● 04.14.22

Gemini version available ♊︎

● Links 14/04/2022: Krita 5.0.5 and a Coreboot Milestone

Posted in News Roundup at 8:38 pm by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxDistributionsDevices/EmbeddedFree Software/Open SourceLeftovers

GNU/Linux

Desktop/Laptop

• Looking for a small desktop that has great Linux support? Star Labs just announced the Byte, and it looks to be a pretty mighty little unit. It might be a Mini PC but nothing it does in mini. Starting at £663, this AMD Ryzen powered unit won’t take up much room but it will give you plenty.

• You get a choice of firmware to load it up with too, with it supporting coreboot+EDKII or American Megatrends+EDKII, if you prefer to have a device that’s more open — you can!

• Meet Byte Mk I, the first generation mini PC from Star Labs, which are well known for their nice Linux laptops. Byte Mk I is equipped with an AMD Ryzen 7 5800U Octo-Core processor with AMD Radeon graphics and up to 4.4GHz clock speed, supports up to 64GB 3200MHz of memory, as well as up to 6TB of fast SSD storage.

• But what makes Byte Mk I versatile is the many ports it comes with to allow you to connect everything you need to set up your home office.

• It’s been a decade since Razer shipped its first Blade laptop, and they’ve all come with Windows. That isn’t quite changing today — but a company called Lambda is now putting Ubuntu on a souped-up version of last year’s Razer Blade 15 Advanced with Razer’s full blessing, with the aim of selling it to machine learning and artificial intelligence researchers.

• It’s called the Razer x Lambda Tensorbook, and the $3,500 machine is absolutely identical to a high-end version of last year’s laptop in most ways. It’s got an 11th-gen Intel Core i7 CPU, Nvidia RTX 3080 Max-Q graphics and 64GB of RAM underneath a 15.6-inch 165Hz 1440p display, all powered by a 80Wh battery inside an identically sized and shaped 4.45-pound chassis. It’s also got the same speedy I/O, including two Thunderbolt 4 ports, three USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports, a UHS-III SD card reader and both Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2.

Audiocasts/Shows

• In this video, I am going to show an overview of Kubuntu 22.04 LTS and some of the applications pre-installed.

• There are better options, but let’s review where these common solutions fall short and what I do to fix them.

• SUSE has a skunkworks distro in development, the transition Debian is struggling with, and some long-awaited improvements to Raspberry Pi OS.

• Whenever you talk about Linux snaps there’s always people that have a problem with them but why do people hate snaps much and do they deserve the negativity

• Today we are looking at MX Linux 21.1. It comes with XFCE 4.16, based on Debian 11, Linux kernel 5.10, and uses about 900MB – 1.3GB of ram when idling. Enjoy!

• In this video, we are looking at MX Linux 21.1.

Applications

• Vim is a text editor with its roots deep in UNIX. It was developed back in 1991 and still maintains an avid community of users and developers from around the globe. Not only due to the fact that many are trying to figure out how to exit it. However awesome it is, it can still come across as being dull or missing features when compared to others such as Neovim. This is where any of these 12 best Vim plugins will come in handy from our list below.

• A list of new features and enhancements of Links 2.6 which is a minimal web browser supporting both graphical and console mode.

• Want to play some nature sounds or ambient noise on Linux? Blanket is a really good choice with a stylish user interface.

• As far as know, there are 2 good open-source applications in Linux for playing ambient sounds. They are ‘Blanket‘ who has a good design on its UI, and ‘Anoise‘ which has many more cool sounds but looks ugly.

• For Ubuntu 22.04, Fedora 36 or Arch Linux user with GNOME 42, Blanket looks more native because of the dark mode support and GTK4 + libadwaita port.

• FitoTrack is a mobile app for logging and viewing your workouts. Whether you’re running, cycling or hiking, it will show you the most important information, with detailed charts and statistics. It is open-source and completely ad-free.

• [...] The app is an open-source as it’s released under the GPL-3.0 License.

• The Reproducible Builds project relies on several projects, supporters and sponsors for financial support, but they are also valued as ambassadors who spread the word about the project and the work that we do.

• This is the third instalment in a series featuring the projects, companies and individuals who support the Reproducible Builds project. If you are a supporter of the Reproducible Builds project (of whatever size) and would like to be featured here, please let get in touch with us at contact@reproducible-builds.org.

• This year I’ve decided to bite the bullet and properly try out hledger for personal accounting. It seems I need to commit to it properly if I’m to figure out whether it will work for me or not.

• Up until now I’d been strictly separating my finances into two buckets: family and personal. I’d been using GNUCash for a couple of years for my personal finances, initially to evaluate it for use for the family, but I had not managed to adopt it for that.

• I set up a new git repository to track the ledger file, as well as a notes.txt “diary” that documents my planning around its structure and how to use it, and a import.txt which documents what account data I have imported and confirmed that the resulting balances match those reported on monthly statements.

