Revert to this revision

Attended: Ben F, Ben S. Adam B. Apologies:

  • Andrew Spiers

Update on tasks from last meeting

  • - Les finally got to finish off his "How I got into Free Software"

Confirm details of upcoming meeting

  • Meeting chair/timekeeper - Ben F.
  • Presentation (0:45)
    • Damien would like to talk + how I got into Free Software
  • Gnews (0:15)
    • The Privacy Workshop summary?
    • ThinkPenguin have some new machine builds:
      • Investigating a free-software HTPC build
      • Free-software Wifi ADSL router
    • Debian freeze period has begun
  • Meet a member (0:15)
    • Works well to end the formal meeting, pre-dinner conversation
  • Dinner

Audio conferencing for November meeting

  • broadcast meeting audio via Mumble server?
  • XMPP for a chat channel during meetings?

VPAC training room access

  • Andrew no longer with VPAC
  • Ben F., Alex F. moving office away from CBD in 2014-12
  • We should at least consider a different venue

New activity: Australia-wide Mumble audio conference

Upcoming meetings:

  • 2014-12-04: committee meeting
  • 2014-12-18: no presentations, group dinner
  • 2015-01: no regular meeting - something caual for Deb Nicholson
  • 2015-02-05: committee meeting
  • 2015-02-19: regular meeting

To do:

  • - Adam: Confirm with Damien Z. - Ben F: Drag someone in to do Gnews in Feb - Ben S: Sound out Electron Workshop, Les uni - Ben S.: converse with Fraser for a date for Free Software Australia teleconf

Gnews items:

Internet Archive: 900 Classic Arcade Games on your Web Browser
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/04/2138206
Uses: JSMESS - MESS to JavaScript
Project: https://github.com/jsmess/jsmess
License: GPL3
Demo: https://archive.org/details/internetarcade
Notes:

  • MESS = Multi Emulator Super System (953 unique systems support)
    • Sister project to MAME for console and computer systems.
  • MAME = Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator

Dutch Parliment Urges Increased Use of Open Source by Government
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/22/0928223

Adobe Spies on Readers: Every DRM Page Turn Leaked to Base Over SSL
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/24/0912208

Debian Jessie enters a freeze period.

Closing the Loop on Online Advertising
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/27/1757255

  • Adnauseam: clicking ads so you don't have to.

iCloud Uploads Local Data Outside of iCloud Drive
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/26/2126238

  • OS X 10.10 uploads locally-stored "unsaved" documents to Apple without warning.

PDF signing feature coming to LibreOffice in April, paid for via crowdfunding.
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/27/1420219

Email Exploiting Shellshock Targeting Vulnerable Servers to Create Botnets
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/27/2123249

Microsoft Working on Open Source Package Manager for Windows 10
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/28/1221211

Prior to Version 1.16, wget Allows for a Web Server to Write Arbitrary Files on the Client Side
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/29/1142238

The Journal Nature is Asking for Source Code
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/31/1316211

  • Nature is updating its policy to state that [1]papers in Nature journals should make computer code accessible where possible. Nature is not requiring open source though, from the [2]Authors and Referees Guidelines.

Facebook Creates Tor Hidden Service
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/10/31/215241
Hidden URL: https://facebookcorewwwi.onion/

Apache Software Foundation (ASF) celebrates 15 years of community-led development.
https://blogs.apache.org/foundation/entry/the_asf_15_chairman_s

OpenBSD 5.6 release includes a new httpd HTTP server with FastCGI and SSL support.
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/01/1924206

BBC Removes RSS Feeds, Breaks 3rd-party iPlayer Apps on Purpose
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/02/131256

  • "In particular, the BBC does not sanction XBMC, get_iplayer or similar clients, and the iPlayer RSS feeds were never designed or intended to support them." API called Nitro to be available to sanctioned players in the future.

China to Upgrade All Gov't PCs to GNU/Linux by 20220
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/03/1154254

  • "The plan is to replace Windows-powered machines at a rate of 15 percent per year, give or take 10 percent, over five years."

Police can Compel Fingerprint Unlocking of Phones - in Virginia
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/04/0920233

  • Use passwords/passcodes on mobile devices, not fingerprints.

Cryptome Reveals How MSFT Gives the FBI & NSA Back Doors to Crack Encryption
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/05/0916249
http://cryptome.org/2014/11/ms-onedrive-nsa-prism.htm

OpenSUSE 13.2 released.
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/05/1832251
https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:13.2

  • Re-factoring of YAST after transition to Ruby
  • Tighter integration with systemd...

NTFS (R/O) Now Supported in ReactOS LiveCD
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/06/1335238

GnuPG 2.1.0 released.
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/06/2235238
https://gnupg.org/faq/whats-new-in-2.1.html

  • Supports ECC
  • More can be done in non-interactive mode
  • GPG_AGENT_INFO environment variable replaced by a socket. gpg-agent daemon started whenever first called. No more need for Xsession.d scripts (unless --enable-ssh-support is used).
  • Better keyserver support through dirmngr improvements, and improved keyserver pool support (for cases when a keyserver in a pool is down).
  • Massive speed improvements on large keyrings.
  • Revocation certificates are now automatically generated when creating a keypair.
  • ...and much more!

ESR launched SRC 0.1 to the world. Up to 0.9 at time of writing.
http://www.catb.org/esr/src/

  • Simple Revision Control is RCS reloaded with a modern UI, designed to manage single-file solo projects kept more than one to a directory. Use it fot FAQs, ~/bin directories, config files, and the like. Features integer sequential revision numbers and a command set that will seem familiar to Subversion/Git/hg users.
  • A Python wrapper around RCS. :)
  • Modified BSD licensed.

Twitter Suspends Indie Journalists
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/10/037210

  • A reminder that you have no right to account ownership with centralised services such as Twitter.

Linux Community Mulls NSA Involvement With systemd
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/11/1348235

  • Numerous sources suspect systemd has been compromised.

Systemd-resolved Subject to Cache Poisoning
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/12/2126227

  • There are no reports as to the affected versions or how widespread the problem may be.
  • Many questioning why systemd would be doing this in the first place.

20 Percent Speed Improvement in Intel's Mesa Linux Video Driver Due to Valve Subcontractor
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/13/0830243

  • Likely the patches will be in 3.18 or 3.19.
  • Intel did not indicate what they actually corrected, as it was a call to a function of the GPU not publically documented.

Indonesia Tax Agency Saves 90% with Open Source
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/16/1548237

  • The Indonesian tax agency has recorded 90 per cent savings by using open source systems, it told FutureGov.

Debian General Resolution To Prevent Init System Coupling Fails to Pass
http://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/11/19/0826247