------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Debian Project http://www.debian.org/ Debian Project News [email protected] August 11th, 2010 http://debian.org/News/weekly/2010/09/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Welcome to this year's ninth issue of DPN, the newsletter for the Debian community. Topics covered in this issue include: * The Debian project Release Team announces an official Freeze * Annual Debian Developer Conference 2010 ended * A free (as in speech) Debian book in the making * Second alpha version for "Squeeze" -based Debian Live images * Net-installation CD images with firmware available * Debian Edu/Skolelinux 6.0.0 alpha0 test release * ZFS support in unstable on kFreeBSD ports * Debian-Accessibility is using Blends web sentinel * Debian GIS project will release Blends metapackages in "Squeeze" * DebiChem project will release Blends metapackages in "Squeeze" * DebConf11 logo contest * When should services started by init.d scripts be operational? * Different statistics about Debian * Building all files from source * ... and much more. The Debian project Release Team announces an official Freeze ------------------------------------------------------------ On 6 August at DebConf10 in New York City, Adam D. Barratt and the rest of the Debian Release Team announced that Debian is being frozen in preparation for release [1]. The tentative release goal is before the end of the year. As Adam D. Barratt said, a freeze is a horizontal transition and it means that one doesn't introduce new transitions, or upload packages to unstable which are not intended to be released in "Squeeze" . Also, if your package is involved in an ongoing transition, don't upload a new version until it migrates. You can check thetransition tracker [2] for more information. 1 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 2 : http://release.debian.org/transitions/ Annual Debian Developer Conference 2010 ended --------------------------------------------- The 2010 annual Debian Developer Conference, DebConf10, which was held at Columbia University in New York City, ended last Saturday on 7 August, 2010. With over 300 Debian Developers, Maintainers, and Users from 40 countries attending, it was one of the most productive conferences ever. Attendees met other developers, worked on projects, toured New York City, and attended talks, thus forming strong community bonds throughout the week long event. Holding DebConf in New York allowed organizers to include members of the wider Free Software and Free Culture community who gave talks and presentations. Eben Moglen, chairman of the Software Freedom Law Center, gave a talk "The Silver Lining in the Cloud" (beta version of the recording [3]) that inspired days of conversation and got many participants interested in the Freedom Box project. John Sullivan from the Free Software Foundation showed a film about patents, "Patent Absurdity" (beta version of the recording [4]), and led a BOF detailing the many campaigns of the Free Software Foundation. We also enjoyed the award winning animated film released under a Creative Commons license [5] "Sita Sings the Blues" . The filmmaker, Nina Paley, along with Karl Fogel from Questioncopyright, led a lively question and answer period after the film. 3 : http://ftp.acc.umu.se/pub/debian-meetings/2010/debconf10/high/1252_How_We_Can_Be_the_Silver_Lining_of_the_Cloud.ogv 4 : http://ftp.acc.umu.se/pub/debian-meetings/2010/debconf10/high/1336_1336_Patent_Absurdity.ogv 5 : http://www.sitasingstheblues.com/ Many other interesting Debian-related talks and ad-hoc sessions took place, ranging from the latest developments in packaging up to collaboration with derivative distributions and projects like "Constantly Usable Testing" . Preceding the conference, a one week work camp took place, and thanks to the bug-squashing contest held during the past two weeks, almost 140 bugs were closed for the next release, and almost 80 for the current stable release! Debian's current DPL, Stefano Zacchiroli, gave an inspirational talk (beta version of the recording [6]), explaining why Debian is still relevant after 17 years but also making recommendations for attracting more users and developers, and for building stronger collaboration with derivatives. The Release Team delivered a quick but concise talk about their status and announced the immediate freeze of [7] "Squeeze" . 6 : http://ftp.acc.umu.se/pub/debian-meetings/2010/debconf10/high/1124_1124_Bits_from_the_DPL.ogv 7 : http://www.debian.org/News/2010/20100806 For those who couldn't attend the conference, and would like to watch the talks, many sessions were streamed by the DebConf video team composed of over 40 volunteers. If you liked their work, please say thank you [8] as this helps to keep them motivated. 8 : http://wiki.debconf.org/wiki/DebConf10/Videoteam/Thanks A low quality beta version of the video recordings [9] is already available. 9 : http://blog.debconf.org/blog/debconf10/hl_beta_videos_up.dc The Debian Project, the attendees, and all who followed the streams would like to thank this year's sponsors [10] and the organizers [11] for making all that possible! 