Re: If no enforcement takes place between two parties (GPL) Was: Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel

[Bruce Perens]

OK, I apologize to all who were involved in this conversation. I will block
further emails from "aconcernedfossdev" and no longer encourage him.

Bruce


On Fri, Jul 14, 2017 at 9:24 PM, <aconcernedfoss...@airmail.cc> wrote:

> These are simply counterpoints the defense would likely contend and one
> should be prepared for as they could be entertained by a court.
>
> One can certainly contend that to remain silent when any reasonable person
> would speak if they were in opposition, indicates assent. The court may
> reject that argument in this case or not.
>
> Well, you are confusing civil and criminal law.
>>
>
> I am not.
> I gave that example as a supporting point to the discussion on civil law
> and equity that is almost farcical extreme example (that courts will, for
> example, hold you in contempt for not paying a settlement while you are
> imprisoned and have no way of raising the money, imprisoning the person
> again and again in perpetuity for contempt again and again (this has
> changed very recently in a few states, but not most)). This arises often
> from judgements for non-payment of civil liabilities. That does not detract
> from this statement:
>
> The court would likely feel that one could represent oneself if one
>> desired. Usually lack of finances is not taken into account by courts; only
>> real incapability (mental or physical or related to one's status as a minor)
>>
>
> Though it is said "one who represents himself usually has a fool for a
> client", that does not mean one is legally or physically incapable of
> mounting a case, thus if one does sit on one's cause of action (regardless
> of finances), laches may apply and the equitable remedies may be found to
> be out of reach.
>
>
> On 2017-07-15 02:06, Bruce Perens wrote:
>
>> Well, you are confusing civil and criminal law. I assure you winning a
>> laches defense is no sure thing, nor does it necessarily win the
>> entire case, it is more likely to only limit the period of the offense
>> for which the plaintiff may seek damages.
>>
>> And being a passive participant in Linus discussion is no tacit
>> license to your copyright rights over what the GPL already offers. If
>> Linus really wanted that, he'd have to call for opposition, and remove
>> works of opposing parties from the kernel.
>>
>

Re: If no enforcement takes place between two parties (GPL) Was: Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel

[Bruce Perens]

Well, you are confusing civil and criminal law. I assure you winning a
laches defense is no sure thing, nor does it necessarily win the entire
case, it is more likely to only limit the period of the offense for which
the plaintiff may seek damages.

And being a passive participant in Linus discussion is no tacit license to
your copyright rights over what the GPL already offers. If Linus really
wanted that, he'd have to call for opposition, and remove works of opposing
parties from the kernel.

Re: If no enforcement takes place between two parties (GPL) Was: Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel

[Bruce Perens]

A laches might be created if
all of the rights holders actually had the capability to enforce and were
refraining from doing so. But they are restrained by finances. So, I don't
believe there is any laches.

Re: If no enforcement takes place between two parties (GPL) Was: Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel

[Bruce Perens]

Bradley is uncomfortable with your (not mine) cc list. You should drop him
from the next message.

Things are different for a collective work. I don't believe Linus can
represent the desires of all copyright holders.

Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel?

[Bruce Perens]

Hi Bradley,

I was proceeding after others in the community had already made contact and
were rebuffed.

I have definitely looked at the principles of GPL-oriented enforcement that
SFC is currently distributing. I have some issues with your current policy.

Let's discuss the policy of forgiveness of past offenses in exchange for
current compliance. This has worked very well for the non-profit projects
that SFC is actually able to serve, because there is literally no reason
for the well-counseled offender not to settle with SFC. Both of us have
experience with highly visible deep-pockets offenders who have not been
well enough counseled to accept this easy exit from violation.

As you know, I have a compliance business. I have advised every client
without exception to come into compliance with the GPL as soon as possible,
and where allowed I have engineered that compliance. The companies that
reject that advice do not become my customer.

We should remain aware that Richard and Eben made an exception to the
policy of not asking for financial damages in the case of Cisco, for quite
a large settlement.

With the advent of dual-licensing as used by Artifex (Ghostscript) since
1984, MySQL since the 1990's, and others, we have a paradigm that arguably
makes the GPL more fair to more people, especially the GPL developers
themselves. Those who wish to participate in the GPL's partnership of
sharing do, those who do not pay money, and the money goes to paying the
developers to make more good Free Software under the GPL. The developers do
not have to wear hair shirts or spend their days as waiters or as
programmers of proprietary software for big companies, but can support
their families while creating Free Software. This worked for Peter Deutsch
who has been able to enjoy retirement as a composer and musician as a
result, and of course for Michael Widenius and his partners in MySQL. We
are all using the result of these dual-license enterprises.

It seems to me that it would be fair for these dual-licensing companies,
who offered the GPL but made dual licensing available to those who did not
wish to accept the GPL terms, to exact the fees of lost commercial
licensing from commercial infringers. Those infringers clearly had paid
licensing as an option. Dual-licensing is not inimical to the philosophy of
Free Software, and SFC should support the dual-license enterprises in
collecting fair damages.

I am also concerned because in our society there is a right to sue and
collect damages in compensation for violation of your rights, and SFC may
have allowed itself, without planning to, to be in the position of
suppressing developer's rights. Obviously I am aware of the excesses of the
"intellectual property" and tort system, and moderation is necessary. But
entirely suppressing the right to collect damages doesn't sound like a good
solution.

Then we have the issue of SFC's obvious inability to pursue all but a
fraction of one percent of all violators. Besides the obvious cases which
remain untried, I have in my own practice twice witnessed SFC so
short-staffed as to be unable to respond for many months to a company that
was attempting to settle with SFC, and another company that had settled and
was attempting to fulfill its continuing obligation to SFC. So, here SFC is
as the only organization with funding to pursue violations of the GPL,
closing out the avenue for other such organizations to fund themselves
through settlement and take up some of the case load. And the developers
don't get served and get de-motivated by the persistent and un-remedied
infringements. So, unfortunately, the principles of community-oriented
enforcement aren't actually serving the community.

Recently, we have observed:

1. Failure of SFC or its funded parties to attempt to appeal the VMWare
decision or find another plaintiff.
2. A consultation with the Linux kernel developers who are not terribly in
favor of enforcement, I feel due to prejudices so loudly expressed by Linus
Torvalds, who just doesn't accept that lawyers are of any benefit to
society.
3. No visible enforcement for quite a while.
4. Very many egregious violations in our sight that we have no way to cure.

So eventually, Bradley, we lose patience. I have no way to fund enforcement
of GPL violations. I don't have confidence that you can ever handle more
than 1% of them, and you don't tell me what 1% you are working on. I only
have publicity as a tool.

Thanks

Bruce



On Fri, Jul 14, 2017 at 11:06 AM, Bradley M. Kuhn 
wrote:

> [ I'm not on debian-user regularly but I was dragged into the thread by a
>   large cc list that Bruce started.  Removing individual email addresses of
>   possible non-list members, other than Bruce. ]
>
> Bruce, if you haven't looked at the Principles of of Community-Oriented
> Enforcement  >,
> which were co-published by Conservancy and the FSF, and 

Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel?

[Bruce Perens]

Thank you. I did not have a copy of the Grsecurity Stable Patch Access
Agreement before, and I've linked it to my article
.
IMO it's quite imprudent of them to put down in writing how they restrict
your GPL rights.

Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel?

[Bruce Perens]

I published an advisory regarding Grsecurity at

http://perens.com/blog/2017/06/28/warning-grsecurity-potential-contributory-infringement-risk-for-customers/

Thanks

Bruce

On Mon, Jun 19, 2017 at 11:41 AM, Richard Stallman  wrote:
>>
>> I am not trying to study the GRsecurity case because (0) it's
>> complicated, and it would take a lot of time to think about, (1) the
>> FSF has no say in the matter (it is about Linux) and (2) I don't think
>> the copany would heed whatever I might say.
>
>

Re: Why does no one care that Brad Spengler of GRSecurity is blatantly violating the intention of the rightsholders to the Linux Kernel?

[Bruce Perens]

I think I'll be able to write something to inform present and potential
customers of the lawsuit risk and their position as contributory
infringers. This is more effective than writing to the company.