Instructionals/Technical

• The Rsync command allows us to transfer and sync files over an SSH connection or a local machine across different directories and machines. If you ever need to backup your directory or sync the data, the Rsync is one of the best tools for backing up the system. Using the Rsync is a lot more efficient than just copying files because Rsync only copies what is different.

• For instance, if you’re trying to backup 1000 photos, the Rsync will only choose those specific files that are either new or different since the last backup. And also, if you’re copying data and lose the network connection and re-run the Rsync command, it would know where it left off and wouldn’t have to start over.

• As a Linux sysadmin, you must know some major and practical examples of Rsync commands in Linux to make your experience smoother.

• Tools provided with Kubernetes continually make it easier for Java developers to build applications, store them in registries, and deploy images. This article looks at Helm charts, the fundamental tool for building applications on Kubernetes and the Red Hat OpenShift cloud service, together with Eclipse JKube, which is available as a Kubernetes Maven or Gradle plugin.

• If you’re new to Linux, there’s a very handy file you’ll want to learn about right away. Jack Wallen introduces you to the hosts file and how to add entries to it.

• Today’s operating systems are stable enough that we don’t have to deal with serious bugs. However, that does not mean that from time to time, we use the operating system that we use, we encounter different problems that not only block the PC, but also force it to restart. We are talking, for example, about the mythical blue screen of Windows, or its equivalent in Linux, the Kernel Panic .

• In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Laravel on AlmaLinux 8. For those of you who didn’t know, Laravel is a PHP web application framework with expressive, elegant syntax. It has a refined, simple, and readable syntax for developing modern, robust and powerful applications from the ground up. Laravel offers powerful features including, Artisan, MVC Architecture, Object-relational mapping, Template Engine, Unit-Testing, and Database Migration System.

• This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the Laravel PHP Framework on AlmaLinux 8. You can follow the same instructions for CentOS and Rocky Linux.

• Today we are looking at how to install VeadoTube mini on a Chromebook. Please follow the video/audio guide as a tutorial where we explain the process step by step and use the commands below.

• Apache Kafka is a distributed event store and stream-processing platform. It is an open-source system developed by the Apache Software Foundation written in Java and Scala. The project aims to provide a unified, high-throughput, low-latency platform for handling real-time data feeds

• It is an open-source distributed event streaming platform used by thousands of companies for high-performance data pipelines, streaming analytics, data integration, and mission-critical applications.

• NTP stands for Network Time Protocol. It is a protocol or service used to synchronize the clock of your client computers with the clock of a server. The server’s clock is also synchronized with the Internet.

• In this article, I’ll show you how to set up an NTP server in your environment and synchronize the clock with the client machines. I have run all the commands and procedures on my Debian 11 machines.

• Gwenview is an image viewer for Unix-like systems (including Linux) and is released as part of the KDE Applications bundle. The current maintainer is Aurélien Gâteau. The word “Gwen” means “white” in the Breton language and is commonly used as a first name.

• Gwenview is a fast and easy-to-use basic image viewer. It shows images in a full-screen slideshow view and making simple adjustments, such as rotating or cropping images.

• FlareGet is a popular open-source internet download manager and accelerator for Linux systems. It has some great features such as browser integration and threading.

• It supports Windows XP/Vista/7/8/10 , Mac OS X 10.7+ and almost all 32 and 64 bit Debian, RPM and Pacman based Linux Distributions. The supported Linux Distributions include Ubuntu, Fedora, Mandriva, OpenSuse, LinuxMint, Arch Linux, Chakra Linux.

• So in this guide, we will show you how to install Okular on ubuntu systems.

• Okular is a multiplatform document viewer developed by the KDE community and based on Qt and KDE Frameworks libraries. It is distributed as part of the KDE Applications bundle.

• Also Okular is a universal document viewer developed by KDE. Okular allows you to read PDF documents, comics, and EPub books, browse images, visualize Markdown documents, and much more.

• Many companies opt to go with the likes of Slack. But what if you’d rather keep all of that communication in-house? After all, it’s inevitable that sensitive information is going to be passed around, from employee to employee. When that happens, you might not want that information to be bandied about on a third-party service.

• An open-source business process management, and low code development platform.

• In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Firefox ESR on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. For those of you who didn’t know, Firefox ESR (Firefox Extended Support Release) is an official version of Firefox for the enterprise. It comes with the latest security and stability fixes but not with the latest features. This ESR Firefox builds are intended for organizations like universities, governments, businesses, and much more.

• This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the Firefox ESR browser on Ubuntu 20.04 (Focal Fossa). You can follow the same instructions for Ubuntu 18.04, 16.04, and any other Debian-based distribution like Linux Mint.

• In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Python on Rocky Linux 8. For those of you who didn’t know, Python is one of the most popular high-level languages, focusing on high-level and object-oriented applications. Generally, Python is used in automation, scripting, data analysis, machine learning, back-end development, handling big data, and performing complex mathematics. Python has been around since the late 1980s and continues to be one of the most popular languages in use today.