10 : http://debconf10.debconf.org/ 11 : http://wiki.debconf.org/wiki/DebConf10/NewYork#Active A free (as in speech) Debian book in the making ----------------------------------------------- Debian developers Raphaël Hertzog and Roland Mas have announced their intention to translate their French Debian book into English. Their best-seller covers a wide range of topics from the basics (introducing the community, dpkg, APT, debian-installer, etc.) to more advanced administration tasks (automated installation, virtualization with Xen, RAID/LVM, SELinux, etc.) as well as the most common services (mail, web, firewall, file server, LDAP, etc.). It will be based on the upcoming Debian "Squeeze" . The resulting book will be published under a DFSG-compliant license (dual license: CC-BY-SA 3.0/GPL2+) provided that they manage to raise the money required to fund this work. At this point, they need your feedback to pick the most appropriate funding service: check their announcement [12] and respond to the questionnaire [13] that they have set up. 12 : http://raphaelhertzog.com/2010/07/28/do-you-want-a-free-debian-book/ 13 : http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dG4yZ3lqTjdsbG83c0F3Sm5kLU1HaWc6MQ Second alpha version for "Squeeze" -based Debian Live images available ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Daniel Baumann announced the availability of the second alpha version of Debian [14] "Squeeze" -based live images, which can be used without being installed. Due to space limitations, dedicated USB-HDD images will most likely not be offered anymore, as the new ISO-hybrid images can be used on both optical media like DVDs and USB-sticks. It's also possible to use them via network boot. The images [15] are available for the amd64, i386, and powerpc architectures and also contain an experimental installation system. 14 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 15 : http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/squeeze_live_alpha2/ Net-installation CD images with firmware available -------------------------------------------------- During the last few weeks, "netinst" CD images (containing the installation system and all packages for the base system, downloading everything else from the Internet) have been available which also contain the partly non-free firmware files needed (e.g.) for some network and WLAN controllers. Now that they have been tested,they have been moved to their final location [16] and can be downloaded from the official download site [17] for the i386, amd64, and powerpc architectures as well as one image to boot all three architectures. 16 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 17 : http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/unofficial/non-free/cd-including-firmware/ Debian Edu/Skolelinux 6.0.0 alpha0 test release ----------------------------------------------- DebianEdu, who adapt Debian for the special needs of schools and similar institutions, released their first test version [18] based uopn Debian "Squeeze" . Many applications have been updated and added, so testers are asked to take special care about the package selections: missing, unneeded, and untranslated applications should bereported back [19]. Other newly introduced features are the integration of the LXDE desktop environment and a roaming workstation profile for laptops. 18 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 19 : mailto:[email protected] ZFS support in unstable on kFreeBSD ports ----------------------------------------- Thanks to Tuco Xyz, Petr Salinger and Aurelien Jarno, zfsutils [20] are now packaged for Debian GNU/kFreeBSD [21] and available in "Sid" , including therelevant libraries [22] and a udeb package for the Debian Installer [23]. Its availability also brought some kernel ZFS issues to light which have been fixed in the meantime. Now Debian GNU/kFreeBSD can fully support ZFS. 20 : http://packages.debian.org/sid/zfsutils 21 : http://wiki.debian.org/Debian_GNU/kFreeBSD 22 : http://packages.qa.debian.org/z/zfsutils.html 23 : http://packages.debian.org/sid/zfsutils-udeb Debian-Accessibility is using Blends web sentinel ------------------------------------------------- The Debian-Accessibility [24] project is now using the web sentinel provided by the Debian Pure Blends effort to show their current work to users. Those who are interested might have a look at the 24 : http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-accessibility * user oriented tasks pages [25] * developer oriented bugs pages [26] There is some ongoing discussion [27] whether Blends metapackages make sense for the Debian-Accessibility project. 25 : http://blends.alioth.debian.org/accessibility/tasks 26 : http://blends.alioth.debian.org/accessibility/bugs 27 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] The definition for the packages which are shown on the pages above is available in the Subversion repository [28] and the documentation of the format of the tasks files is available in the Debian Pure Blends documentation [29]. 28 : http://svn.debian.org/viewsvn/blends/projects/accessibility/trunk/debian-accessibility/tasks/ 29 : http://blends.alioth.debian.org/blends/ Debian GIS project will release Blends metapackages in "Squeeze" ---------------------------------------------------------------- The Debian GIS [30] project has now released a set of metapackages built using Debian Pure Blends tools which are available in testing (and thus will be released in "Squeeze" ). The web sentinel provides anoverview [31] of the available GIS and OSM packages in Debian. It would be great if some OpenStreetMap addicts would join this effort. 30 : http://wiki.debian.org/DebianGis 31 : http://blends.alioth.debian.org/gis/tasks As above, the definition for the packages shown is available in the Subversion repository [32]. 32 : http://svn.debian.org/viewsvn/blends/projects/gis/trunk/debian-gis/tasks/ DebiChem project will release Blends metapackages in "Squeeze" -------------------------------------------------------------- The DebiChem [33] project has likewise released a set of metapackages for "Squeeze" built using Debian Pure Blends tools. See theoverview [34] of chemical application packages in Debian and task definition in the Subversion repository [35]. 