan gets–along with the delighted cackling of the two hackers sitting behind me in the backseat.

• Jack, a famed white hat hacker, was scheduled to present at the Black Hat security conference next week, and present research on vulnerabilities in implantable medical devices. Conference organizers said Jack’s talk would not be replaced, and that the allotted hour on Thursday would be left vacant to commemorate his life and work.

• The San Francisco medical examiner’s office said Jack, 35, died in the city on Thursday – but did not provide details on the circumstances surrounding his death.

• Jack had exposed a security flaw in insulin pumps that could be made to dispense a fatal dose by a hacker 300ft away, pushing some medical companies to review the security of these devices.

• He was also a popular and respected figure in the information security scene. Within that small scene, reverse engineers are especially close, said Matthieu Suiche, a friend of Jack’s and chief scientist at CloudVolumes Inc in an email. “We pretty much all know each other, or have lots of common friends,” Suiche said. “It’s almost like we all grew up together.”

Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

• In an almost palpable irony, Russian and U.S. officials simultaneously announced their intent to move forward with controversial arms transfers to opposing sides in the Syrian civil war Monday.

• If full-body scanners and TSA pat-downs make you feel uncomfortable, you now have an alternate option – making the agency like you and paying a fee of $85.

• The Transportation Security Administration has launched an expansion to their program that allows members to bypass regular airport pre-flight security checkpoints. Those enrolled in the ‘trusted traveler’ program, called TSA PreCheck, don’t have to remove their shoes, jackets and belts during screening. Members can also keep their laptop computers and approved liquids in their bags.

• Police officers are usually the heroes in the reality television show “Bait Car,” which follows undercover cops as they catch car thieves. But the show caught one Los Angeles sheriff’s detective lying on arrest reports and in court, the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday. A district attorney’s investigation found that lead detective Anthony Shapiro deliberately lied about reading suspects their Miranda rights before they made incriminating statements that could later be used against them in court.

• In the same segment, Fox’s Trace Gallagher said, “The question many are asking is why the magazine is making him look like a teen heartthrob instead of a terrorist and alleged killer?”

• That question raises another: How do you make someone look like “a terrorist and alleged killer”?

• Today it is Washington that is enamored of tyranny.

• [...]

• The Obama Regime has destroyed press freedom. A lackey federal appeals court has ruled that NY Times reporter James Risen must testify in the trial of a CIA officer charged with providing Risen with information about CIA plots against Iran. The ruling of this fascist court destroys confidentiality and is intended to end all leaks of the government’s crimes to media.

• What Americans have learned in the 21st century is that the US government lies about everything and breaks every law. Without whistleblowers, Americans will remain in the dark as “their” government enserfs them, destroying every liberty, and impoverishes them with endless wars for Washington’s and Wall Street’s hegemony.

• Snowden harmed no one except the liars and traitors in the US government. Contrast Washington’s animosity against Snowden with the pardon that Bush gave to Dick Cheney aide, Libby, who took the fall for his boss for blowing the cover, a felony, on a covert CIA operative, the spouse of a former government official who exposed the Bush/Cheney/neocon lies about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

• Whatever serves the tiny clique that rules america is legal; whatever exposes the criminals is illegal.

• That’s all there is to it.

• Head of Venezuela’s National Assembly Diosdado Cabello has stated that he will make public “hard evidence of assassination attempts” targeting himself and President Nicolas Maduro “in due course”.

• “We know who they are, what they are, what they want, and we will find them,” Cabello told legislators during a special session of the assembly in Zulia state on Wednesday.

• The alleged plot was first revealed by Maduro during a street government in Monagas state the day before, when he said that “fascist” groups operating in Venezuela “have crazy plans”.

• “I have appointed Diosdado Cabello as political head of the PSUV to find the truth of how they have prepared for attacks against me for months,” Maduro said.

• Maduro stated that if he or Cabello were targeted for assassination, “the wrath of god and the people would be unstoppable” adding that the political opposition would be crippled.

Environment/Energy/Wildlife

• Oilfield services giant Halliburton will plead guilty to destroying computer test results that had been sought as evidence in the Deepwater Horizon disaster, the Justice Department announced Thursday.

• As we’ve written before, the mysterious mass die-off of honey bees that pollinate $30 billion worth of crops in the US has so decimated America’s apis mellifera population that one bad winter could leave fields fallow. Now, a new study has pinpointed some of the probable causes of bee deaths and the rather scary results show that averting beemageddon will be much more difficult than previously thought.