• This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the Python Programming Language on Rocky Linux. 8.

• TimeZone plays an important role for time crucial applications. In that case, you must have to set a proper timezone for the running operating system. One of our users asked about setting up the Timezone in Azure App Services.

• In this tutorial, you will learn how to set the Timezone for an application running on Azure App Services. All the screenshots of this tutorial are made for Windows-based Azure App Service.

• Snaps are app packages for desktop, cloud and IoT that are easy to install, secure, cross‐platform and dependency‐free. Snaps are discoverable and installable from the Snap Store, the app store for Linux with an audience of millions. This post is a quick snap cheat sheet for Ubuntu that contains the commonly used snap commands, fixes for common snapd service error that I faced and fixed. Hope it helps someone.

Games

• There’s been a lot of talk lately about Ray Tracing and the Steam Deck, especially after the recent Digital Foundry video but there’s a few things that need to be cleared up.

• As a reminder: the Steam Deck runs Linux, specifically it’s SteamOS “Holo” based on Arch Linux. Right now, Ray Tracing is supported on Linux both for Native Linux titles and Windows title through Proton. NVIDIA has supported Native Vulkan Ray Tracing a long time now, and DirectX Ray Tracing (DXR) is getting into shape too with VKD3D-Proton (that translates Direct3D 12 to Vulkan) version 2.5 that was released back in October 2021 mentioning “DXR 1.0 support is more or less feature complete” and “DXR 1.1 is now experimentally exposed”.

• Do you remember the classic multiplayer shooter Soldat? Well, it continues living on with the original now being open source and the sequel just got completely remade.

• Soldat 2 entered Early Access in September 2020 but it seems it didn’t quite hit the marks players wanted, and failed to find much of an audience. Transhuman Design never gave up on it, and as it turned out they were hard at work to overhaul everything. This huge revamp is out now!

• Worms, a game I grew up with playing on the Amiga, it’s an absolute classic and some modern versions just don’t have the same charm. Thankfully, Worms 2 can be played easily on Linux (and Windows) thanks to Worms 2 Plus.

• Originally released back in 1997, it’s obviously quite dated now. Getting it running on modern systems can be quite a hassle but that’s where Worms 2 Plus comes in. The developer emailed in about it, as they’ve made sure that it nicely works with Wine too and the installer “automatically configures the game for Wine” they tell me, and this is a perfect way for Wine to shine.

• Do you love programming? How about real-time strategy games? Check out the new Native Linux release of Screeps: Arena. This is the second game in the series, with the first being Screeps: World that was released back in 2016 and gained a positive rating (and still has players too).

• While Screeps: World was a persistent MMO, Screeps: Arena brings things down to be more like a traditional RTS that might end up appealing to a much wider variety of players. It’s online only and PvP, where your scripts fight off against others autonomously. Actually sounds quite fun, if you enjoying writing a few lines first.

• Valve sure do give a lot of love to their games (okay, most, I hear the rumbling of TF2 fans in the background) and a new update has rolled out for the original Portal to help the Steam Deck.

• Portal is one of the titles that Valve updated with DXVK-Native, which allows the classic to run using Vulkan instead of OpenGL, an update for this title I somehow missed from back in late February. They did the same for Portal 2, Left 4 Dead 2 and the Half-Life 2 series. The problem with DXVK for both Native Linux titles and Windows games in Proton, is that it can stutter while it builds up a shader cache.

• GTFO, the scary online co-op shooter from 10 Chambers recently had another update, and with it the developers claim they added in “partial” support for the Steam Deck.

• What is it? “GTFO is an extreme cooperative horror shooter that throws you from gripping suspense to explosive action in a heartbeat. Stealth, strategy, and teamwork are necessary to survive in your deadly, underground prison. Work together or die together” — according to the developer.

• A title that already ran reasonably well on Linux desktops with Proton. For the Steam Deck though it’s currently rated as “Playable”, and when I quizzed them a little more one of their team said it works better now with the “virtual keyboard, among some other things” as they work to make it Verified. Small steps but certainly better than nothing.

•  Yes, Steam will be coming to Chrome OS soon.

• Thanks to Linux for making that possible. But how? Let’s find out.

• Google recently announced that they are working on Steam for Chrome OS Alpha.

• Now, in a new blog post, Google revealed that they would be sharing more technical details on how they’re making it possible or its progress for developers and users.

• It looks like we have some significant information on how Linux helps enable Steam for Chrome OS users. Let me briefly explain what it is all about.

• Infra is the kind of game that you’d think shouldn’t exist, but I’m glad it does.