33 : http://debichem.alioth.debian.org/ 34 : http://blends.alioth.debian.org/debichem/tasks 35 : http://svn.debian.org/viewsvn/blends/projects/debichem/trunk/debichem/tasks/ DebConf11 logo contest ---------------------- While Annual Debian Developers Conference 2010 has just ended, preparations for the 2011 conference have already begun. One example is the DebConf11 logo contest [36] collecting ideas and logos for the conference, which will take place in Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina. 36 : http://www.debianart.org/cchost/?ccm=/debconf11logo When should services started by init.d scripts be operational? -------------------------------------------------------------- Petter Reinholdtsen wondered [37] whether a service started by an init.d script should already be operational when the script exits successfully. As the execution of these scripts is ordered based on their dependencies, it can lead to difficult to solve problems (see for example #585966 [38] or #589915 [39]) when these scripts exit before their service is completely up and running. A depending service may be called while the service is still only starting up. Josselin Mouette noted [40] that this would be the case for all init.d scripts using the start-stop-daemon with the --background option. Josef Spillner added [41] that services should be able to handle it if services they depend on are temporarily unavailable, e.g. by trying to reconnect. 37 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 38 : http://bugs.debian.org/585966 39 : http://bugs.debian.org/589915 40 : http://lists.debian.org/1280912277.449.26.ca...@meh 41 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] Different statistics about Debian --------------------------------- Anthony Towns published several statistics [42] about Debian, including the average time needed to close bugs and the number of release-critical bugs. The graphs are rendered using JavaScript allowing different filters and zooming into the graphs. 42 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] Building all files from source ------------------------------ After several bugs had been filed against packages not building Flash files during their build process but shipping precompiled files, Charlie Smotherman wondered whether all files shipped in a Debian package really need to be built from source [43]. Some of the reasons named were quality assurance [44], conforming with Debian Poliy [45], and compliance with the Debian Free Software Guidelines [46]: being able to modify files distributed by Debian [47] is a core principle. 43 : http://lists.debian.org/1280958574.29450.39.ca...@debian 44 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 45 : http://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ 46 : http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines 47 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] Other news ---------- The twenty-third issue of the miscellaneous news for developers [48] has been released and covers the following topics: * Debian MiniConfs * Debian Maintainer index * GoogleCode redirector * Commit rights to Debian Project News for DDs * Debian Developer Portfolio Service * #debian-ubuntu on OFTC * Team uploads A list of the contents of all JAR files [49] in Debian unstable is now generated daily. You can use zgrep to search package names, JAR filenames, or class names. 48 : http://lists.debian.org/1281303504.32187.19.ca...@chianamo 49 : http://ftp-master.debian.org/users/twerner/jar-content.txt.gz Martin Zobel-Helas announced the agenda for a meeting of Debian's System Administrators [50] to take place on 3 September in Munich, Germany. 50 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] Russell Coker documented how to create a chroot environment [51] using SELinux [52]. 51 : http://etbe.coker.com.au/2010/07/26/se-linux-chroot-environment/ 52 : http://wiki.debian.org/SELinux Petter Reinholdtsen wondered [53] whether tools used to create users and their home directories should use a common framework (e.g. scripts in /etc/skel.d/) to automatically fill these directories with configuration files. 53 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] New Developers and Maintainers ------------------------------ Six applicants have been accepted [54] as Debian Maintainers since the previous issue of the Debian Project News. Please welcome Michael Ziegler, Josué Miguel Abarca Samayoa, Manuel A. Fernandez Montecelo, Tomasz Muras, Praveen Arimbrathodiyil, and Youhei SASAKI into our project! 54 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] Release-critical bugs statistics for the upcoming release --------------------------------------------------------- According to the unofficial release-critical bug counter [55], the upcoming release, Debian 6.0 "Squeeze" , is currently affected by 245 release-critical bugs. Ignoring bugs which are easily solved or on the way to being solved, roughly speaking, about 145 release-critical bugs remain to be solved for the release to happen. 55 : http://bts.turmzimmer.net/details.php There are also more detailed statistics [56] as well as some hints on how to interpret [57] these numbers. 56 : http://blog.schmehl.info/Debian/rc-stats/2010-31 57 : http://wiki.debian.org/ProjectNews/RC-Stats Important Debian Security Advisories ------------------------------------ Debian's Security Team recently released advisories for these packages (among others): xulrunner [58], gnupg2 [59], openldap [60], kvirc [61], mapserver [62], ghostscript [63], libmikmod [64], gmime2.2 [65], moin [66], tiff [67], lftp [68], avahi [69], cabextract [70], wget [71], php5 [72] and socat [73]. Please read them carefully and take the proper measures. 