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Links 28/9/2020: Linux 5.9 RC7, Review of Linuxfx 10.6, OpenSSH 8.4



  • GNU/Linux

    • Desktop/Laptop

    • Audiocasts/Shows

      • Linux Action News 156

        Lenovo expands its Linux lineup in a big way, with 30 Ubuntu systems. And why Microsoft Edge on Linux might be more significant than you think.

        Plus, the latest Mozilla project being spun-out, and how Timescale might have a solution for a self-sustaining open-source business in the cloud era.

      • GNU World Order 373

        **madplay**, **abxtest**, and the **man** package of the **ap** Slackware package set.

      • Deepin 20: Big Sur? - Deepin v20 Review

        There is widespread adoption of a certain macOS design trend in the latest release of deepin. This desktop OS is beautiful in its latest iteration, but is the beauty only skin deep?

      • Why Choose Manjaro KDE Plasma 20.1?

        Manjaro 20.1 Mikah is one of the main players in desktop Linux. With the 20.1 release, I boot up the KDE Plasma edition to explore why you should consider this distribution if you value choice in your Linux OS.

      • Wait, there's a GNOME OS now?

        Yep, and now YOU can try it! With the new release of @GNOME 3.38, the developers also released something called GNOME OS. What's this all about? Jason has used it, and he fills you in on this cool initiative that aims to further improve one of the most popular Linux desktop environments.

      • Linux Laptops Have A Price Problem

        Want to see more Linux laptops built and priced for the average PC user? It needs to happen, but the people covering Linux are part of the problem. And that includes me! So how do we solve this?

      • JC's Top 5 Linux Myths
    • Kernel Space

      • Linux 5.9-rc7
        So we finally have all the issues I know about sorted out - the fix
        for the VM issue I mentioned in the rc6 announcement is here, as is
        the fix for the slab corruption issue that was separately discussed,
        along with another silly page locking bug one-liner fix.
        
        

        But while I do now know of any remaining gating issues any more, the fixes came in fairly late. So unless I feel insanely optimistic and/or a burning bush tells me that everything is bug-free, my plan right now is that I'll do another rc next Sunday rather than the final 5.9 release. And btw, please no more burning bushes. We're kind of sensitive about those on the West coast right now.

        Anyway, while the MM side is what kept me on my toes last week, most of the changes here are actually drivers and networking. And networking drivers. With a small smattering of documentation and filesystem fixes and other noise thrown in.

        Shortlog appended, but what I really hope you all will do is to give it a nice good testing. One extra week or rc kernels will help, but only if people actually try this out.

        So.. Please?

        Linus
      • Kernel prepatch 5.9-rc7

        The 5.9-rc7 kernel prepatch is out for testing. "But while I do now know of any remaining gating issues any more, the fixes came in fairly late. So unless I feel insanely optimistic and/or a burning bush tells me that everything is bug-free, my plan right now is that I'll do another rc next Sunday rather than the final 5.9 release. And btw, please no more burning bushes. We're kind of sensitive about those on the West coast right now."

      • Linux 5.9 Stable Expected In Two Weeks, But For Now Is Linux 5.9-rc7

        Linus Torvalds just released Linux 5.9-rc7 as the newest weekly test candidate for Linux 5.9. Due to the regressions encountered this cycle and prominent issues being resolved late, he's looking at releasing Linux 5.9 in two weeks time rather than next week.

      • MSM Adreno DRM Driver For Linux 5.10 Has DisplayPort, Per-Process Pagetables

        Rob Clark who founded the Freedreno/MSM driver project and current Googler sent in the MSM direct rendering manager driver updates targeting the upcoming Linux 5.10 merge window. This time around the Adreno kernel graphics/display driver has some notable additions.

        With Linux 5.10 the MSM DRM driver now has DisplayPort output support for Adreno hardware with DP outputs.

      • Broadcom Has 200G Ethernet Link Speed Support Coming To Its Driver For Linux 5.10

        Broadcom engineers have prepared their Linux network driver infrastructure for supporting 200G link speeds.

        Coming to Broadcom's "bnxt_en" Linux network driver in Linux 5.10 are the necessary alterations for handling 200G links. It was back in late 2018 when Broadcom first announced the world's first 200G Ethernet controller utilizing 50G PAM-4 and PCI Express 4.0. Now as we approach the end of 2020 and prepping for an interesting 2021 of new hardware, bnxt_en is ready with this 200G Ethernet link speed.