Desktop Environments/WMs

• In the world of Linux theming and customization, Xfce is a huge aspect. You can search for yourself as well that no other operating system offers such a kind of flexibility for customizing the desktop. Each environment is best for customizing the look of this system. This is no exception; instead, it has a huge library of themes and big community support. Such designs are being developed for your desktop. It is easy to install and customize the 10 best Xfce themes for Linux we have listed below.

• You can get hundreds of beautiful themes which are available for download and use on websites such as DeviantArt. But! Have you ever tried the best GTK themes we have for Ubuntu and other Linux distributions?

• It is easy to feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of choice there is on offer. This post will help you to make an informed decision and a style that suits you.

• You have landed at the right place to know about the most gorgeous, attractive, and visually striking.

• Yes!! We are talking about the Ubuntu Themes that you want to screenshot and show off as well. At least, we are proud to show off our desktops and how colourful they look.

K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt

•  Today we release Krita 5.0.5, probably the last release before Krita 5.1.0 comes out, hopefully in June. Note on the numbering: you didn’t miss 5.0.3 and 5.0.4. Some stores, if they think a certain package isn’t good enough, insist you upload a package with an increased version number, and that happened twice with 5.0.2…

• Anyway, we worked hard and fixed a bunch of things!

GNOME Desktop/GTK

• Since I wrote the announcement of Boatswain, things have progressed quite a lot. As I prepare for the 1.0 release, more features and bugfixes get in, and it’s getting dangerously close to achieving all features I personally want from it.

• Stream Deck Mini & Original (v1)

• Thanks to a generous Stream Deck Mini donation, I managed to fix a couple of bugs in the HID code that controls is. It is now able to upload icons to buttons, and properly fetch the serial number of the device.

• Later on, a kind individual helped testing and debugging the Stream Deck Original (v1) code. I only have a 2nd generation Original, and the HID protocol changed significantly between them, so this testing was invaluable. There were another couple of bugs specific to Original v1 fixed in no time after they were reported.

• Because Stream Deck Original (v2), XL, and MK.2 seem to share the same HID protocol, I’m cautiously confident that they all should be fine.

Distributions

New Releases

• MX Linux is a desktop distribution that shuns systemd and opts to go with the older SysVInit initialization system. As it has in the past, MX Linux offers versions with Xfce, KDE Plasma, and MX-fluxbox. This distribution eschews flash for simplicity and offers 32-bit versions for the Xfce and Fluxbox releases, and 64-bit versions for all three desktops.

• This new release is based on Debian 11.3, ships with the 5.16 Advanced Hardware Support kernel and has plenty of updated applications, the usual bug fixes, and an improved installer. One pleasant surprise to be found in MX Linux 21.1 is the mx-samba-config tool for the simplified setup of Samba/CIFS shares.

SUSE/OpenSUSE

•  Today, we are proud to announce the release of SUSE Linux Enterprise Micro 5.2 – a lightweight and secure operating system built for containerized and virtualized workloads.

• This latest release of SLE Micro is a stabilization and consolidation release geared towards improving usability and reliability.

• SLE Micro can be used as a single-node container host, Kubernetes cluster node, single-node KVM virtualization host or in public cloud. Since it is built to scale, customers can incorporate SLE Micro into their digital transformation plans – whether at the edge or supporting edge deployments with mainframes – in a way that allows them to transition workload designs from monolithic to microservices, at their own pace. They can start with container workloads or virtualize their current legacy workloads, then move to containerized workloads when they are ready, with no change in the underlying system platform.

• SUSE has begun to discuss its plans for the next version of SUSE Linux Enterprise on the openSUSE lists. It appears that there will be some significant changes.

• SUSE is beginning the development of an “Adaptable Linux Platform” (ALP) that is expected to be the successor to SUSE Linux Enterprise 15.

• SUSE Linux is one of the oldest Linux distributions out there – its first version appeared in 1994. It is widely popular among Linux users with its two free and open-source flavors – openSUSE Leap and openSUSE Tumbleweed.

• In addition, SUSE offers a paid version of its distro called SUSE Linux Enterprise (SLE). It is available in several editions, the most popular being:

• SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) is designed for use in mainframes, servers, and workstations, offering enterprise solutions to large corporations. SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED) is designed to help businesses access various applications and collaboration tools to improve employees’ productivity.

Canonical/Ubuntu Family

• Whether you’re trying Linux for the first time or simply want a reliable alternative to Windows, Ubuntu is a great choice.

• It offers a functional desktop thanks to the GNOME desktop environment, a collection of excellent open source productivity tools (including LibreOffice), and gets regular security updates. Installation is similar to putting Windows on a computer, but it’s smart to know what choices you’re going to face.

• Here’s how to install Ubuntu on a PC.

• SmartNICs, the programmable network adapters that make data center networking, security and storage efficient, scalable and modular, have started to play a significant role in the industry. Canonical believes that SmartNICs are an integral part of cloud infrastructure and we work with partners to integrate our cutting-edge products, such as Ubuntu, Snaps, Snapstore, MAAS, Openstack, and MicroK8s with their products to deliver value to the customers and the industry.