Thanks

Bruce

On Mon, Jun 19, 2017 at 11:41 AM, Richard Stallman  wrote:

> [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider]]]
> [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies, ]]]
> [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]
>
> I am not trying to study the GRsecurity case because (0) it's
> complicated, and it would take a lot of time to think about, (1) the
> FSF has no say in the matter (it is about Linux) and (2) I don't think
> the copany would heed whatever I might say.
>
> --
> Dr Richard Stallman
> President, Free Software Foundation (gnu.org, fsf.org)
> Internet Hall-of-Famer (internethalloffame.org)
> Skype: No way! See stallman.org/skype.html.
>
>

Toshiba Libretto 100 or 110 docking station problem

[Bruce Perens]

Does anyone out there have the Toshiba Libretto 100 or 110?  I can't
get the PCMCIA slots in the docking unit to be recognized. This is a
problem because the PCMCIA slots in the Libretto are destroyed (by the
previous owner, I got a good price).

The controller for the additional slots doesn't show up using lspci,
as I'd expect it to.

Thanks

Bruce


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Never mind! Re: Toshiba Libretto 100 or 110 docking station problem

[Bruce Perens]

Never mind. It turns out to have been poor seating in the docking unit.

Thanks

Bruce

On Thu, Mar 13, 2003 at 09:13:05PM +, bruce wrote:
 Does anyone out there have the Toshiba Libretto 100 or 110?  I can't
 get the PCMCIA slots in the docking unit to be recognized. This is a
 problem because the PCMCIA slots in the Libretto are destroyed (by the
 previous owner, I got a good price).
 
 The controller for the additional slots doesn't show up using lspci,
 as I'd expect it to.
 
   Thanks
 
   Bruce


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Answers to your questions about W3C patent policy

[Bruce Perens]

From: Pierre Machard [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 Do you have any reason to think that the position you defend will
 satisfy Patent holders ?

Some of them have threatened to walk off of W3C in response to even so
mild a position as the draft policy. Nobody thinks they'll really do it.
But your question shows the problem: we can't control their behavior
through the standards organization. We need their cooperation to make
this work. Thus, we can't take a draconian position. The only way around
this is to get legislation, which is a worthy but uphill battle.

From: Nick Phillips [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I presume you've seen Rik van Riel's suggestion as posted
 to one of the SPI lists earlier. In fact it wouldn't surprise me if the same
 things triggered his message as yours, either directly or indirectly.

A number of people have suggested defensive patent pools. I think
I remember doing so in a 1997 article in LinuxWorld.com . The three
problems are:

1. Getting inventions.
2. Getting money to file for patents. This is both legal fees to
   format the patent claim (which has to be right if you want to
   be enforcible), and filing fees.
3. Getting money to file lawsuits. If you can't sue, nobody's going
   to be very interested in your claims.

I think that #1 could be handled by the community, #2 could at least be
started with pro-bono assistance from legal and engineering students, etc.
#3 doesn't have to come until later. If you want to run with the project,
please do so. Note that some have tried, or at least have made abortive
efforts in this direction.

From: Wouter Verhelst [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 It may not be a bad idea to have patent holders turn to a different
 standards body than people that object to software patents. If there are
 expensive 'standards' from one standards body and free standards from
 another, I feel that people would use the free standards, so that the
 patent holders would lose. Even if they have their own standard.

Well, there are about 100 existing organizations they could turn to,
including IETF (which has a joke of a patent policy IMO) and OASIS. It
would be very easy to do. I don't think making them do that would win
us anything.

From: James Antill [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From Bruce:
  The code that makes use of
  the patented principle must be under the MIT license, which allows a
  scope-limited patent license. That may be linked into GPL code and
  distributed.
 
  How does this work?
  Say I have xmms, which is GPL code that I didn't write ... and I
 want to implement some w3c std. that contains one of these patents. So
 I do the code as an MIT license, but I'm going to have to link it to
 the GPL'd code ... it's going to be a _derivative work_ ... so the
 code is basically GPL, no matter what I put at the top of the file.

The GPL terms on linking are that all parts of the derivative work must be
under a license with _no_additional_restrictions_ on top of those in the
GPL. The GPL does not prevent you from _removing_restrictions_, as long
as you are the copyright holder on the portion of the code in question.

From: Andre Lehovich [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I've been trying to comment on the draft patent policy.
 The link below -- to approve inclusion of my comments in the
 official archive -- doesn't work for me, returing a 404.

It's breaking for everyone, I think. I notified Danny Weitzner, the Patent
Policy Working Group chair.

Attention anyone whose message doesn't appear here: thanks for writing!
As usual, I am buried in mail and stuff to do, so although I read them
all, I can't answer every message individually.

Thanks

Bruce Perens


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Re: Answers to your questions about W3C patent policy

[Bruce Perens]

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Brian T. Sniffen)
 I don't see how that can possibly coexist with this sentence of the
 GPL, section 7:
 
 : if a patent license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of
 : the Program by all those who receive copies directly or indirectly
 : through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it and this
 : License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the Program.

This sentence would not disallow a field-of-use limited grant.
The patent is licensed for everyone's free use. They forgot to
say for any purpose, surely something that will be fixed in
the next version of the GPL. If the patent were used for a
non-standard-related purpose, the program would not be distributable.

 The recipient of the program (which combines a GPL'd framework
 with a patent-encumbered MIT library) will be able to use the program
 to implement the standard, but not for any other purpose.

Right.

 Certainly,
 if he modifies it to use the patented material for some other purpose,
 he won't be able to redistribute *that*...

Yes.

 and since he won't be able
 to do so, you can't distribute the GPL'd code for which you don't have
 copyright.

Well, I think there is no problem _until_ the patented material is
modified to exercise the patent for some non-standards-related purpose.
Then, you would not be able to distribute the modified version. But the
unmodified version would be fine.

You can approach this another way. Take any known patent, for example
the Unisys GIF patent. Take any random GPL program, for example GNU Emacs.
You may not modify GNU Emacs to do GIF encoding. But you can still
distribute GNU Emacs until it is modified to do that.

Thanks

Bruce


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Please Help Pass W3C Patent Policy

[Bruce Perens]

To All Members of the Free Software and Open Source Community,

For the past two years, I've been working on the W3C patent policy on
your behalf, to make it safe for Free Software to implement W3C standards.
Now, I'm worried that we could lose that fight, not because of the patent
holders, but because of our own community.

There's a long discussion below. I'm asking you to do something once you
read that discussion: Please write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
and tell them something like this (please elaborate - everyone discounts
rubber-stamp comments):

To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Approve of draft policy - disapprove of software patenting.

I request that W3C approve the draft patent policy, because it's a
compromise that protects the right of Open Source / Free Software
programmers to implement W3C standards.

I object to software patents, and support efforts to eliminate them
at the legislative level.

Now, to the discussion.

Three representatives of the Free Software / Open Source community:
myself, Larry Rosen of the Open Source Initiative, and Eben Moglen of
the Free Software Foundation, worked on the W3C patent policy for two
years. We spent between 1/8 and 1/4 of our time on the project for all
of that time, participating in many face-to-face meetings and conference
calls. Across the table were some companies that, I feel, wanted to
farm their own patents in W3C standards and would have erected
lucrative toll-booths to collect royalties from every implementor of
web standards. If they had their way, we would have been locked
out.

We got you the best deal we could get. It's not everything we want,
and it can't be.

The proposed W3C patent policy grants a royalty-free right for everyone
to practice patents that are embedded in the standard by W3C members who
own those patents. It prevents patent farming, the biggest problem
that faced us. The problem is that the right is limited - it only
applies to code that actually implements the standard. This is called a
field-of-use limitation. The problem for the Free Software community
is that other uses of the patent in our code would be covered by royalties.

I object to software patents entirely, and most of you do as well. Why,
then, did I (on your behalf) approve of a policy containing that
limitation, and why am I asking you to support it?

The answer is simple. Patent holders won't continue their membership
in W3C if that membership forces them to give up their patent rights
for non-standards-related applications. They will instead move their
standards-making activities to other organizations that allow them to
charge patent royalties on the standards. And we will have lost.