    • Applications

      • grep-3.5 released [stable]
        This is to announce grep-3.5, a stable release.
        
        

        Thanks especially to Paul Eggert, Norihiro Tanaka and Bruno Haible for changes both in grep proper and in gnulib.

        There have been 56 commits by 3 people in the 38 weeks since 3.4.

      • GnuCash 4.2

        GnuCash is a personal and small business finance application, freely licensed under the GNU GPL and available for GNU/Linux, BSD, Solaris, Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows. It’s designed to be easy to use, yet powerful and flexible. GnuCash allows you to track your income and expenses, reconcile bank accounts, monitor stock portfolios and manage your small business finances. It is based on professional accounting principles to ensure balanced books and accurate reports.

        GnuCash can keep track of your personal finances in as much detail as you prefer. If you are just starting out, use GnuCash to keep track of your checkbook. You may then decide to track cash as well as credit card purchases to better determine where your money is being spent. When you start investing, you can use GnuCash to help monitor your portfolio. Buying a vehicle or a home? GnuCash will help you plan the investment and track loan payments. If your financial records span the globe, GnuCash provides all the multiple-currency support you need.

      • Ventoy 1.0.22

        Ventoy is an open source tool to create bootable USB drive for ISO/WIM/IMG/VHD(x)/EFI files. With Ventoy, you don't need to format the disk over and over, you just need to copy the ISO/WIM/IMG/VHD(x)EFI files to the USB drive and boot them directly. You can copy many files at a time and ventoy will give you a boot menu to select them. Both Legacy BIOS and UEFI are supported in the same way. Most type of OS supported (Windows/WinPE/Linux/Unix/Vmware/Xen...)

    • Instructionals/Technical

    • Games

      • Google announces another three games confirmed for Stadia

        As Google continue to build up Stadia, they're gradually announcing more games coming and we have another three smaller indie titles now confirmed.

        The first is Cake Bash, arriving on October 15 which is a four player party game where assorted forms of cake beat each other up. It sounds pretty amusing.

    • Desktop Environments/WMs

      • K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt

        • Nuno Pinheir: Week log O€¹

          In a nutshell, did some stuff, then done it again was happy with parts of it, and finaly ended the week on a positive note with a talk on QtCon brazil 2020

        • Maui Weekly Report 6

          Today, we bring you a new report on the Maui Project progress.

    • Distributions

      • Reviews

        • Review: Linuxfx 10.6

          The Linuxfx distribution, which is sometimes referred to as "Windowsfx" on the project's website and in various applications, is based on Linux Mint and appears to one have overarching goal: to look and act as much like Microsoft Windows 10 as possible. The distribution does this by adjusting the desktop, theme, icons, and settings panel to look as much like Microsoft's operating system as possible. The project then adds in WINE, a virtual assistant application, and adjusts application launchers to resemble those used by Windows. Under the hood though Linuxfx is still very much running Linux Mint packages as its base with the Cinnamon desktop environment.

          I was surprised to find the distribution's recent stable release, 10.5, has been removed from the project's download mirrors. The only edition available to me was a new version labablled 10.6 which runs on 64-bit (x86_64) machines exclusively. The download for this live media is 3.8GB in size.

          Note: Following writing this review, just before publication, the Linuxfx team removed the free downloads for version 10.6 (and earlier versions of the distribution) from their website. The distribution is now a commercial offering.

      • New Releases

        • Linux Weekly Roundup #97

          We had another exciting week in the world of Linux Releases with the releases of, Enso 0.4, KaOS 2020.09, EndeavourOS 2020.09.20, Linux Lite 5.2-rc1, Bluestar 5.8.10, and Debian 10.6.

      • BSD

        • Announce: OpenSSH 8.4 released

          It is now possible[1] to perform chosen-prefix attacks against the SHA-1 algorithm for less than USD$50K. For this reason, we will be disabling the "ssh-rsa" public key signature algorithm by default in a near-future release.

          This algorithm is unfortunately still used widely despite the existence of better alternatives, being the only remaining public key signature algorithm specified by the original SSH RFCs.

          The better alternatives include: [...]

        • Default window manager switched to CTWM in NetBSD-current

          For more than 20 years, NetBSD has shipped X11 with the "classic" default window manager of twm. However, it's been showing its age for a long time now.

