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Links 19/9/2021: Sparky 2021.09, Whisker Menu 2.6.0, HarfBuzz 3.0, and gThumb 3.12



  • GNU/Linux

    • Linux Weekly Roundup #148

      We had a busy week in the world of Linux Releases with Bluestar Linux 5.14.2, Manjaro 21.1.3, Ubuntu 18.04.6. and SparkyLinux 2021.09. Kdenlive 5.23 Beta, has also been released.

      As I mentioned last week, we are closing in to the 150 release of this weekly roundup, and I plan, to celebrate it, a bit more background about me and how I started to use Linux in 2013. If it might be interesting for you?

    • Audiocasts/Shows

    • Kernel Space

      • That Didn't Take Long: KSMBD In-Kernel File Server Already Needs Important Security Fix - Phoronix

        It was just a few weeks back that KSMBD was merged into Linux 5.15 while now it's seeing its first important security fix.

        When KSMBD as an in-kernel SMB3 file server was first talked about, many expressed concerns in the name of security even though NFS exists within the kernel, etc. This weekend's security vulnerability for KSMBD is an issue leading to files outside of the SMB3 file share being accessible to clients...

      • Linux 5.16 To Support Sensor Readings On More ASUS Motherboards - Phoronix

        With a change to the nct6775 hardware monitoring sensor driver, more ASUS motherboards should enjoy working sensor support come Linux 5.16.

        The changed queued up this week via the "HWMON" hardware monitoring subsystem's "for-next" branch for Linux 5.16 allows the nct6775 driver to access the ASIC using ASUS WMI functions. The driver's existing functionality doesn't work on ASUS motherboards since ACPI marks the I/O port as used so instead the ASUS WMI functions will be used in such case.

      • Graphics Stack

        • An OpenCL frontend written in Rust is being developed for Mesa

          Red Hat’s Karol Herbst, who is involved in the development of Mesa, the Nouveau driver, and the OpenCL open stack, has published rusticl , an experimental software implementation of OpenCL (OpenCL frontend) for Mesa written in Rust. Rusticl acts as an analogue of the frontend already present in Mesa OpenCL Clover and is also developed using the interface provided in Mesa Gallium .

          The development was presented on September 17 at the conference XDC 2021 (X.Org Developers Conference). The goal of the development was to study Rust, work out the best ways to integrate Rust into Mesa, try out creating API implementations in another language, and test the compatibility of Rust components with the rest of the C code. Development is not yet fully completed – CL CTS tests related to copying, reading and writing buffers are already successfully running, but compiler integration is not yet provided and there is no support for external crate packages in the build system. To generate bindings for Mesa and OpenCL, allowing cause Rust-functions in C code and vice versa, is involved rust-bindgen .

    • Applications

      • The 7 Best RSS Feed Readers for Linux

        RSS or Really Simple Syndication is a web feed that keeps you up to date with the latest updates from your favorite websites on the internet. However, to read these feeds, you need what's called an RSS reader.

        An RSS reader is a feed curator, which aggregates content from your favorite sources on the internet and organizes it into a digestible feed, so you don't have to visit those sources manually to keep up with what's new.

        If you're on Linux, here are our picks for the best RSS feed reader apps you can use to improve your content consumption.

      • gThumb 3.12 Released with HEIF/HEIC & AVIF Image Support

        AVIF and HEIF images can now be opened and edited in gThumb, the open source photo manager for Linux desktops.

        The new gThumb 3.12 release includes the ability to load .avif, .heif (including Apple’s .heic) and .jxl images, as well as the ability to save images in the .avif format.

      • New tag management capabilities, usability improvements, and a bunch of fixes — Kalendar devlog 15 – Stuff I wrote down

        This week, we have once again included a big number of little UI changes that should make Kalendar easier to use and prettier to look at than ever.

        Building upon our tag work from last week, we have also made tags far more feature complete this week. Let’s take a look!

      • HarfBuzz 3.0 Released With Unicode 14.0 Support, More APIs Considered Stable - Phoronix

        HarfBuzz 3.0 has been released as a new version of this widely-used, open-source text shaping library that is used by the major Linux desktop environments along with Chrome OS, Java, Android, Chrome, and a plethora of other software projects and UI toolkits.

      • Whisker Menu 2.6.0 released

        Whisker Menu is an alternate application launcher for Xfce. When you open it you are shown a list of applications you have marked as favorites. You can browse through all of your installed applications by clicking on the category buttons on the side. Top level categories make browsing fast, and simple to switch between. Additionally, Whisker Menu keeps a list of the last ten applications that you’ve launched from it.

        Favorites are easy to add and reorder. When browsing through your applications, right-click on any of them and select “Add to Favorites”. Simply drag and drop your favorites list to arrange them to suit your needs. You can remove them at any time from another right-click option.

        If you’re not sure exactly where a program is listed, instead of browsing through each category you can simply enter a search term. The search field is focused when opening the menu, so you can just start typing. Application descriptions as well as names are searched, which allows you to find a program by using a general word (such as “browser” to find all web browsers installed on your computer).