• Join Canonical at the first SmartNICs Summit in San Jose, California from April 26 to 28 to connect with engineers and managers who are interested in this field.

• Ubuntu is one of the best Linux distributions that we can find on the net. This is an excellent gateway for all those users who have not tried any Linux distribution before, and a robust, stable system that is faithful to the Linux philosophy for those who are more demanding. Canonical, the company responsible for the development of this OS, usually releases two (controversial) updates a year for this distro. And now it is the turn of the first update of 2022: discover the new Ubuntu 22.04 “Jammy Jellyfish” .

• Every 6 months, Canonical releases a new version of Ubuntu in which, in general, it usually updates its packages and includes a new Kernel. These updates have a general support of 9 months, which requires, yes or yes, to update the system at least twice a year. Unless we choose to install an LTS version. These stand out for having a 5-year support, and Canonical releases a new LTS every 2 years. That is, after three normal updates, the fourth is back to LTS.

• After the release of Ubuntu 20.04, the last LTS to date, three updates of this distro have already arrived: 20.10, 21.04 and 21.10. Therefore, the new version 22.04 is once again an LTS. It is time to update our systems again.

• Dell Technologies World is the premier event for technologists; it’s where the best minds gather to celebrate technology, business, and innovation.

• We’re excited to share that we’ll be at the Dell Technologies World in Las Vegas from May 2–5.

• Together with Dell Technologies, we deliver world-leading Open Source solutions and services that capitalize on the benefits of Open Source built upon Dell’s hardened infrastructure – a joint offering that is based on a long-term strategic Alliance.

• At first glance, the title of this article may sound like an oxymoron. However, what it highlights is the introduction of a rather useful feature that will enable a far more robust and elegant handling of the /dev/shm implementation inside the snap sandbox. This will make snap development easier, more secure, and reduce potential bugs in browser-like apps.

Devices/Embedded

• Early this month, the strategic partnership between e-con Systems and Qualcomm launched a ready-to-deploy AI vision kit targeted for applications that require powerful vision computing, machine learning and wireless connectivity. The edge AI vision kit consists of the e-con’s Sony STARVIS IMX415 and the Qualcomm QCS610 processor.

• The qSmartAI80_CUQ610 vision kit incorporates the Qualcomm® QCS610 System on Chip designed to deliver high performance without sacrificing thermal efficiency. The QCS610 SoC integrates a powerful image signal processor (ISP), a Qualcomm-based Artificial Intelligence Engine and customizable CPU, GPU and DSP to meet AI performance requirements.

Open Hardware/Modding

• The flux capacitor is one of the most iconic movie props of all time. Part of that is due to its plot purpose in the Back to the Future franchise, but its fame is also because it looked so futuristic when the first movie hit theaters in 1985. LEDs were still relatively new in the public consciousness at the time and the animated LED effects in the prop flux capacitor were attention getting. If you want to reproduce that effect, element14 Presents’ Derek Brodeur has a video showing you have to drive flux capacitor-style LEDs with an Arduino.

• The experienced among you know that this effect is possible to achieve with discrete components, which is likely how the original prop worked. But it is easier to reproduce the “animation” using a modern microcontroller like the Microchip ATmega4809 found on the Nano Every board. By driving each LED via PWM (pulse-width modulation), you can control its brightness. PWM works by very quickly modulating power to LED, with proportion of “on” time resulting in perceived brightness.

• With the Earth’s population still on track to increase by another two billion people by the year 2050, finding ways to feed them without causing grave harm to the environment is a top priority. Currently, fish is one of the most widely consumed foods in the world, and a new technology called biofloc helps provide both a food source and environmental stabilizer to fishponds without the need for dangerous chemicals/processes.

• As part of element14’s Just Encase Design Challenge, Md. Khairul Taifur had the idea to create a device that could sit within a pond and report detailed telemetry for environmental markers, as well as correct minor water quality issues via the use of a heater and water pump. His system is based around a MKR WAN 1300, which is responsible for collecting data from each sensor and then sending it to the cloud with its onboard LoRaWAN module. To make the system independent from an external power source, Taifur included a small 5V solar panel, power management board, and rechargeable battery pack.

Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

• We can customize the home screen of our phone with help of various methods, but what about the overall user interface? You shall be having different options to put a stamp on your smartphone with the 8 best Android UI varying from minimalistic skins and launchers to completely transforming the experience.

• With this get a complete makeover like changing the look and feel with various icons and themes to adding in new functions like search assistants and smart folders. Android look might be evolving every now and then but don’t worry as there is more than one launcher for your android smartphone device.

Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

• If somebody would tell 7 years ago that Intel will support open source firmware, he would be laughed at instantly. If we recall time, like 15 years ago where the datasheets were more open and were sufficient to write open source firmware, today it is not possible. Silicon vendors are hiding the intellectual property contained in the processors. It would seem like the open source firmware is doomed, but…

• Thankfully there are companies and Intel employees that try to make impact and change this situation. For example Google supporting the coreboot project on their Chromebooks encourage Intel to release the Firmware Support Package (FSP). The FSP is a bundled silicon initialization code in a binary form with well documented interface and configuration options. It simplifies new hardware enabling and reduces cost of overall firmware development. While it doesn’t solve all problems and sometimes causes issues, kudos should go to Intel for supporting the open source firmware. Special credits should go to the open source firmware community members from Intel: Nathaniel DeSimone, Vincent Zimmer, Brian Richardson and Isaac Oram.

Web Browsers

Mozilla

• The idea of “soft-errors”, particularly “single-event upsets” often comes up when we have strange errors in telemetry. Single-event upsets are defined as: “a change of state caused by one single ionizing particle (ions, electrons, photons…) striking a sensitive node in a micro-electronic device, such as in a microprocessor, semiconductor memory, or power transistors. The state change is a result of the free charge created by ionization in or close to an important node of a logic element (e.g. memory “bit”)”. And what exactly causes these single-event upsets? Well, from the same Wikipedia article: “Terrestrial SEU arise due to cosmic particles colliding with atoms in the atmosphere, creating cascades or showers of neutrons and protons, which in turn may interact with electronic circuits”. In other words, energy from space can affect your computer and turn a 1 into a 0 or vice versa.

• We’re pleased to announce that we have partnered with the Center for Humane Technology, a nonprofit organization that radically reimagines the digital infrastructure. Its mission is to drive a comprehensive shift toward humane technology that supports the collective well-being, democracy and shared information environment. Many of you may remember the Center for Humane Tech from the Netflix documentary ‘Social Dilemma’, solidifying the saying “If you’re not paying for the product, then you are the product”. The Social Dilemma, is all about the dark side of technology, focusing on the individual and societal impact of algorithms.

• It’s no surprise that this decision to partner was a no brainer and supports our efforts for a safe and open web that is accessible and joyful for all. Many people do not understand how AI and algorithms regularly touch our lives and feel powerless in the face of these systems. We are dedicated to making sure the public understands that we can and must have a say in when machines are used to make important decisions – and shape how those decisions are made.

• April 15th marks my ninth year working for Mozilla! Last year’s mozillaversary post was a bit of a stop gap. Truth be told, I just didn’t have the energy to write about what I had been doing at work given all the unrest that was happening in the world. This year, despite the world still being in ongoing states of WTF, I’m going to try and talk a bit more about what I’ve been keeping my brain busy with at work.

FSFE

• On 26 January 2022, the European Commission presented its proposal for the EU Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles which will serve as a reference point in the future and as a common EU vision of our digital rights. The declaration is now being discussed in the European Parliament and Council, and Free Software should become part of it.

• Built on the Berlin and Tallinn declarations, this proposal aims to lay the groundwork for a consistent framework that will serve as a guideline and a reference point for the ongoing and future digital transformation of Europe. These aforementioned declarations already refer to Free Software (“Open Source” in their text) when it comes to digital sovereignty and interoperability, while they also demand more use of “Open Source” and strengthening the requirement for its use.

• Free Software guarantees you the essential four freedoms to use, study, share, and improve the software.

• This video from Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) explains the four freedoms and what they mean in less than three minutes.

Standards/Consortia

• One of the most noticeable things about Gemini is that it is text-based. Sure, it can support images but, depending on the client, these are mostly left ‘hidden’. Gemini gains a lot of its ‘identity’ from this emphasis on text. One of the first things you’ll notice if you compare an average web page and a page on Gemini is that one is filled with images and highly ‘visual’, while the other is just a wall of text.

• Does this mean, then, that gemtext is somehow anti-image? That it is some new, iconoclastic medium which attempts to break free from the ‘seduction’ of images on the web? In some ways, yes, but in my experience browsing Gemini, it’s not as simple as that.

Leftovers

• In the ever more vertical company that Google is becoming, it is even more important to collaborate on some of your communication – more people want to contribute to the message and get it right, and more thought needs to be given to the ever wider audience you’re sending mails to.

• After 30 years of using the Internet and trying many communication formats, e-mail is still my favorite. However, e-mail has many problems. Spam is just annoying, but phishing and especially, spear phishing attacks can also be dangerous. A recent security training, and a Twitter thread I started about it, changed my mind completely about how I treat these harmful e-mails.

• I’m on Easter Break. I was hanging on last term and getting grouchy, browsing for alternative jobs in my breaks and arguing with managers about workload, so I needed the rest. I’ve been looking into ways to cut five hours a week from work to have more family time – I’m back in the classroom Tuesday, so I’ll see how well that goes. Karl Von Clausewitz said no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy, but you have to have a plan.