          In 2015, ctwm was imported, but after that no progress was made. ctwm is a fork of twm with some extra features - the primary advantages are that it's still incredibly lightweight, but highly configurable, and has support for virtual desktops, as well as a NetBSD-compatible license and ongoing development. Thanks to its configuration options, we can provide a default experience that's much more usable to people experienced with other operating systems.

      • Arch Family

      • IBM/Red Hat/Fedora

        • Call an existing REST service with Apache Camel K

          With the release of Apache Camel K, it is possible to create and deploy integrations with existing applications that are quicker and more lightweight than ever. In many cases, calling an existing REST endpoint is the best way to connect a new system to an existing one. Take the example of a cafe serving coffee. What happens when the cafe wants to allow customers to use a delivery service like GrubHub? You would only need to introduce a single Camel K integration to connect the cafe and GrubHub systems.

          In this article, I will show you how to create a Camel K integration that calls an existing REST service and uses its existing data format. For the data format, I have a Maven project configured with Java objects. Ideally, you would have this packaged and available in a Nexus repository. For the purpose of my demonstration, I utilized JitPack, which lets me have my dependency available in a repository directly from my GitHub code. See the GitHub repository associated with this demo for the data format code and directions for getting it into JitPack.

        • Build a data streaming pipeline using Kafka Streams and Quarkus

          In typical data warehousing systems, data is first accumulated and then processed. But with the advent of new technologies, it is now possible to process data as and when it arrives. We call this real-time data processing. In real-time processing, data streams through pipelines; i.e., moving from one system to another. Data gets generated from static sources (like databases) or real-time systems (like transactional applications), and then gets filtered, transformed, and finally stored in a database or pushed to several other systems for further processing. The other systems can then follow the same cycle—i.e., filter, transform, store, or push to other systems.

          In this article, we will build a Quarkus application that streams and processes data in real-time using Kafka Streams. As we go through the example, you will learn how to apply Kafka concepts such as joins, windows, processors, state stores, punctuators, and interactive queries. By the end of the article, you will have the architecture for a realistic data streaming pipeline in Quarkus.

        • Fedora 32 : Can be better? part 012.

          Pidgin is a chat program which lets you log into accounts on multiple chat networks simultaneously. Pidgin can be install on multiple operating systems and platforms. Pidgin is compatible with the following chat networks out of the box: I.R.C., Jabber/XMPP, Bonjour, Gadu-Gadu, IRC, Novell GroupWise Messenger, Lotus Sametime, SILC, SIMPLE, and Zephyr. Can it be better? The only problems a user in need of help may have are in the command line environment. Obviously, in this case, this application cannot be used. I would suggest building a terminal application like WeeChat dedicated to Fedora users and including I.R.C channels. Now, let's install this application.

      • Debian Family

        • Norbert Preining: Cinnamon for Debian – imminent removal from testing

          I have been more or less maintaining Cinnamon now for quite some time, but using it only sporadically due to my switch to KDE/Plasma. Currently, Cinnamon’s cjs package depends on mozjs52, which also is probably going to be orphaned soon. This will precipitate a lot of changes, not the least being Cinnamon being removed from Debian/testing.

        • Cherrytree

          There is a new application available for Sparkers: Cherrytree

    • Devices/Embedded

      • Tiny Rock Pi S SBC gets 802.3af PoE & audio HAT add-on board

        Powered by a Rockchip RK3308 quad-core Cortex-A35 processor, Radxa Rock Pi S single board computer was launched with specifications listing PoE support via an add-on board. Just one little problem though: it was not available for sale.

        The good news is that Radxa has now launched a PoE HAT for the Linux SBC adding support for 802.3af PoE up to 10W input, making it one of the smallest single board computers with PoE support in the world, and adding audio features with a 3.5mm audio jack, and an FPC connector for a microphone array. It can be purchased on Seeed Studio for $13.00.

      • Raspberry Pi: Five handy home office projects to try

        Initially designed as a low-cost computing board for teaching kids to code, the Raspberry Pi has since evolved into a fully fledged PC comfortably capable of replacing your desktop setup. At the same time, the board's legions of dedicated fans have ensured a steady stream of ingenious open-source projects: media center, weather station, virtual assistant, Lego-powered book scanner – if you can imagine it, the chances are it's been done.