It comes down to what we can compel people to do, and what they won't
stand for. The patent holders want the W3C brand on their standards,
and will give up something for that. If we ask them to give up more,
they'll do without the W3C brand, and we have no way to control what
standards organization they move to. If we wish to fight software patents
outside of standards, I think our only choice is to do so at the legislative
level.

The field-of-use limitation presents special problems regarding the GPL,
because the GPL disallows a field-of-use-limited patent license. There is a
work-around for this. The code that makes use of the patented principle
must be under the MIT license, which allows a scope-limited patent
license. That may be linked into GPL code and distributed. I'm less than
comfortable with this, but my discomfort arises from the basic injustice
of software patents. A work-around is the best we can do in this case.

FSF, by its tenets, was bound to protest the field-of-use-limitation.
I respect that protest, as it is rooted an a belief that I share - that
software patents are fundamentally wrong.  However, if the Free Software /
Open Source community comes out against the W3C patent policy, and the
patent holders who want unlimited rights to charge royalties come out
against it, just who will speak for it? The result will be that W3C
will fail to give final approval to the policy, and we will not even have
the limited protection from software patents that we've won. Thus, I
have to ask you _not_ to do what FSF asks this time. Of course, this
disagreement does not diminish my respect of FSF, and I will continue
to work with them as I have on many projects for years.

Thus, I'd like you to write that email now. Thanks!

As always, please feel free to call me to discuss this at 510-526-1165
(California time) or write me at [EMAIL PROTECTED] .

Thanks

Bruce Perens


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CANCEL: Bruce Perens in Paris for Bastille Day

[Bruce Perens]

I have had something come up, and it looks as if I won't be able to go
to Paris. I will attend the important portions of the W3C meeting via
speakerphone.

Thanks

Bruce


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UN-CANCEL! Bruce Perens IS coming to Paris for Bastille Day

[Bruce Perens]

I have cleared the problem that came up, and will be able to get on the
plane to Paris after all. Sorry for being such a flake :-)
So, is anyone able to meet?

Thanks

Bruce

On Sat, Jul 13, 2002 at 06:56:45AM +, bruce wrote:
 Hi,
 
 Please excuse me for the late notice, and for not being able to write this
 in French.
 
 I am coming to Paris on Sunday, and will attend the World Wide Web Consortium
 Patent Policy Board meeting Monday through Wednesday. I'm there to represent
 SPI and Debian, and will of course be lobbying to keep W3C standards
 free of royalty-bearing and discriminatory patent licensing, so that they can
 continue to be implemented in Free Software.
 
 I'd like to take part in some of the Bastille Day festivities on the day that
 I arrive, and am wondering if one or more of you would like to get together
 in the afternoon on Sunday for conversation and to help a non-French-speaker
 celebrate. I will have slept on the plane, and should be reasonably alert.
 
 Please reply within the next 24 hours, I'll have wireless email until they
 close the plane. Airline and hotel information is below.
 
   Thanks
 
   Bruce Perens


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Bruce in Paris

[Bruce Perens]

Fabien,

Thank you for volunteering your home in the Bastile as the meeting place.
I suggest that everyone else coordinate with Fabien.

I will get from the airport to my hotel for a shower, call you on the phone,
(or please leave a message for me if you aren't available at that time)
and then I'll meet up with you at the time that you designate. I'll print
out your map for the taxi.

My hotel Telephone: 33-1-49-54-87-00 Fax Phone: 33-1-49-54-87-01

Thanks

Bruce

From: Fabien Penso [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I'm living at Bastille, in Paris (hehe) and I would be really interested
 to meet you.
 
 Depending of how many people we are, we can meet at my home, the map is
 on my personal page (see the sig).
 
 I'll come back from LSM tonight, around 23.15 (but I might change it to
 come back sooner). Please keep me informed.
 
 Just in case: 06 07 37 89 98 is my phone number.
 
 =2D-=20
 Fabien Penso [EMAIL PROTECTED] | LinuxFr a toujours besoin de :
 http://perso.LinuxFr.org/penso/  | http://linuxFr.org/dons/
 
 Note sp=E9ciale: Je serai aux LSM du 10 au 13 inclus: http://lsm.abul.org


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Bruce Perens in Paris for Bastille Day

[Bruce Perens]

Hi,

Please excuse me for the late notice, and for not being able to write this
in French.

I am coming to Paris on Sunday, and will attend the World Wide Web Consortium
Patent Policy Board meeting Monday through Wednesday. I'm there to represent
SPI and Debian, and will of course be lobbying to keep W3C standards
free of royalty-bearing and discriminatory patent licensing, so that they can
continue to be implemented in Free Software.

I'd like to take part in some of the Bastille Day festivities on the day that
I arrive, and am wondering if one or more of you would like to get together
in the afternoon on Sunday for conversation and to help a non-French-speaker
celebrate. I will have slept on the plane, and should be reasonably alert.

Please reply within the next 24 hours, I'll have wireless email until they
close the plane. Airline and hotel information is below.

Thanks

Bruce Perens

United Airlines
Flight 960
Jul 13 18:25 depart SFO
Jul 14 13:55 arrive CDG

* Hotel Information *

Holiday Inn Par St Germain Des Pres


  / 92 RUE DE VAUGIRARD /

*Telephone:* 33-1-49-54-87-00
*Fax Phone:* 33-1-49-54-87-01


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Am I being attacked?

[Bruce Perens]

The answer is probably yes, but do the following indicate script-kiddie
probes? They are directed at portmap, lpr, and nmbd. I don't know why the
ones on the smtp port were rejected. The .184 system is my router.

Thanks

Bruce

Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 216.103.219.35:17956 216.15.108.184:111 
L=40 S=0x00 I=3466 F=0x T=108 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 202.66.169.18:4439 216.15.108.184:515 L=60 
S=0x00 I=43201 F=0x4000 T=47 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=17 216.187.75.24:137 216.15.108.184:137 L=78 
S=0x00 I=18430 F=0x T=114 (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=17 216.187.75.24:137 216.15.108.184:137 L=78 
S=0x00 I=18686 F=0x T=114 (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=17 216.187.75.24:137 216.15.108.184:137 L=78 
S=0x00 I=18942 F=0x T=114 (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 210.101.105.16:3546 216.15.108.184:111 L=60 
S=0x00 I=13241 F=0x4000 T=47 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 4.60.161.230:1054 216.15.108.184:25 L=48 
S=0x00 I=57801 F=0x4000 T=110 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 4.60.161.230:1054 216.15.108.184:25 L=48 
S=0x00 I=57847 F=0x4000 T=110 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 4.60.161.230:1054 216.15.108.184:25 L=48 
S=0x00 I=57880 F=0x4000 T=110 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 209.10.200.83:2151 216.15.108.184:111 L=60 
S=0x00 I=14138 F=0x4000 T=56 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 210.178.232.1:4935 216.15.108.184:111 L=60 
S=0x00 I=38311 F=0x4000 T=41 SYN (#10)
Packet log: input DENY eth0 PROTO=6 64.65.56.45:1274 216.15.108.184:515 L=60 
S=0x00 I=146 F=0x4000 T=46 SYN (#10)

DNS problem found

[Bruce Perens]

I asked a day ago about a problem with my DNS. It turns out that
Two out of three of the DNS servers at my internet provider are delegating
my reverse DNS incorrectly, to the root name servers, the third is doing it
correctly.

Thanks

Bruce

DNS problem

[Bruce Perens]

I'm stumped. Connects from my mail delivery system are being refused by
hotmail, oreilly.com, brics.dk, and a number of other sites. I suspect
that I've done something stupid in my DNS and am being rejected by sites
that set ALL: PARANOID in /etc/hosts.deny . I don't see my system in the
RBL, DUL, or RSS lists.

Anyone want to help? The problem system is perens.com, IP is 216.15.108.186 .
You should be able to see forward and reverse DNS from outside.

Thanks

Bruce

potato holding up well

[Bruce Perens]

We are running WeWantHackers.com and all of the systems of two businesses (not 
counting
Progeny) on potato. It's holding up quite well.