Integrity/Availability

Proprietary

• As the old saying goes, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” That seems to be the words to live by for many PC users. Not only do they not jump to upgrade to new Windows versions, but some also don’t do it several times over. A recent study showed that more users still use Windows XP than Windows 11.

Pseudo-Open Source

Privatisation/Privateering

Linux Foundation

• In this episode of Security Nation, Jen and Tod chat with Kate Stewart, VP of Dependable Embedded Systems at the Linux Foundation, about the open-source security projects she’s working on, including the Zephyr project. They chat about strategies for dealing with bugs and vulnerabilities in today’s complex tech landscape, including the much talked-about software bill of materials (SBOM), so we can reap the benefits of open source while avoiding the downsides as much as possible.

• The Linux Foundation partnered with Google Cloud and others to create a new open source project called Nephio.

• Now in its fifth year as an umbrella organization, LF Networking (LFN) and its projects enable organizations across the globe to more quickly and effectively achieve digital transformation via the community’s shared development efforts. This includes companies of all sizes and types that rely on LFN’s breadth of commercially-ready ecosystem offerings, all based on open source innovation spearheaded within the LF Networking community.

• As mature LFN projects, ONAP (Open Network Automation Platform) and OpenDaylight are currently deployed as critical components in networks around the globe. Below is a sampling of specific case studies currently implemented in the real-world that are allowing organizations to transform their networks.

• About 3 ½ years ago, Sanath Kumar Ramesh and his wife welcomed their son, Raghav, into the world. Like any new parents, he immediately became their everything. And, as new parents do, they threw him a 1st birthday bash where many of their friends and family were meeting Raghav for the first time.

• Today, the Zephyr® Project announced that T-Mobile has joined as a Platinum member, leveraging the Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) to power its new Developer Kit, which gives innovators fast and easy access to build on T-Mobile’s network. The Zephyr Project is an open source project at the Linux Foundation that builds a safe, secure and flexible RTOS for resource-constrained devices. T-Mobile is the first wireless carrier to join the project.

• “As a leader in the industry and our first telecom member, T-Mobile brings a unique perspective and expertise to the Zephyr ecosystem,” said Kate Stewart, Vice President of Dependable Embedded Systems at The Linux Foundation. “Zephyr’s existing wireless capabilities (Bluetooth Low Energy, Wi-Fi, and 802.15.4), coupled with DevEdge, T-Mobile’s new developer platform, will unleash innovators to create new solutions for the connected future.”

• Today, the Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization enabling mass innovation through open source, announced the Software for Open Networking in the Cloud (SONiC, an open source networking operating system), is now part of the Linux Foundation. The Linux Foundation provides a venue for continued ecosystem, developer growth and diversity, as well as collaboration across the open source networking stack.

• “We are pleased to welcome SONiC to the Linux Foundation family of open networking projects,” said Arpit Joshipura, general manager, Networking, Edge, and IoT, the Linux Foundation. “SONiC is a leader in open source data center NOS deployments, and we’re looking forward to growing its developer community.”

Security

• The Department of Energy, CISA, the FBI, and the NSA jointly issued an advisory describing a sophisticated piece of malware called Pipedream that’s designed to attack a wide range of industrial control systems.

• This blog post is my analysis of a vulnerability exploited in the wild and patched in early 2021. Like the writeup published last week looking at an ASN.1 parser bug, this blog post is based on the notes I took as I was analyzing the patch and trying to understand the XNU vouchers subsystem. I hope that this writeup serves as the missing documentation for how some of the internals of the voucher subsystem works and its quirks which lead to this vulnerability.

• WIRED reported that Russia’s Sandworm hacking group recently attempted a third blackout in Ukraine, years after its historic cyberattacks on the Ukrainian power grid in 2015 and 2016. Malware, inserted in the IT system of a high-voltage electrical substation in Ukraine months ago, was due to be activated late on April 8. The attack could have left two million people living in the region without energy.

• Security updates have been issued by Debian (lrzip), Fedora (community-mysql, expat, firefox, kernel, mingw-openjpeg2, nss, and openjpeg2), Mageia (ceph, subversion, and webkit2), openSUSE (chromium), Oracle (httpd:2.4), Red Hat (kpatch-patch), Slackware (ruby), SUSE (kernel and netatalk), and Ubuntu (gzip and xz-utils).

• Cisco has released security updates to address vulnerabilities in multiple Cisco products. An attacker could exploit some of these vulnerabilities to take control of an affected system.

Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

• I’ll jot down some quick thoughts on Lemmy, a Reddit-like service for the Fediverse. When it first was announced a few years ago, I thought “yeah, right, it has a really long way to go” and instead of helping I just sorted it under “vaporware”. But now it’s becoming usable♥.

• It’s centralized, and federated.

• Every community is tightly tied to one server (while there are several servers, each have their own communities). So there’s not a lot you gain compared to something like a lobste.rs server or a Discourse server or a mailing list or other traditional forum softwares and bulletin boards. Each community is still centralized. (And you also get to keep some of the simplicity of that approach, but only some, because this is still Fedi in all its clunky glory.)