        [...]

        Cybersecurity has become a major concern for companies while their employees are working from home, who now have far less visibility on the devices being used to access corporate data. While a Raspberry Pi won't provide the solution for IT admins, it can be modified into a handy network-monitoring tool that will allow you to keep an eye on devices and data connecting to your home network.

      • Iain R. Learmonth: Multicast IPTV

        For almost a decade, I’ve been very slowly making progress on a multicast IPTV system. Recently I’ve made a significant leap forward in this project, and I wanted to write a little on the topic so I’ll have something to look at when I pick this up next. I was aspiring to have a useable system by the end of today, but for a couple of reasons, it wasn’t possible.

        [...]

        The Raspberry Pi devices will run DVBlast, an open-source DVB demultiplexer and streaming server. Each of the tuners will be tuned to a different transponder giving me the ability to stream any combination of available channels simultaneously. This is everything that would be needed to watch TV on PCs on the home network with VLC.

        I’ve not yet worked out if Kodi will accept multicast streams as a TV source, but I do know that Tvheadend will. Tvheadend can also act as a PVR to record programmes for later playback so is useful even if the multicast streams can be viewed directly.

        So how far did I get? I have built two Raspberry Pis in cases with the DVB-T hats on. They need to sit in the lounge as that’s where the antenna comes down from the roof. There’s no wired network connection in the lounge. I planned to use an OpenBSD box as a gateway, bridging the wireless network to a wired network.

      • Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

    • Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

      • 5 ways to conduct user research with an open source mindset

        There are common beliefs about user experiences—the best ones are user-centered, iterative, and intuitive. When user experience (UX) research is conducted, user stories about these experiences are collected—but the research methods chosen inform user experiences, too.

        So, what makes for an engaging research experience, and how can methods evolve alongside products to better connect with users?

        Red Hat's User Experience Design (UXD) research team has the answer: a community-centered, open source mindset.

        As a UX writer on Red Hat's UXD team, I create new design documentation, empower team voices, and share Red Hat's open source story. My passion lies in using content to connect and inspire others. On our Twitter and Medium channels, we share thought leadership about UX writing, research, development, and design, all to amplify and grow our open source community. This community is at the heart of what we do. So when I learned how the research team centers community throughout their user testing, I leaped at the chance to tell their story.

      • Productivity Software/LibreOffice/Calligra

        • LibreOffice 10th Anniversary

          Today is LibreOffice 10th Anniversary: it is a significant achievement for the project, and a date to remember for all community members.

          We have created a video based on pictures of community members and a few events, in two versions: a long one, for blogs and websites, and a short version for social media.

      • CMS

        • What is Odoo? Odoo, More than an ERP Software

          What is Odoo? Odoo is open source business management software. Odoo is web based software. Odoo, formerly known as OpenERP, was a traditional ERP player. In this article, we are going to see Odoo is really more than an ERP Software.

          Things started to change for OpenERP as they built a network of 500+ partners worldwide. In 2013, they beheld 2.000.000 users worldwide backed by a robust open-source community.

      • Programming/Development

        • pkgKitten 0.2.0: Now with tinytest and new docs

          A new release 0.2.0 of pkgKitten just hit on CRAN today, or about eleven months after the previous release.

          This release brings support for tinytest by having pkgKitten::kitten() automagically call tinytest::puppy() if the latter package is installed (and the user did not opt out of calling it). So your newly created minimal package now also uses a wonderful yet tiny testing framework. We also added a new documentation site using the previously tweeted-about wrapper for Material for MkDocs I really dig. And last but not least we switched to BSPM-based Continued Integration (which I wrote about yesterday in R4 #30) and fixed one bug regarding the default NAMESPACE file.

        • Python

          • Add sound to your Python game

            Pygame provides an easy way to integrate sounds into your Python video game. Pygame's mixer module can play one or more sounds on command, and by mixing those sounds together, you can have, for instance, background music playing at the same time you hear the sounds of your hero collecting loot or jumping over enemies.

            It is easy to integrate the mixer module into an existing game, so—rather than giving you code samples showing you exactly where to put them—this article explains the four steps required to get sound in your application.

          • PyDev of the Week: William Cox

            This week we welcome William Cox as our PyDev of the Week. William is a data scientist who has spoken at a few Python conferences. He maintains a blog where you can catch up on what’s new with him

            [...]