Bruce

ProFTPd bandwidth limits working?

[Bruce Perens]

Has anyone gotten the ProFTPd bandwidth limits to work? I just tried them and
no joy.

Bruce

DVD restraining order motion DENIED!

[Bruce Perens]

The judge has denied the DVD Copy Control Consortium's motion. There will
be no temporary restraining order to block you from distributing the DeCSS
software. Next news will be on January 14, when we have the hearing regarding
a preliminary injunction.

Bruce

motherboard temperature alarm beeps during screen-saver activity

[Bruce Perens]

I have a SuperMicro motherboard with a temperature alarm. The alarm beeps
intermittently during screen-saver activity. There is no temperature problem.
Either there's some I/O port being touched that should not be, or the beeper
is going off due to some motherboard-detected error. I have parity enabled,
I wonder if that's it?

Has anyone seen this?

Bruce

It's Time to Talk About Free Software Again

[Bruce Perens]

It's Time to Talk about Free Software Again

I'm Bruce Perens. You may know me as the primary author of the Debian Free
Software Guidelines and the Open Source Definition. I wrote the Electric
Fence malloc() debugger, and some pieces of Debian. And you may remember
me for having brought the TIGER map database to free software. If you want
copies of that, you can get them through Dale Scheetz [EMAIL PROTECTED].

About a year ago, I sent out a message announcing Open Source. Eric Raymond
and I founded the Open Source Initiative as a way of introducing the non-hacker
world to Free Software. Well, thanks to Eric, the world noticed. And now it's
time for the second stage: Now that the world is watching, it's time for us
to start teaching them about Free Software. Notice, I said Free Software,
_not_ Open Source.

Most hackers know that Free Software and Open Source are just two words for
the same thing. Unfortunately, though, Open Source has de-emphasized the
importance of the freedoms involved in Free Software. It's time for us to
fix that. We must make it clear to the world that those freedoms are still
important, and that software such as Linux would not be around without them.

One of the unfortunate things about Open Source is that it overshadowed the
Free Software Foundation's efforts. This was never fair - although some
disapprove of Richard Stallman's rhetoric and disagree with his belief that
_all_ software should be free, the Open Source Definition is entirely
compatible with the Free Software Foundation's goals, and a schism between
the two groups should never have been allowed to develop. I objected to that
schism, but was not able to get the two parties together. Another unfortunate
fact is the certification mark dispute which has gone on between Software in
the Public Interest and the Open Source Initiative for a whole year. That was
entirely my fault.

Sadly, as I've tended toward promotion of Free Software rather than Open
Source, Eric Raymond seems to be losing his free software focus. The Open
Source certification mark has already been abused in ways I find
unconscionable and that I will not abide. I fear that the Open Source
Initiative is drifting away from the Free Sofware values with which we
originally created it. It's ironic, but I've found myself again siding with
Software in the Public Interest and the Free Software Foundation, much as I
did in 1995. I feel that the Open Source Definition, which was copied from
the Debian Free Software Guidelines, should still be our touchstone, and I'll
be working to promote software that fits that definition, but independently
from the Open Source Initiative.

Thanks

Bruce Perens

Re: It's Time to Talk About Free Software Again

[Bruce Perens]

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I'm interested in learning about this, Bruce.  While avoiding
 the use of names on any points of antagonism (avoiding flame
 buttons, friends), in what ways has the Open Source Definition been
 deviated from?
 
I'm afraid that anything I say on debian-user would end up on Slashdot.
I don't want to sound catty in public, and would rather be done with
that argument than stretch it out any longer. If you really need to know
about this, it would be best to call me on the phone, US Pacific time
10AM-9PM, at 510-526-1165.

 IMO, it would be nice to see many _of the best_ developers and
 systems analysts able to make a livelyhood at working with Linux for a
 long time without marketing moguls buying it all away. It also seems
 to me that it benefits us all to give _everyone_ a chance at a good
 education and career, regardless of early income, without draining
 resources from governments via student loans.  ...any correlations
 here?  

I'm not sure I understand the question. My concern is with having a good
set of _free_ software that does lots of things. I'm not against non-free
software, but I really dislike non-free software that masquerades as free.
Some people criticize my promotion of free software because they think it
keeps people from making a living writing non-free Linux software.

I hope that makes sense.

Thanks

Bruce

Re: Flavours of rebooting (was 3C509 acting strangely on Win95/Debian ...)

[Bruce Perens]

It belongs on the LILO command line that boots the linux kernel (given
that you boot with LILO). It's interpreted by the _kernel_, not any
user-mode program, at boot time, and it saves that parameter until halt
time. You can also hack the kernel to hard-code the booting method.

Another solution would be an /etc/init.d script that saves the motor
positions when halting, and restores them while booting. Of course,
this is not as nice as having the hardware remember. You might have to
re-calibrate at boot time just to make sure the stored positions are
right.

Thanks

Bruce
--
The $70 Billion US budget surplus hardly offsets our $5 Trillion national
debt. The debt increased by $133 Billion in the same year we found a
surplus.
Bruce Perens K6BP [EMAIL PROTECTED] 510-620-3502 NCI-1001

Re: debian.org removed from root nameservers

[Bruce Perens]

Note that Tim and I have both sent ACKs that we should be removed from
those domains - I sent mine before the problem came up. Because of the
snafu, we might have to go through that process another time.

Also, moving the U.S. mail address requires a notarized document, it
can't be done electronicaly. As soon as I get this from the Debian folks,
I'll sign and notarize it, and pass it on to Tim to do the same.

Thanks

Bruce

Re: is this the end of debian?

[Bruce Perens]

On Thu, 19 Mar 1998, ' ALLAN W. BART wrote:
 is this the end of debian as we know it.

Yo, guys, wake up. There are over 300 Debian developers. There is a project
leader in place who has been there for three months. My presence was not
making that much difference any longer. I made sure things were set up
really well before departing. It's not going to make much difference to
Debian.

Sheesh. You'd think after all this time (since some time in 1995, I guess)
I'd be able to change jobs without people getting upset. It happens that
Valerie and I are trying to have a child and I would not have had _time_ for
Debian for that much longer, anyway.

Thanks

Bruce


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I am leaving Debian

[Bruce Perens]

There was some question on this list yesterday regarding whether I would
leave Debian. It is indeed true. I will remain as president of SPI and
will redirect SPI's mission to be for all free software rather than just
for Debian. I'm sorry it had to be this way, but I feel that my mission to
bring free software to the masses really isn't compatible with Debian any
longer, and that I should be working with one of the more mainstream Linux
distributions.

Thanks

Bruce Perens


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Executive decision on usenet gateway

[Bruce Perens]

Chris,

Please arrange for _every_ posting to carry X-No-Archive: yes, or arrange
for the X-No-Archive headers to be preserved. I'm sure you can hack that
much in. If you can't, please stop distributing the bugs list until this
is fixed. There is no reason for anyone to go nonlinear about this.

Thanks

Bruce
-- 
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Debian GNU/Linux Logo chosen

[Bruce Perens]

We've been having a logo contest for a long time. It failed to generate
a consensus on a logo for the project. It got to the point where people
were clamoring for me to hire a commercial artist and get the job done.
I went over the candidates in the logo contest, and found one that was
probably as good as what I would have gotten after spending money on a
commercial artist. The logo I chose is

http://fatman.mathematik.tu-muenchen.de/~schwarz/debian-logo/profile/si02.html
specifically the color one with the blue eye.

This is the logo of Debian GNU/Linux. Any future Debian system we do with
the Hurd would obviously have a different logo. We could still use a logo
for Software in the Public Interest.

I chose this logo because it is a simple, easily recognized image, it
emphasizes the Linux connection while it is also definitely different
from the Linux penguin, it's easily trademarked, and it has esthetic merit.

We need some more artistic treatements of this logo - different sizes (for
example one for a CD jacket), different type, use of the image in various
contexts, etc.

My thanks to all of the artists who submitted logos. There was great
creativity, and I'm sorry that we could not use all of them!