58 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2075 59 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2076 60 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2077 61 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2078 62 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2079 63 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2080 64 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2081 65 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2082 66 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2083 67 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2084 68 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2085 69 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2086 70 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2087 71 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2088 72 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2089 73 : http://www.debian.org/security/2010/dsa-2090 Please note that these are a selection of the more important security advisories of the last weeks. If you need to be kept up to date about security advisories released by the Debian Security Team, please subscribe to the security mailing list [74] for announcements. 74 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-security-announce/ New and noteworthy packages --------------------------- The following packages were added to the unstable Debian archive recently (among others [75]): 75 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/newpkg * amora-applet -- use a bluetooth device as X remote control (systray applet) [76] * debian-installer-launcher -- Debian Installer desktop launcher [77] * forked-daapd -- media server with support for RSP, DAAP, DACP and AirTunes [78] * gnome-screensaver-flags -- Screensaver for GNOME with flags of the world. [79] * gnuspool -- A network-based print spooler [80] * guitarix -- Rock guitar amplifier for Jack [81] * juffed -- Lightweight Qt 4 text editor [82] * med-data -- Debian Med suggestions for medical databases [83] * mencoder -- MPlayer's Movie Encoder [84] * mplayer-gui -- movie player for Unix-like systems [85] * mupdf -- lightweight PDF viewer [86] * mussh -- MUltihost SSH Wrapper [87] * nailgun -- client, protocol, and server for running Java programs from CLI [88] * plasma-widget-fastuserswitch -- Fast user switch plasmoid for switching between sessions in KDE [89] * pyrit -- A GPGPU-driven WPA/WPA2-PSK key cracker [90] * vlc-plugin-notify -- LibNotify plugin for VLC [91] * xacobeo -- XPath (XML Path Language) visualizer [92] * xul-ext-dispmua -- display Mail User Agent extension for Icedove [93] * xul-ext-imap-acl -- Extension to manage ACLs on IMAP folders [94] * xul-ext-sieve -- Extension that implements the ManageSieve protocol [95] * zathura -- PDF viewer with a minimalistic interface [96] * zfsutils -- command-line tools to manage ZFS filesystems [97] 76 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/amora-applet 77 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/debian-installer-launcher 78 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/forked-daapd 79 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/gnome-screensaver-flags 80 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/gnuspool 81 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/guitarix 82 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/juffed 83 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/med-data 84 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/mencoder 85 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/mplayer-gui 86 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/mupdf 87 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/mussh 88 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/nailgun 89 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/plasma-widget-fastuserswitch 90 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/pyrit 91 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/vlc-plugin-notify 92 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xacobeo 93 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xul-ext-dispmua 94 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xul-ext-imap-acl 95 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xul-ext-sieve 96 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/zathura 97 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/zfsutils Work-needing packages --------------------- Currently 597 packages are orphaned and 141 packages are up for adoption. Please take a look at the recent [98] reports [99] to see if there are packages you are interested in or view the complete list of packages which need your help [100]. 98 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 99 : http://lists.debian.org/[email protected] 100 : http://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/help_requested Want to continue reading DPN? ----------------------------- Please help us create this newsletter. We still need more volunteer writers to watch the Debian community and report about what is going on. Please see the contributing page [101] to find out how to help. We're looking forward to receiving your mail at [email protected] [102]. 101 : http://wiki.debian.org/ProjectNews/HowToContribute 102 : mailto:[email protected] This issue of Debian Project News was edited by Raphaël Hertzog, Andreas Tille, Jeremiah C. Foster, Biella Coleman and Alexander Reichle-Schmehl [103]. 103 : mailto:[email protected] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [email protected] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [email protected] Archive: http://lists.debian.org/[email protected]