            When I was 12 my dad dropped “Teach Yourself Perl in 21 Days” on my desk and said, “you should learn this.” It took me much longer than 21 days, but I’m glad he did that. I dabbled in several languages (PHP, Java, C) but spent many years in graduate school honing my MATLAB skills, due to its powerful plotting and data analysis capabilities. My first job was at a military contractor and they all used MATLAB. This was the early 10’s and Python was really taking off as the language of scientific computing so I was able to convince my boss that it was something I should be learning – he was especially attracted to how much money they could save over thir massive MATLAB bills. I got my 2nd job with my impressive iPython Notebook skills! It was, however, till I started my 2nd job that I finally started learning what it means to write software with a team. It’s a lot different than dabbling on your own.

          • Python Dictionary

            In this post, learn every thing about Python Dictionaries.

        • Perl

  • Leftovers

    • Everyday Threat Modeling

      Don’t ever think you’ve captured all the scenarios, or that you have a perfect model.

      In each of these, and the hundreds of other similar scenarios, go through the methodology. Even if you don’t get to something perfect or precise, you will at least get some clarity in what the problem is and how to think about it.

    • Thirty-Six Hours Past Judgment Day
    • Science

      • As a helium shortage looms, "vacuum balloons" could save physics, medicine, and birthday parties

        While helium is largely used by consumers to fill balloons at parties and events, this only accounts for about 10% of total helium use. It is mostly used for medical and scientific purposes and research and to inflate flying objects like blimps, weather balloons and high-altitude balloons that provide internet access to remote areas. It is also used to produce fiber optic cables and semiconductor chips for phones and other electronics, as well as in its liquid state as a coolant for superconducting magnets.

        Helium, which is a nonrenewable resource extracted from natural gas and has a limited shelf life, has been in short supply in recent years due to the depletion of gas reserves in the US. The shortage has forced scientists to shut down projects and superconducting magnets that rely on helium while party stores that rely on balloon sales have shuttered due in part to the dwindling supply.

    • Health/Nutrition

    • Integrity/Availability

      • Proprietary

        • Pseudo-Open Source

        • Security

          • Microsoft issues warning about actively exploited Zerologon vulnerability in Windows

            It is just days since the CISA (Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency) issued an emergency warning about a critical Windows vulnerability. Now Microsoft has issued a warning that the vulnerability is being actively exploited and the company is "actively tracking threat actor activity".

            The Netlogon EoP vulnerability (CVE-2020-1472) is concerning not just because of its severity, but because of the fact that it can be exploited in a matter of seconds. The security issue affects Windows Server 2008 and above, and enables an attacker to gain admin control of a domain.

          • ARDC sponsors the Reproducible Builds project

            The Reproducible Builds project is pleased to announce a donation from Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) in support of its goals. ARDC’s contribution will propel the Reproducible Builds project’s efforts in ensuring the future health, security and sustainability of our increasingly digital society.

          • Privacy/Surveillance

            • Trump’s TikTok App Download Ban Blocked by Judge

              A U.S. government order banning TikTok from app stores imposed by the Trump administration — which had been set to kick in Sunday, Sept. 27, at midnight ET — was temporarily halted by a federal judge.

              Judge Carl Nichols of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued the ruling Sunday night, granting TikTok’s motion for a preliminary injunction just three and a half hours before the ban was to take effect. Trump appointed Nichols to the federal bench in June 2019.

    • Defence/Aggression

    • Environment

      • Indigenous activist who denounced lack of water murdered in Baja California

        A member of the Kumeyaay indigenous group, Eyraud had been an activist for years, speaking out about issues of ethnicity and environmental injustice, a family member said.

        Last month, Eyraud publicly denounced the lack of water in his community and warned of cultural consequences to come.

        In an interview with the newspaper Reforma in August, conducted in a dried-up field, Eyraud complained that water that should go to indigenous communities to irrigate their crops was being diverted to transnational companies, such as Heineken.

      • Global Plastic
      • What Does Equitable Climate Policy Actually Look Like?

        Back in March, when the pandemic had just planted its roots in the U.S., President Donald Trump directed the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to do something devastating: The agency was to indefinitely and cruelly suspend environmental rule enforcement. The EPA complied, and for just under half a year, it provided over 3,000 waivers that granted facilities clemency from state-level environmental rule compliance.