Many Thanks

Bruce Perens
Debian Project Leader
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Re: REDHAT 4.1 SONY CDU-33A

[Bruce Perens]

Please don't address redhat questions to the Debian mailing lists.

Bruce
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Re: infinite loop in interrupt

[Bruce Perens]

I suspect an analog problem on your network - what is causing the constant
interrupts is noise on the net. This wastes some CPU time.

Bruce
-- 
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Heck, Debian is POPULAR!

[Bruce Perens]

Polls are cool, but when you get 100 messages on debian-user between
midnight and 2 P.M. (California time) you have to figure that there's
somebody using the software.

Bruce
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Re: eth0: Bogus packet size

[Bruce Perens]

That packet size is bigger than the maximum handled by ethernet. It might
indicate that you have another device at the same address at the networking
card, or something else is happening to corrupt the data read from it by the
OS.

Thanks

Bruce
-- 
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Re: KDE team doesn't like Debian dist.?

[Bruce Perens]

From: Paul Serice [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I've just finished installing the right honorable Debian version of  
 KDE.  I'm impressed with how well it works and how well it is
 packaged.  
 
 The README.debian file says the KDE team is not too happy with the   
 packaging.  I'm wondering why.

We moved some files around to conform to the Debian policy manual.

Bruce
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Re: Linux as a career path

[Bruce Perens]

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I suspect that Linux would be very useful in getting an entry
 level or lowerlevel position.  And personally I would go out of my way for
 someone who supports or develops  Linux.

A Linux developer would often qualify for a high-level position that another
candidate might miss. For example:

1. The Linux developer might have systems programming experience in the kernel,
   compiler internals, C library, etc. It's impossible to pick up
   similar experience except perhaps for writing device drivers if you
   are using almost any other system, unless you work for MS or have
   some other insider position, in which case you might well be
   subject to a non-compete agreement. Good operating systems
   programmers are very hard to find and command six-digit salaries (at
   least out here in the Silicon Valley).

2. The Linux developer has probably had to think for themselves a whole lot
   more than they would as a certified novell engineer, who has their path
   and competencies charted out for them by others.

My experience is that the people who actually develop Linux have no shortage
of job offers. I can certainly list 5 or 6 companies that know me only through
Linux and have made it clear the offer's open if I ever want to join.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Q: Web Based Admin

[Bruce Perens]

Caldera is GPL-ing COAS (http://www.caldera.com/coas/). They promised on
their public list that the sources will be ready this month. From what I
hear we might have some interesting reading over the Thanksging weekend.

What they are releasing is _not_ a complete web-based admin system, but it
is an excellent framework for building such a thing. Read the white paper
on their web site.

We have one problem with what they are releasing in that it uses Qt (a
non-free library) as one of its three interfaces - curses works now, java
(for web-based admin) is coming later. We would re-write the Qt interface
using GTK.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: suppressing special output from troff -Tascii

[Bruce Perens]

Run col.

Bruce
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Re: log rotation package?

[Bruce Perens]

There's a rotatelogs program in one of the web server packages, I think.
It should be broken out into its own package.

Bruce
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Re: to find fastest debian mirror

[Bruce Perens]

Nice program.

Adding the -s 1024 flag to ping would make the packets closer to the
size of FTP packets, and make the results more accurate.

I would suggest that the program create its own temporary directory under
/tmp and delete it when it is done, rather than insist that ~/tmp exist.
Set your umask so that others do not have write permissions on the directory
and its files _before_ you create the directory. Mkdir will fail if any of
the security problems exist.

Please do some AWK work to take the number of dropped packets into account. 
Speed should probably be something like:

reliability = (100 - dropped_packet_percentage) / 100
real_speed = speed * reliability

Indeed, because of the re-transmission delay for dropped packets, you
may want to increase the penalty for them above this.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: hello?

[Bruce Perens]

The list doesn't mind if you subscribe more than once using the same
address - it'll only send one message to each address. That's the best
thing to do when it gets quiet.

The server will unsubscribe you when it gets too many bounces from your
system. This happens when your disk quota runs out, etc.

Bruce
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Re: Installation SONY CD-ROM

[Bruce Perens]

 configuration
and LILO.

At the linux boot prompt, press the ALT key and add the following line
after the boot name (you can let the kernel boot, it will tell you the
default boot name while booting):

cdu31a=base address,interrupt[,PAS]

The base address needs to have 0x in front of it, since it is in
hex.  For instance, to configure a drive at address 320 on interrupt 5,
use the following:

cdu31a=0x320,5

I use the following boot line:

cdu31a=0x1f88,0,PAS

because I have a PAS-16 which does not support interrupt for the
CDU31A interface.

Adding this as an append line at the beginning of the /etc/lilo.conf
file will set it for lilo configurations.  I have the following as the
first line in my lilo.conf file:

append=cdu31a=0x1f88,0

I'm not sure how to set up Bootlin (I have never used it), if someone
would like to fill in this section please do.


Configuring as a Module
---

The driver supports loading as a module.  However, you must specify
the boot address and interrupt on the boot line to insmod.  You can't
use modprobe to load it, since modprobe doesn't support setting
variables.

Anyway, I use the following line to load my driver as a module

  /sbin/insmod /lib/modules/`uname -r`/misc/cdu31a.o cdu31a_port=0x1f88

You can set the following variables in the driver:

  cdu31a_port=I/O address - sets the base I/O.  If hex, put 0x in
  front of it.  This must be specified.

  cdu31a_irq=interrupt - Sets the interrupt number.  Leaving this
   off will turn interrupts off.


Driver Special Features
---

This section describes features beyond the normal audio and CD-ROM
functions of the drive.

2048 byte buffer mode

If a disk is mounted with -o block=2048, data is copied straight from
the drive data port to the buffer.  Otherwise, the readahead buffer
must be involved to hold the other 1K of data when a 1K block
operation is done.  Note that with 2048 byte blocks you cannot execute
files from the CD.

XA compatibility

The driver should support XA disks for both the CDU31A and CDU33A.  It
does this transparently, the using program doesn't need to set it.

Multi-Session

A multi-session disk looks just like a normal disk to the user.  Just
mount one normally, and all the data should be there.  A special
thanks to Koen for help with this!

Raw sector I/O

Using the CDROMREADAUDIO it is possible to read raw audio and data
tracks.  Both operations return 2352 bytes per sector.  On the data
tracks, the first 12 bytes is not returned by the drive and the value
of that data is indeterminate.
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Re: hardware again

[Bruce Perens]

Maybe nobody has booted those two computers. If you are mail-ordering
them you are going to have a problem. If you can get them at a store
go to the store with a Debian boot floppy and the tecra floppy, and see
if either boots. Odds are, they will.

Bruce
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Re: laptop problems

[Bruce Perens]

From: David S. Zelinsky [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 But with some experimenting, I
 discovered that telling the BIOS to disable both primary and secondary cache,
 I was able to get Linux to load, and all went well after that.

Turn it back on now, and see if it boots from hard disk with the cache on.

 1) Does telling the BIOS to disable L1 and L2 cache have any affect on Linux?

Yes. The settings persist after BIOS hands control over to the boot loader.

 2) Why was this preventing Linux from loading?

There are two problems that pop up. One has to do with some floppies
failing with the cache enabled and is poorly understood. The other
(more likely) has to do with many systems not invalidating the cache
contents when the A20 gate is asserted to change the system from real
to protected mode. This causes the kernel to die just after it starts
because it reads incorrect data out of the cache. If this is what is
happening try the tecra kernel, or build your own kernel as a
zImage rather than bzImage.

 3) What affect does not disabling shadow RAM?  Does it just decrease the RAM
 available to Linux (/proc/meminfo does seem to report about 1.5 MB less than
 16 MB I'm supposed to have)?  Or can it cause more serious problems.

First, it's wasted because Linux doesn't spend much time executing code
in the ROMS that are shadowed. It might spend a little time in APM and some
32-bit BIOS functions, but not a significant amount. Second, if you have
shadow RAM mapped over I/O devices (many motherboards will do that if you
ask them to), accesses to those devices will not work. That RAM count does
not contain the memory that is below 1MB.