Finance

• In Manhattan, the super rich foreign class is driving a boom in luxury condo towers that is widening the gap. Places such as London, and Sydney are feeling the hard pinch of high real estate prices as well. But in those cities, considerable effort has been made to control rising prices and debt and deal with declining ownership.

• A report by MPs says 200,000 pension savers who lost money in the Equitable Life scandal may miss out because of lack of publicity for a compensation scheme.

• Kicking off a series of speeches about the economy, President Obama told a crowd in Illinois on Wednesday that reversing growing inequality and rejuvenating the middle class “has to be Washington’s highest priority.” During his remarks, Obama failed to mention the bankruptcy filing by Detroit, where thousands of public workers are now fighting to protect their pensions and medical benefits as the city threatens massive cuts to overcome an estimated $18 billion in debt. Detroit’s bankruptcy “is an example of a failed economic system,” says economist Richard Wolff, professor emeritus of economics at University of Massachusetts. “There are so many other cities in Detroit’s situation, that if the courts decide that it is legal to take away the pension that has been promised to and paid for by these workers, you have [legalized] theft. It is class war, redistributing income from the bottom to the top.”

• The recently declared bankruptcy of Detroit City could serve as an epitome of the rise and fall of not just American capitalism, but the capitalist system generally as an historical mode of production. It is a mode of production that is no longer viable as a way of efficiently organizing and sustaining society in the 21st Century. In fact, the system has become the nemesis of American and other societies across the world.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

• Last week, news of the anticipation of the royal baby eclipsed much other news in the U.S.

Censorship

• The essential detail is that they will assume you want filters enabled across a wide range of content, and unless you un-tick the option, network filters will be enabled. As we’ve said repeatedly, it’s not just about hardcore pornography.

• The U.K. Prime Minister today proposed a sweeping set of internet filtering–some would say censorship–laws. They will go nowhere.

• Change.gov, the website created by the Obama transition team in 2008, has effectively disappeared sometime over the last month.

• While front splash page for for Change.gov has linked to the main White House website for years, until recently, you could still continue on to see the materials and agenda laid out by the administration. This was a particularly helpful resource for those looking to compare Obama’s performance in office against his vision for reform, laid out in detail on Change.gov.

• According to the Internet Archive, the last time that content (beyond the splash page) was available was June 8th — last month.

• The pornography filtering system praised by David Cameron is controlled by the controversial Chinese company Huawei, the BBC has learned.

• UK-based employees at the firm are able to decide which sites TalkTalk’s net filtering service blocks.

• Politicians in both the UK and US have raised concerns about alleged close ties between Huawei and the Chinese government.

• This week prime minister David Cameron announced further details of his crusade to have adult material censored in the UK. It’s a controversial topic for a number of reasons, with even those unconcerned about losing access to porn wondering what will be censored next. Apparently the government have already thought that through. According to ISPs speaking with the Open Rights Group, the filter will target a range of other content too.

Privacy

• A federal judge has denied the government’s request to delay what could turn out to be a major landmark case (ACLU v. Clapper) on the legality of the National Security Agency’s (NSA) mass metadata collection program. In a complaint filed last month, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) asked a judge to declare Verizon’s ongoing metadata collection and sharing to the NSA unconstitutional.

• European businesses should be more concerned about local intelligence agencies’ data-collection campaigns than the US NSA’s PRISM programme, according to ex-Navy Seal and Silent Circle chief executive Mike Janke.

• Critics of the National Security Agency’s vast surveillance programs will be provided with a platform to speak out against the spy agency on Wednesday at a congressional hearing.

• Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Florida) told the Guardian on Friday that a bipartisan group of lawmakers have begun organizing a hearing to be held in the middle of next week in order to counter the “constant misleading information” being presented by the United States intelligence community.

• The U.S. government has demanded that major Internet companies divulge users’ stored passwords, according to two industry sources familiar with these orders, which represent an escalation in surveillance techniques that has not previously been disclosed.

• If the government is able to determine a person’s password, which is typically stored in encrypted form, the credential could be used to log in to an account to peruse confidential correspondence or even impersonate the user. Obtaining it also would aid in deciphering encrypted devices in situations where passwords are reused.

• The revelations of Edward Snowden have severely damaged the reputation of US technology firms. And now we can start counting the cost in terms of lost euros.