      • Energy

        • Retirement Fund for Many California Firefighters Battling Wildfires Puts Money in Coal

          Five of the six largest fires to strike California since reliable record-keeping began€ are currently burning according to Cal Fire. Smoke from the fires has already reached the Atlantic coast and turned skies along the West coast eerie shades of orange and red. The fires have killed at least 26 people — and the smoke may have already caused the deaths of an additional 1,200 people, researchers from Stanford University estimated earlier this€ month.

      • Wildlife/Nature

        • Why funnel-web spiders are so dangerous to people

          Except that the venom does not, in general, kill mammals. Dogs, cats, mice, rabbits and guinea pigs all shake it off. It is only human beings and other primates that succumb. And there is another odd thing about it. Funnel-web-spider venom has thousands of components, but delta-hexatoxins, the specific molecules within it that kill people, are produced in particularly large quantities by sexually mature males during the breeding season—a time when they are barely feeding at all.

    • Finance

    • AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

      • Ignorance Is Bliss

        For the trump, are at most minor inconveniences that can always be overcome by rhetoric.

      • Debate Detector: Trump's Top 10 Tricks

        Here's a useful guide to have on hand as the presidential debates get underway.

      • The Coming Civil War Over Trump’s Ego

        The central fight is over Donald J Trump.

      • Yes, There Is Hope

        There are increasing numbers of experiences putting collaborative methods for hope and dialogue into practice.

      • 'A Truly Horrifying Pick': Fury Over Trump Nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to SCOTUS

        "The American people see this rushed process for what it is. An attempt to cement a right-wing supermajority on the highest court in order to dismantle the Affordable Care Act in the middle of a pandemic and overturn Roe v. Wade."

      • From a Justice for Gender Equality to a "Justice" for Gender Oppression

        Amy Coney Barrett and Ruth Bader Ginsburg could not be more different when it comes to their respective notions of justice. Ginsburg, a pioneer in the protection of gender equality, spent her entire career, including 27 years on the Supreme Court, fighting for the rights of women, immigrants, people of color, criminal defendants, LGBTQ people, workers, people with mental disabilities and the poor. Barrett seeks to strip health insurance from tens of millions of people and crush reproductive rights.

      • The Fate of Our Rights Won't Be Determined by Barrett, But by Popular Struggle

        After Mohsin Yafai became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2001, his wife, Zahoor Ahmed, a Yemeni citizen, applied for visas for herself and their children. A consular officer at the Department of Homeland Security denied her visa application, claiming that they tried to “smuggle two children” into the U.S. Ahmed and Yafai provided documentation explaining that the names belonged to two of their children, who had tragically passed while waiting for their visas. However, the government denied the visas again by simply citing the same statute, and Ahmed and Yafai filed a lawsuit. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed their challenge last year in Yafai v. Pompeo. The judge who wrote the decision had been appointed by President Donald Trump in 2017 — Amy Coney Barrett.

      • Progressives Demand Outside Supreme Court: 'No Confirmation Before Inauguration'

        "The people demand that OUR NEEDS ARE MET before the Senate entertains the idea of confirming a new justice days before the most important presidential election of our lifetime."

    • Censorship/Free Speech

      • Paris Attacker Says He Was Targeting 'Charlie Hebdo' Magazine

        He was apparently unaware that the magazine had moved from that location, following a 2015 attack that killed 17 people.

        French authorities launched an anti-terrorism investigation after the attack on Friday.

        In an interview with France 2 television station, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said the attack was "clearly an act of Islamist terrorism." 

    • Monopolies

      • Patents

        • Supreme Court Patent Law 2020: Long Conference Preview

          While the country is still mourning the loss of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and arguing over her replacement, the Supreme Court itself is set to begin its October 2020 term this week. One of the first orders-of-business will be the Long Conference set for September 29, 2020. At that first conference of the term, the court is set to consider the pile of certiorari briefing completed over the summer.

          [...]

          The court has not granted certiorari to any patent cases this term. However, Google LLC v. Oracle America, Inc., No. 18-956 is set for oral arguments on October 7, 2020. The case focuses on copyright protection in functional aspects of software and thus may well impact patent law. In December, the court will hear Facebook v. Duguid. Facebook is arguing that the statutory prohibition on certain debt-collection telephone calls is a violation of its free speech rights. A third case that I am watching is Van Buren v. US, which is set for oral arguments at the end of November. In that case, the question asks “Whether a person who is authorized to access information on a computer for certain purposes violates Section 1030(a)(2) of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act if he accesses the same information for an improper purpose.” Here, Van Buren was a police officer who was running searches on the internal databases for a “friend.”