 4) Is there any way to disable shadow RAM, if the BIOS setup doesn't offer it
 as an option?  Is there any way to reclaim the lost RAM?

Only if you can get technical information on the chipset. A service manual
is the best bet, otherwise see what you can wheedle out of technical service.

 Another curiosity:  When I went to run fips to shrink the win95 partition, I
 found, instead of just one large partition, there were four partitions:  The
 first was almost the full 2 GB, the second and third were empty (zero length),
 and the fourth was 4 MB, but of unknown type.  I was a little worried that
 some win95 feature was using that last partition, so I was afraid to delete
 it.  Luckily I was able to shrink the first partition and put Linux swap and
 native partitions as the second and third, and leave the fourth alone.

That 4MB partition could be a boot manager partition, especially if you've
tried NT or have installed System Commander or its ilk. It might also be for
saving the system state when you suspend, but I'd expect it to be bigger
if that's the case. My Toshiba saves the state by continuing RAM power at
all times and does not use a disk partition for this.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: laptop problems

[Bruce Perens]

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (David S. Zelinsky)
 (In reference to an earlier thread: how can anyone complain about a project
 leader who actually answers users' questions?)

Because I'm not perfect by their standards. Sigh.

 So if all the devices seem to work, does that mean I won't have any problem
 with the shadow RAM?  Is there some way to be sure about this?

If it works, the only problem is that you aren't getting the memory you
paid for. That would drive some people _crazy_ :-)

 I guess I'll try deleting it and see what happens!

Do a dd of the partition to a file, so that you can restore it. Run
fdisk on Linux and read out its partition type number.

Bruce
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Re: Proposal on PPP

[Bruce Perens]

All that is necessary is for the xisp package to install a file in
/usr/lib/menu, that will hook it into the menu system of the Debian
menu package.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: cannot find qt1g in unstable

[Bruce Perens]

look in non-free.

Bruce
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list server healthy again

[Bruce Perens]

I removed maximum-child-process limits from the list server and raised
the number of inodes and file descriptors in the kernel. It seems to be
working much better.

Thanks to Phil Troin for info on what to write in /proc/sys/kernel .
Also, thanks to Manoj Srivasta for calling me at home to tell me
about the problem last night.

Bruce
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Re: Problem Installing Debian Linux

[Bruce Perens]

I guess you don't get to the menu? The message would not be fatal in itself.
Is that the last statement the system prints, and does it hang after that?

If your BIOS lets you disable plug-and-play and set fixed interrupts
for your devices, do that.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Problem Installing Debian Linux

[Bruce Perens]

It's possible this device is in the development kernel.

Bruce
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Re: 1.3.1 Setup with ULTRA DMA disk

[Bruce Perens]

Turn off plug-and-play if you can. If not, copy the kernel from the rescue
disk to your hard disk, and re-run LILO. You might have to build a kernel
with plug-and-play enabled - I don't know why you have a different
kernel on the rescue disk and on your hard disk if you have not already
done that.

Debian runs fine with one disk on each IDE interface. The second disk
would be hdc, not hdb, in this case.

Bruce
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Re: Is there something wrong ?

[Bruce Perens]

I had to stop and start the qmail on master about three times. At the
moment it is doing 3-4 deliveries per second. There was a boring but
voluminous debate on debian-devel that might have put an unusual load
on the queue. Qmail had been running uninterrupted for 25 days when it
started having problems.

Bruce
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Re: COM 5? Extra I/O Card?

[Bruce Perens]

 Can I somehow use this card and assign irq 5 to the new com port and move
 the sound card to say 7?

Edit /etc/rc.boot/0setserial . That will get the serial card going.

You might have to re-build the kernel to move the sound card IRQ.

Bruce
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Re: apology to list

[Bruce Perens]

It's OK. Some messages are _so_ dumb that they almost _require_ a snappy
answer. Of course no user questions fall into this category.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Writing CD images (not under Linux)

[Bruce Perens]

This is from 
ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/distributions/debian/OfficialCD/1.3.1/CD_Writer_Instructions.txt
 .
The list of drives is probably out-of-date, check their web site.

Bruce

Golden Hawk file2cd

There is a freeware track-at-once CD-writer program for DOS systems called
file2cd. You can find it at
http://www.mainstream.net/goldenhawk/cdrom/freeware.html .

It runs on Creative CDR4210, Grundig CDR100IPW, HP 4020i and 6020i, JVC
XR-W2001/2010, Kodak PCD-600 and PCD225, Olympus CDS615E and CDS620E,
Panasonic CW7501, Philips 521, CDD2000, CDD2600, Pinnacle
RCD-1000/5020/5040, Pioneer DW-S114X, Plasmon CDR4240, Plasmon RF4100,
Ricoh MP6200S, RO-1420C, RS-1060C, Sony CDU-920S, CDU-940S, Teac
CD-R50S, Yamaha CDR100, CDR102, CDR200, and CDR400.

It is very simple to use. To write the Debian binary CD using file2cd, run:

file2cd binary.iso /postgap

The program is smart enough to find the CD-R drive and use it if there
is only one choice.

Reported by: Brett Watson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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debian-devel@lists.debian.org

[Bruce Perens]

We need an attorney who really hates spam. Someone who is willing to work
pro-bono to collect an advertising fee from our spammers.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Question: I2O, and how Linux is dealing

[Bruce Perens]

The i20 group left their specification on their anonymous FTP server and we
all have a copy now. They then took it back off the server. Go figure. We
have no problem with them now, there is no possible non-disclosure case
and when the hardware comes out we will write drivers for it.

Thanks

Bruce 
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Re: [Q] half-duplex mode with EEPRO100

[Bruce Perens]

I think full-duplex mode is valid only for a point-to-point connection
with a special cable. But I could be wrong. I suggest you look at the
driver source code.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: space, time, matter

[Bruce Perens]

Brendan,

Many people find discussion groups like ours by searching for keywords
on the web, and then they post questions to those groups without really
understanding what the groups are for. This is the conventional theory.

My theory is that people like you don't really exist. You are simply a
figment of my imagination. You have no existence independent of me. If
I stop thinking about you, it will be as if you never were.

I will now add your name to my e-mail kill file, and will consciously
perform an act of forgetting. Shortly after you receive this message,
you will disappear into thin air.

Bruce Perens
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Re: HELLO

[Bruce Perens]

4) And be sure to tell all your friends to not get ripped off on winmodems
the way you did. They won't run Linux either.


Bruce
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Re: a c++ version of efence

[Bruce Perens]

Yes, g++ operator new and operator delete and their vector variants
call malloc() and free(), and will work with Efence out of the box. 
This is not true for some other compilers and operating systems.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Netscape and deep displays

[Bruce Perens]

Bogus! I switched to 16-bit mode and netscape runs properly. Of course I
want 24-bit mode for looking at images for work (we made Toy Story here).

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Problems installing Linux from floppy

[Bruce Perens]

Mount the floppy manually with mount -r -t msdos /dev/fd0 /mnt.
Cd to /mnt and see if you can find install.sh, if not, you arre writing
the floppy wrong, see the instructions. If it is there, try running
this: cd /mnt;sh ./install.sh / . I think the trailing slash is
important. That should install the kernel.

Thanks

Bruce
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Netscape and deep displays

[Bruce Perens]

My display is running in 24 or 32-bit mode. My XF86Config
is attached. Netscape 4's Icons are 1-bit deep. Everything else
is fine. Is there something I can tell X to fix this?

Thanks

Bruce# XF86Config auto-generated by XF86Setup
#
# Copyright (c) 1996 by The XFree86 Project, Inc.