• Unlike Discourse, you can post from an account from another server (sort of like with Open ID back in the blog era). This means from other Lemmy servers but also from other ActivityPub implementations. (It’s a “subset with extensions” so you might have to square peg it a bit.) You can also then receive replies and notifications on that home server, which is convenient and cozy. (On the other hand, some of these forum servers have mailing list modes which are convenient and cozy in their own way.)

• It is also similar to Guppe in many ways. You can follow communities and it boosts posts from those communities into your timeline, and you can post to the community too. Compared to Guppe, there is moderation and group ownership, and there’s an optional Reddit-like web frontend. One way I like to use it is to browse the web frontend and then when I wanna reply, I dig up the post via Fedi and reply from there. A few extra hoops, but then I’ll see any replies from the comforts of my own home.

Monopolies

• Tech companies are facing more pressure to ensure people in crisis zones have access to critical information.

• Meanwhile, e-cigarette company Juul settled a Washington state lawsuit over advertising to underaged people that will require the company to halt most social media promotions.

• This is Hillicon Valley, detailing all you need to know about tech and cyber news from Capitol Hill to Silicon Valley.

• AN UNPRECEDENTED SPREE of policy changes and carveouts aimed at protecting Ukrainian civilians from Facebook’s censorship systems has earned praise from human rights groups and free expression advocates. But a new open letter addressed to Facebook and its social media rivals questions why these companies seem to care far more about some attempts to resist foreign invasion than others.

• In response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook and Instagram, rapidly changed its typically strict speech rules in order to exempt a variety of posts that would have otherwise been deleted for violating the company’s prohibition against hate speech and violent incitement.

• Internal Meta materials reviewed by The Intercept show that in early March the company temporarily enacted an exception to its hate speech policy permitting Facebook and Instagram users in Ukraine to call for the “explicit removal [of] Russians from Ukraine and Belarus,” posts that would have otherwise been deleted for violating the company’s ban on calling for the “exclusion or segregation” of people based on their national origin. The rule change, previously reported by the New York Times, was part of a broader package of carveouts that included a rare dispensation to call for the death of Russian President Vladimir Putin, use dehumanizing language against Russian soldiers, and praise the notorious Azov Battalion of the Ukrainian National Guard, previously banned from the platform due to its neo-Nazi ideology.

Patents

Software Patents

• Now is a crucial time for the open source community to respond to the consultation launched by the European Commission on standards essential patents (SEPs). The Commission is proposing the creation of a new framework governing their use. Since this has been directed at the existing SEP-reliant industries where open source is less common, we want to be sure the voices of the open source community are heard in this public consultation.

• It’s easy to misunderstand SEPs as implying that patents are essential to all standards; they are not! It is OSI’s position that many standards do not involve SEPs, that open source requires restriction-free licensing if the creators of a standard hold essential patents, and that the EU needs to harmonize its open source and standards strategies. OSI’s formal response to this Call for Evidence is forthcoming.

• This public consultation came about because some standards users have found the current system for licensing SEPs has issues with transparency, predictability and efficiency. In some cases it also offers incumbents undue market control, especially over market entry. Under the current approach, patent-holders commit to license their SEPs – patents known to be inherent to implementation of a standard – to users of the standard on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms and conditions.

Copyrights

• Ostentatio genitalium (the display of the genitals) refers to disparate traditions in Renaissance visual culture of attributing formal, thematic, and theological significance to the penis of Jesus. That these images seem to have been created in good faith, with pious intentions, mystifies art historians, and many refuse to recognize the category as noteworthy or distinct from the nudity of angels and putti. Yet, as examples accrue, the conspicuous attention lent to Christ’s phallus cannot escape even the most disinterested gaze. “It is no exaggeration to say that this has probably been the most taboo topic in Christian thought for two thousand years”, writes Stephen Sapp. In contrast to classical sculptural conventions, which — with exceptions like certain herma and statues of satyrs — often showcase male genitalia in a state of flaccid modesty (akin to Michelangelo’s Risen Christ), these Renaissance images shock us because they are so frequently ithyphallic: Christ has risen, but not in the way we have come to expect. Beginning around 1260 and enjoying widespread employment before finally tapering off in the seventeenth-century, ostentatio genitalium reversed a Byzantine tendency to depict Christ as sexless, his missing organs covered by flat, diaphanous veils. This was a symbol of purity and perfection, following from Augustinian notions that untimely erections are reminders of Adam’s “sin of disobedience”. Yet in the ostentatio genitalium tradition the opposite seems true: it is the visual virility of Christ that affirms his divinity. The natural question to ask, after blinking our eyes, would be why? How do practitioners of a religion, whose seven heavenly virtues include prudence and temperance, decide to venerate, for centuries, an apparently prurient vision of their savior?

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