        • CardieX secures patent in Europe for blood pressure technology

          CardieX subsidiary ATCOR has secured a new patent by the European Patent Office (EPO) for its SphygmoCor technology used in cuff-based blood pressure devices.

          [...]

          Previously, ATCOR was granted similar patents in the US and Japan. The new European patent is valid until 2034.

        • An EPO Case Law Round-Up: Added Matter

          The EPO is well-known for its strict approach to assessing amendments under the added matter provision of Article 123 of the European Patent Convention. This often creates complex legal scenarios which do not exist in other territories, such as the United States.

          Added matter is therefore a hot topic in both prosecution and opposition proceedings in Europe.

        • Record French patent damages; Bayer IP head slams EPO board decision; Blackberry royalties surge; USPTO maintenance fees plummet; Philips goes on US attack; plus much more

          Bayer IP head claims EPO’s Enlarged Board of Appeal got it wrong in recent controversial plant patent ruling, but says the case is now closed and companies must learn to live with it.

        • EPO plant patent decision imperils businesses like ours, says Bayer’s head of IP

          Joerg Thomaier tells IAM that the Enlarged Board of Appeal got it wrong in a recent controversial ruling, but says the case is now closed and companies have to learn...

        • PTAB Denies Broad Motion No. 2 to Substitute the Interference Count

          In the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's decision on motions issued September 10th in Interference No. 106,115 (see "PTAB Decides Parties' Motions in CRISPR Interference") between Senior Party The Broad Institute, Harvard University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (collectively, "Broad") and Junior Party the University of California/Berkeley, the University of Vienna, and Emmanuelle Charpentier (collectively, "CVC") the Board denied Broad's Motion No. 2 to substitute the Count.

          [...]

          The distinction Broad made was between embodiments of CRISPR methods that are limited to "single-molecule guide RNA" (aka "fused" or "covalently linked" species), versus embodiments that encompass single-molecule and "dual molecule" species (wherein in the latter versions, the "targeter-RNA" and "activator-RNA" as recited in the proposed Count are not covalently linked). Broad argued that its Proposed Count 2 should be adopted by the Board because it "properly describes the full scope of the interfering subject matter between the parties because both parties have involved claims that are generic, non-limited RNA claims." The brief also argued that Proposed Count 2 "sets the correct scope of admissible proofs [i.e., their own] for the breakthrough invention described by the generic claims at issue in these proceedings—the successful adaption of CRISPR-Cas9 systems for use in eukaryotic environments," which Broad contended current Court 1 (in either alternative) does not.

          The Board denied this motion for the simple reason that, in its opinion, "Broad fails to provide a sufficient reason why the count should be changed." Citing Louis v. Okada, 59 U.S.P.Q.2d 1073, 1076 (BPAI 2001) (relied upon in opposition by CVC), the Board notes that it will only change the Count when reasons for doing so are "compelling." Broad's motion argued that their claims (and CVC's) were directed to eukaryotic embodiments of CRISPR that were not limited to either single- or dual-molecule RNA species, but that the phrase "guide RNA" was generic. Based on the claim construction, the Board rejected this construction, limiting the claims to single-molecule RNA embodiments.

      • Copyrights

        • Operator of Popcorn Time Information Site Receives Conditional Sentence

          A man arrested in 2015 for running a site that provided information about the Popcorn Time piracy app has been sentenced in Denmark. The 38-year-old received 20 days probation and was subjected to a financial confiscation order after he admitted being criminally complicit in the infringements carried out by ordinary Popcorn Time users.

        • Google Received Copyright Takedown Notices For 3 Million Unique Domains

          Google has reached a new milestone. Over the past several years, copyright holders have asked the search engine to remove URLs from three million unique domains. These include blatant pirate sites such as YTS.mx and Fmovies.to, but also several unusual and innocent targets including Netflix, the BBC, and even the official White House website.