#
# Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a
# copy of this software and associated documentation files (the Software),
# to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation
# the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense,
# and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the
# Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
#
# The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
# all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
#
# THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED AS IS, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
# IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
# FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.  IN NO EVENT SHALL
# THE XFREE86 PROJECT BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY,
# WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF
# OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
# SOFTWARE.
#
# Except as contained in this notice, the name of the XFree86 Project shall
# not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other
# dealings in this Software without prior written authorization from the
# XFree86 Project.
#

# See 'man XF86Config' for info on the format of this file

Section Files
   RgbPath/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc:unscaled
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi:unscaled
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi:unscaled
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi
   FontPath   /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi
EndSection

Section ServerFlags
EndSection

Section Keyboard
   ProtocolStandard
   XkbRulesxfree86
   XkbModelpc101
   XkbLayout   us
EndSection

Section Pointer
   ProtocolPS/2
   Device  /dev/mouse
   Emulate3Timeout 50
   Emulate3Buttons
EndSection

Section Monitor
   Identifier  Laptop Screen
   VendorName  Toshiba
   ModelName   DD-STN
   HorizSync   31.5-48.5
   VertRefresh 40-75
# VESA [EMAIL PROTECTED] Non-Interlaced mode Horizontal Sync = 37.9kHz
   Modeline  800x60040.00 800 840 968 1056 600 601 605 628 +hsync +vsync
EndSection

Section Device
   Identifier  Chips  Technologies CT65550
   VendorName  Chips  Technologies
   BoardName   CT65550
#   Option power_saver
EndSection

Section Screen
   Driver  SVGA
   Device  Chips  Technologies CT65550
   Monitor Laptop Screen
#   BlankTime   0
#   SuspendTime 1
#   OffTime 0
   DefaultColorDepth 24
   SubSection Display
  Depth8
  Modes800x600
  ViewPort 0 0
   EndSubSection
   SubSection Display
  Depth16
  Modes800x600
  ViewPort 0 0
   EndSubSection
   SubSection Display
  Depth24
  Modes800x600
  ViewPort 0 0
   EndSubSection
   SubSection Display
  Depth32
  Modes800x600
  ViewPort 0 0
   EndSubSection
EndSection

Re: [Q] CD-RW

[Bruce Perens]

Note that CDRECORD (still in beta-test) works with a lot of drives
not supported by CDWRITE. Send subscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED], they
know all about both programs on that list.

Bruce
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Re: Using source code for debian; compiling debian

[Bruce Perens]

From: Richard G. Roberto [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I think this is a major shortcoming of the debian package
 system.  Why wouldn't I want to run two different web
 servers?  Two packages that provide the same functionality
 don't need to be mutually exclusive.  Likewise, I'd very
 much like to see support for multiple concurrent package
 instances.  This is key for migration in a production
 environment.  It goes without saying that its a must for a
 development environment.  It would require rethinking quite
 a few things though.

The purpose of the package system is to make things install
automaticaly.  Obviously, having two dissimilar web servers is
something you would want to tweak manually, for example you would
probably change their spool directories and IP ports, and you would
not run both postinst scripts. That's why we give you the source.

There is  one area where this _is_ within the scope of the package
system, and that is libraries.

Yes, we can think this over, but I'd hardly call it a priority.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Using source code for debian; compiling debian

[Bruce Perens]

Several hundred of the Debian packages will compile automaticaly. A number
of them will not, and require a bit of hand tweaking.

You can't install _all_ debian packages, as many of them conflict with each
other. For example we distribute at least 4 web servers, and you'd only want
one.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: init

[Bruce Perens]

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 When I boot up linux, it says INIT: no more processes left in this
 runlevel and stops.  What can I do?

Is this your initial set-up of the system? Where did you get the CD or
what are you using to install? When you type linux single at the boot:
prompt, do you get to the shell prompt?

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Is Compaq QVision chipset supported by X?

[Bruce Perens]

If it's an SVGA card, try the SVGA server. That works with most modern
display cards.

Bruce
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Re: smartmail/exim question

[Bruce Perens]

I bet SmartList didn't make that header. How are you invoking the MDA?

Bruce
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Re: smartmail/exim question

[Bruce Perens]

See if you can not use choplist at all. It's a bit easier on the MDA.
We are currently delivering the Debian lists with qmail, although I think
we will eventually switch to something else since qmail's license is so
strange.

Bruce

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Re: hard drive crash

[Bruce Perens]

Jessica,

Most Internet mailing lists frown on please do my homework requests.
We'd like to keep this list for the single purpose of supporting the
Debian Linux Distribution. 

Thanks

Bruce Perens
Debian Project Leader
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Re: Debian distribution in the CD-ROM distributed with BOOT magazine.

[Bruce Perens]

If your motherboard is set up to boot from CD and the Boot CD is still
in the drive, it might give out that message. Pop the CD out and see what
happens. If you determine your boot block really is clobbered, 
we can tell you how to replace it.

I doubt, at this point, that a virus is to blame.

Thanks

Bruce

From: ESV Narayanan [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 
 I installed Debian from the CD-ROM distributed with BOOT magazine. The 
 computer is a Pentium 200 with 4Gb partitioned into a Win95 half and
 Linux partitions. Everything went well until I installed Loadlin to
 boot Linux from Win95 Boot prompt (following the instructions in 
 Loadlin+Win95 mini-HOWTO. The setup let me boot into Linux the first 
 time, but when I rebooted the machine I started getting invalid system
 disk - replace the disk message and could not boot the machine (both
 Win95 and Linux). I asked Hans Lermen (developer of Loadlin) and here 
 is his reply
 
  change the disk. Now I can boot the machine only with a floppy. Could
  running loadlin have corrupted the boot sector?
 
  No, Loadlin does _not_ write to the disk on normal boot.
 
  Only if you told it to generate a debug output (-d option), then
  it would write that file using normal DOS file access functions (no tricks).
  But this won't lead to overwriting the boot sector.
  
  I once got a similar question from a loadlin user and it turned out that 
  the 
  DOS-system (and loadlin) was infected by a virus (don't ask me which).
  
  Hans
  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 
 Now I am concerned. Does the loadlin.exe included in the CD-ROM contain a 
 virus?
 
 Thank you,
 E. S. Venkatraman
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Re: best Linux video card

[Bruce Perens]

S3 has signed the Open Hardware certification for the Virge.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Comparison of ultra dma disks vs scsi?

[Bruce Perens]

More to the point, has anyone seen Ultra DMA work on Linux yet?

Bruce
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Re: Year 2000

[Bruce Perens]

There is a year-2000 problem we know of that is connected to your PC's
BIOS and clock chip. The BIOS and clock chip of many systems store a
two-digit year. This is a separate issue from the Linux kernel clock,
which is all software. Linux uses a program to read the hardware clock
into the software one at boot time, and then does not refer to the
hardware clock again except to set it or to measure its drift over time
and correct for that. A patch to the hardware clock reader is necessary
to achieve year-2000 compliance even if your BIOS and clock chip think
it's 1900. We expect to be distributing this with Debian 2.0 . Since we
publish all source code, anyone can fix it sooner if necessary.

Unix and Linux store time as a count of seconds since New Year's day
1970 in a signed 32-bit integer. This was chosen to make the system
time-zone-independent. This form of time storage does not have a
year-2000 problem, but it will overflow in the year 2036. By that time
we expect to have converted to a 64-bit variable, which will not
overflow for around 274877906944 years. Hopefully, by that time
something better than Unix will have come along.

Several other year-2000 issues have already been found and repaired.
We've run our systems with the clock set to various future dates to test
them. We can't guarantee there are not any problems left, but we are sure
they would be minor ones, and rapidly repaired. Because we publish all
source code, you are guaranteed that you can get any problems fixed quickly.

Thanks

Bruce Perens
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Re: Comparison of ultra dma disks vs scsi?

[Bruce Perens]

From: George Bonser [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 3.4GB Ultra/DMA that claims to be backward compatable with E-IDE

Right, they are backward compatible. As far as I can tell Linux will run
them without Ultra DMA for now.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: How to maintain a network of workstations via dselect?

[Bruce Perens]

There are flags to dpkg to make it export the list of selected packages
and then re-import it. Try dpkg --get-selections  selection_list, and
then dpkg --set-selections  selection_list on another workstation. This
will do your package selection, but will _not_ install the packages or answer
install-time questions. We have a plan of action for dealing with that aspect
of the problem, but I can't give you a completion date at this time.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: problems with Jaz partitioning

[Bruce Perens]

Jaz seems to work well here using the Adaptec AIC7850 chip on my motherboard,
and the aic7xxx driver. No partitioning problems like you describe. Try changing
the termination settings from auto to manual-on or manual-off. If you are
terminating the SCSI bus use an active terminator. I have had trouble with
SCSI in general that I actually traced down to the cable, and that cable that
comes with the Jaz drive looks rather thin compared to the Belkin space
shuttle cable I usually use. The Belkin cable costs $$$ but seems to be worth
it.