• The first legislative challenge to the National Security Agency’s (NSA) cyber-spying program has failed to pass the United States House of Representatives.

• NYT: “The Obama administration made common cause with the House Republican leadership”

• In the ongoing effort to encrypt the entire web, news sites are an area of special importance. After all, the articles you choose to read can say a lot about you: how close you’re following a political race, for example, can indicate where you stand on sensitive issues, or give clues about personal connections to the people or organizations being covered.

• The United States assured Russia today that it would not seek the death penalty for any current or future charges against NSA leaker Edward Snowden.

• In another positive, he also won’t be tortured.

• “The United States would not seek the death penalty for Mr. Snowden should he return to the United States,” attorney general Eric Holder wrote in a letter to Russian authorities. “The charges he faces do not carry that possibility, and the United States would not seek the death penalty even if Mr. Snowden were charged with additional, death penalty-eligible crimes.”

• In the letter, which the Wall Street Journal obtained a copy of, Holder is attempting to convince his Russian counterpart to not provide political asylum to Snowden. Helpfully interpreting Russian law for the Russians, Holder says Snowden’s grounds for requesting asylum “are entirely without merit.”

• Amash-Conyers amendment brings together Democrats and Republicans against government overreach

• According to Pew, both parties are sharply divided over the data-mining revelations. But one thing is clear: Libertarian sentiment is growing in each.

• The project suggests the NSA is planning to expand, not restrict, its data gathering operations.

Civil Rights

• They’re known by some as Earth’s Most Threatened Tribe, but now Brazil’s indigenous Awá population is getting help from a powerful force — the national army.

• Russia does not have a functioning criminal justice system at all, in the sense of a trial mechanism aimed at determining innocence or guilt. Exactly as in Uzbekistan, the conviction rate in criminal trials is over 99%. If the prosecutors, who are inextricably an arm of the executive government, want to send you to jail, there is absolutely no judicial system to protect you. The judges are purely there for show.

• In early July 2013, Gambia’s parliament made dramatic changes to the nation’s information law, which now states that anyone who uses the Internet to spread “false news” can be punished with 15 years in prison and up to $100,000 in fines. The new law specifically targets individuals who use the Internet to make derogatory statements, incite dissatisfaction, or instigate violence against government or public officials.

• The government justifies this by saying it will ensure stability and prevent “unpatriotic behavior.” David Lewis reports that another rationale offered by Gambia’s information minister for the changes is to prevent people, at home and abroad, from engaging in “treacherous” campaigns against Gambians.

• Now, plans change all the time in broadcast news, for all sorts of reasons. But given that government whistleblowers are by definition people whom the government doesn’t want to tell their story–well, it would be good to hear what the reason was in this case.

• The only minority on the jury that found George Zimmerman not guilty for fatally shooting 17-year-old Trayvon Martin sat for an exclusive interview with Robin Roberts for Friday’s “Good Morning America” and revealed very strong feelings about how the 29-year-old fared in his trial.

• “George Zimmerman got away with murder,” she said. “But you can’t get away from God. And at the end of the day, he’s going to have a lot of questions and answers he has to deal with. [But] the law couldn’t prove it.”

• Someone emailed the leaders of various activist groups such as PANDA, Oathkeepers, and We Are Change. An email containing PDF files was sent to Dan Johnson, founder of PANDA, and Stewart Rhodes, founder of Oathkeepers, under the guise of being sent from Luke Rudkowski, founder of We Are Change. Dan Johnson found the email tag suspicious as it was not an email client that is ever used by any of these men or their organizations.

• Johnson did not download or open the files, but sent them to PANDA’s internet security expert, Garrett. Garrett was able to determine that the PDFs contained child pornography, which would have created metadata that could be recovered later by forensics experts even if the original files had been deleted. PANDA, Oathkeepers, and We Are Change are taking this threat seriously, as should other activists and activist organizations.

• In a sen­sa­tional art­icle in a UK news­pa­per last week­end, the former head of the UK’s for­eign intel­li­gence gath­er­ing agency, MI6, appears to have broken the code of omertà around the fraud­u­lent intel­li­gence case used as the pre­text for the Iraq war in 2003.

• I have known my postman for more than 20 years. Conscientious and good-humored, he is the embodiment of public service at its best. The other day, I asked him, “Why are you standing in front of each door like a soldier on parade?”

• “New system,” he replied. “I am no longer required simply to post the letters through the door. I have to approach every door in a certain way and put the letters through in a certain way.”

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