Recent Techrights' Posts

Comparing U.E.F.I. to B.I.O.S. (Bloat and Insecurity to K.I.S.S.)
By Sami Tikkanen
New 'Slides' From Stallman Support (stallmansupport.org) Site
"In celebration of RMS's birthday, we've been playing a bit. We extracted some quotes from the various articles, comments, letters, writings, etc. and put them in the form of a slideshow in the home page."
Thailand: GNU/Linux Up to 6% of Desktops/Laptops, According to statCounter
Desktop Operating System Market Share Thailand
António Campinos is Still 'The Fucking President' (in His Own Words) After a Fake 'Election' in 2022 (He Bribed All the Voters to Keep His Seat)
António Campinos and the Administrative Council, whose delegates he clearly bribed with EPO budget in exchange for votes
Adrian von Bidder, homeworking & Debian unexplained deaths
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Sainsbury’s Epic Downtime Seems to be Microsoft's Fault and Might Even Constitute a Data Breach (Legal Liability)
one of Britain's largest groceries (and beyond) chains
 
People Don't Just Kill Themselves (Same for Other Animals)
And recent reports about Boeing whistleblower John Barnett
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, March 18, 2024
IRC logs for Monday, March 18, 2024
Suicide Cluster Cover-up tactics & Debian exposed
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Gemini Links 19/03/2024: A Society That Lost Focus and Abandoning Social Control Media
Links for the day
Matthias Kirschner, FSFE: Plagiarism & Child labour in YH4F
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Linux Foundation Boasting About Being Connected to Bill Gates
Examples of boasting about the association
Alexandre Oliva's Article on Monstering Cults
"I'm told an earlier draft version of this post got published elsewhere. Please consider this IMHO improved version instead."
[Meme] 'Russian' Elections in Munich (Bavaria, Germany)
fake elections
Sainsbury's to Techrights: Yes, Our Web Site Broke Down, But We Cannot Say Which Part or Why
Windows TCO?
Plagiarism: Axel Beckert (ETH Zurich) & Debian Developer list hacking
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 18/03/2024: Putin Cements Power
Links for the day
Flashback 2003: Debian has always had a toxic culture
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
[Meme] You Know You're Winning the Argument When...
EPO management starts cursing at everybody (which is what's happening)
Catspaw With Attitude
The posts "they" complain about merely point out the facts about this harassment and doxing
'Clown Computing' Businesses Are Waning and the Same Will Happen to 'G.A.I.' Businesses (the 'Hey Hi' Fame)
decrease in "HEY HI" (AI) hype
Free Software Needs Watchdogs, Too
Gentle lapdogs prevent self-regulation and transparency
Matthias Kirschner, FSFE analogous to identity fraud
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Gemini Links 18/03/2024: LLM Inference and Can We Survive Technology?
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, March 17, 2024
IRC logs for Sunday, March 17, 2024
Links 17/03/2024: Microsoft Windows Shoves Ads Into Third-Party Software, More Countries Explore TikTok Ban
Links for the day
Molly Russell suicide & Debian Frans Pop, Lucy Wayland, social media deaths
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Our Plans for Spring
Later this year we turn 18 and a few months from now our IRC community turns 16
Open Invention Network (OIN) Fails to Explain If Linux is Safe From Microsoft's Software Patent Royalties (Charges)
Keith Bergelt has not replied to queries on this very important matter
RedHat.com, Brought to You by Microsoft Staff
This is totally normal, right?
USPTO Corruption: People Who Don't Use Microsoft Will Be Penalised ~$400 for Each Patent Filing
Not joking!
The Hobbyists of Mozilla, Where the CEO is a Bigger Liability Than All Liabilities Combined
the hobbyist in chief earns much more than colleagues, to say the least; the number quadrupled in a matter of years
Jim Zemlin Says Linux Foundation Should Combat Fraud Together With the Gates Foundation. Maybe They Should Start With Jim's Wife.
There's a class action lawsuit for securities fraud
Not About Linux at All!
nobody bothers with the site anymore; it's marketing, and now even Linux
Links 17/03/2024: Abuses Against Human Rights, Tesla Settlement (and Crash)
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, March 16, 2024
IRC logs for Saturday, March 16, 2024
Under Taliban, GNU/Linux Share Nearly Doubled in Afghanistan, Windows Sank From About 90% to 68.5%
Suffice to say, we're not meaning to imply Taliban is "good"
Debian aggression: woman asked about her profession
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Gemini Links 17/03/2024: Winter Can't Hurt Us Anymore and Playstation Plus
Links for the day