Jaz also works, but with several problems, on my SGI. It's mostly kernel
problems in IRIX 6.2 that keep it from working perfectly.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: * Formal call for the removal of Bruce Perens *

[Bruce Perens]

Leave Dave alone, he's already abandoned this argument.

Bruce
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Re: Thanks and a question

[Bruce Perens]

From: Howard S. Ostrowsky [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 It turns out that my problem was due to the fact that I had
 LD_PRELOAD set to libgnumalloc.so.5, which is apparently no
 longer needed with libc6.  But my question is this:  I had 
 added this environment variable long ago because it was needed
 by some program (I can't recall which one!).  But I have no idea
 what LD_PRELOAD is really for.

This was a hack to switch to using a different memory allocator because
Netscape had some buffer overrun problems. LD_PRELOAD caused
libgnumalloc.so.5 to be loaded before the C library.

Bruce
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Re: FYI (Infomagic's debian outdated.)

[Bruce Perens]

Infomagic did not recieve _any_ master disk from Debian. They made one on
their own.

Bruce
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Re: 3C509 acting strangely on Win95/Debian dual boot system

[Bruce Perens]

No, you need to type linux reboot=h, so that when you halt Linux it will
reset the computer.

Bruce
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Re: 3C509 acting strangely on Win95/Debian dual boot system

[Bruce Perens]

From: kevin havener [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 When rebooting into W95 from Linux, I have to power cycle the machine to
 get it to recognize my 3C509 ethernet card.

Try adding reboot=h to the boot command line. If that works, edit your
lilo config to put it in there permanently. The reboot options are:

w:  warm - no power-on self-test.
c:  cold - performs POST.
b:  bios - reboot by jumping through the BIOS.
h:  hard - reset the CPU to reboot.

Please get back to us and tell us if that works.

Thanks

Bruce
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About Dave Cinege's postings

[Bruce Perens]

My perception is that Dave does sincerely care about Debian, even if he
expresses it poorly.

I placed him on digest mode on the mailing lists a while back,
because several developers requested that I take some action about his
noisy and non-constructive messages. Digest mode means that postings
from a particular person are collected into a digest and posted as one
message, to reduce the volume of postings without censoring the
message. Debian-devel is the list read by the Debian developers, and I
chose that list for the posting of digests because all of the
decision-makers for the project should be reading it. Dave operates
the [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list, where his postings are
always welcome. Of course, Dave can circumvent the digest mode on the
official Debian lists by changing his posting address, and he has
recently done so.

Do not fear that I will be unduly effected by his messages.

Thanks

Bruce
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I'm staying with the project, don't worry!

[Bruce Perens]

I would like to thank all of the people who have been mailing me
unsolicited messages of support. Unfortunately, because of the demands
of project leadership, I don't have time to answer them. I do read
every one.

I am not upset by critical postings, especially when they are obviously
not the voice of the majority. Sometimes I learn something from them,
other times they contain little sense.

I want to assure everyone who might be concerned that I am not thinking
about leaving the Debian project, and I am comfortable in my role as
project leader. In December the developers will hold a project leader
election. I am running against Ian Jackson, another long-time Debian
developer and someone worthy of your respect. Ian might make an
excellent project leader at some future date. This will not deter me
from kicking his butt in this election and continuing as project leader
in 1998 :-)

I won't make promises for 1999, as by that time I could be well on my
way to becoming a father.

Many Thanks

Bruce Perens
Debian Project Leader
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on term limits

[Bruce Perens]

Richard thinks I'm a putz? I am struck to the heart! Oh, cruel fate! :-)

Term limits are fine, but the biggest problem so far has been finding
serious candidates for the job. I greatly appreciate Ian's running, as
until now there never has been a contested election, and I could not
seriously say that the process was democratic because of that.

I don't have a problem with term limits, however they should be limits upon
the maximum number of _consecutive_ terms, not on the number of terms
one can serve in a lifetime.

Let's get the FSF to accept term limits. Then RMS and I can trade jobs :-)

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Win95 connected to my Debian box

[Bruce Perens]

Samba, the standard set of net servers, and perhaps a POP server are all
you need. File and printer sharing work excellently in both directions.
Telnet works from the Windows machine to Debian, POP mail works (Valerie
uses and old Eudora at home, but I think I've seen it work with Exchange,
too).

SMBFS doesn't work as well as SMBCLIENT for sharing files from the 95
system on the Debian machine. At times, it's wedged on me and I have had
to remove and re-load its module to get it going again. However, it has
worked just fine to back up the 95 system using the tape drive on the
Debian system, which is my major application for it.

Thanks

Bruce
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term limits

[Bruce Perens]

From: Britton [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I just don't see the point in making the process of succession so
 competitive.

It depends if you want the project leader choice to be democratic or not.
If it's going to be democratic, there _has_ to be competition.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: IMPORTANT Correction: The real Debian.org

[Bruce Perens]

From: Britton [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 Actually, the first test case has already been won, and I doubt there will
 be a second

The first test case was not sufficiently general. There must be more of
them to overturn the law.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: The Debian Alpha maintainers have some inappropriate elitism

[Bruce Perens]

 I dont understand why the Debian Alpha maintainers want to act as if
 Alpha users dont exist. We are constantly ignored when asking for
 installation instructions and constantly ignored when making FAQ
 suggestions. 
 
 They seem to want to talk over our head.

This is unreleased development software, maybe they just aren't ready for
you yet.

Bruce
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Re: The Debian Alpha maintainers have some inappropriate elitism

[Bruce Perens]

On second thought, perhaps I should be asking you to write the installation
instructions and the FAQ. Since you describe yourself as a user, you must
have figured it out :-)

Thanks

Bruce

  I dont understand why the Debian Alpha maintainers want to act as if
  Alpha users dont exist. We are constantly ignored when asking for
  installation instructions and constantly ignored when making FAQ
  suggestions. 
  
  They seem to want to talk over our head.
 
 This is unreleased development software, maybe they just aren't ready for
 you yet.
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Re: Redhat - Debian PCI problems

[Bruce Perens]

From: Daniel J. Mashao [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I am so ashamed of myself

Don't be. If I had a buck for every stupid mistake I'd made, the mortgage
would be paid off.

Just hang out on the list and help the next guy.

Bruce
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Re: new debian user questions

[Bruce Perens]

From: Manoj Srivastava [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 When there is a standard admin tool, then the packages that do
 have a config script shall doubtless do so ;-)

I expect to be able to announce a tool pretty soon.

Bruce
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Re: cdwrite trouble: SENSE_ERROR

[Bruce Perens]

I've sometimes cleared it by unloading and reloading the SCSI driver.

Bruce
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Re: netware/novell emulator

[Bruce Perens]

Is it that you don't want win95 to prompt for the username and password,
or you want it to do so? I am using Samba and in the Windows 95 control
panel I set the login to be the network login. Then it prompts for the
username and password when logging in the user, and does not prompt again.

Note also that you can configure Samba to allow any user, and avoid the
prompts that way.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Year 2000 Debian

[Bruce Perens]

I ran my system with the date in the year 2000 for a few weeks. I could not
find any problems. Unix was never so dumb as to store the century as two
digits. Richard Stallman and FSF have been testing this, too.

The biggest problem that may happen has to do with the motherboard BIOS
and the PC clock chip on some systems storing the century as two
digits. The Linux program that reads the hardware clock into the
software clock can make up for that.  An update of this program was
just released and will be well-deployed before it is needed.

Thanks

Bruce
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Re: Year 2000 Debian

[Bruce Perens]

There is some dispute over whether it's 2038 or later. In any case, one
only need define time_t to be 64 bits and it will last until the
heat-death of the universe.

Bruce
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