    • Instructionals/Technical

      • The Best Ways to Know Which Process Listening on a Specified Port

        A port is a communication endpoint. At the software level, within an operating system, a port is a logical construct that identifies a specific process or a type of network service. A port is identified for each transport protocol and address combination by a 16-bit unsigned number, known as the port number. The most common transport protocols that use port numbers are the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the User Datagram Protocol (UDP).

        Also port is a logical entity that represents an endpoint of communication and is associated with a given process or service in an operating system. In previous articles, we explained how to find out the list of all open ports in Linux and how to check if remote ports are reachable using the Netcat command.

      • How to install Skype on Linux Lite 5.4 - Invidious [Ed: Microsoft turned it into NSA spyware by changing the topology]

        In this video, we are looking at how to install Skype on Linux Lite 5.4. Enjoy!

      • Ventoy: How to Create a Multiboot USB Drive with Multiple ISO Files

        With Ventoy, you don’t need to format the USB drive for each new installation, you just need to copy the ISO file to the USB drive and boot it.

        Whenever you want to try a new Linux distribution, you download the ISO image from the distributions website and write this to your USB flash drive using the dd command or with the help of some other tool, such as Balena Etcher.

      • Introduction to Ngrok: A Tutorial for Beginners

        If you are into web development, at times, you might have wondered how people on a different network can access your locally hosted website. Say you are developing a website for a client on your PC, and you want them to view it and track the progress without you having to host it online. If so, Ngrok is the perfect solution for you to do that.

        Ngrok is a dev tool to that allows you to expose a server running on your local machine to the internet. In this tutorial we’ll go through how to use the Ngrok utility from installation to deploying an HTML or a React JS website, on a Linux machine.

      • Creating Quality Backtraces for Crash Reports – Michael Catanzaro's Blog



        Hello Linux users! Help developers help you: include a quality backtraces taken with gdb each and every time you create an issue report for a crash. If you don’t, most developers will request that you provide a backtrace, then ignore your issue until you manage to figure out how to do so. Save us the trouble and just provide the backtrace with your initial report, so everything goes smoother. (Backtraces are often called “stack traces.” They are the same thing.)

        Don’t just copy the lower-quality backtrace you see in your system journal into your issue report. That’s a lot better than nothing, but if you really want the crash to be fixed, you should provide the developers with a higher-quality backtrace from gdb. Don’t know how to get a quality backtrace with gdb? Read on.

      • Set up Virtual Box on top of Server F35 (pre release) via rpmfusion (VENV)

        First I've installed the most recent nightly build of Fedora 35 Server on Fedora 34 Bare metal KVM Virthost as Guest OS with "Fedora Workstation" desktop, like virtual machine seating on the Linux bridge been created via Web Cockpit Console. When done issued the following set of commands on F35 Guest...

      • Feeding Dinosaurs: Keeping Ancient HP LaserJets alive

        The world’s first laser printer was built by Gary Starkweather at Xerox PARC in 1971, hooking up a Xerox photocopier and an early Xerox computer. The first commercial laser printers were huge data-center-scale monsters, the IBM 3800 and the Xerox 9700. It took most of a decade, and the crossover from cameras to computers by Canon, for the laser printer to become affordable for home and small…

      • Using RADIUS For WLAN Authentication, Part II - Wi-FiPlanet.com

        There’s a lot of RADIUS options, from doing it yourself, to skipping it, to outsourcing. We invesitigate them all and put a focus on what it takes to outsource with a service like WSC Guard.

        [...]

        Install an Open Source RADIUS Server: If you’re not a Windows shop and have a penchant for breaking your knuckles on open source code, you may want to check out FreeRADIUS. This 802.1X-capable open source Server is still beta code, so caveat emptor. To go this route, you’ll need spare time, UN*X know-how, and a box running Linux, Free or OpenBSD, OSF/Unix, or Solaris to host your Server.

      • IPRoyal Proxy Testing: How It Works

        A proxy is an essential tool for online privacy and security. But not every proxy is created equal, and not all offer the same protections. How can you distinguish a high-quality proxy from standard mediocrity? It’s critical to examine your proxy to ensure that you’re getting the performance and security that you expect.

        This article will delve into the details of proxy testing and how to verify that your proxy is up to the task of keeping you safe.

      • Here’s how to boot Microsoft’s own Linux distribution: CBL-Mariner [Ed: Why would anyone want Microsoft in control of one's Linux?]
      • How to install Rocky Linux 8 on Amazon AWS Ec2 Instance - Linux Shout

        Rocky Linux 8 is the latest Linux operating system to replace CentOS 8 but with long-term support that has been dropped by its parent company RedHat. Hence, if you are an Amazon cloud user and want to start with Rocky Linux then here are the steps to install it on AWS Ec2 Instance.

      • How to tweet from the Linux Command Line

        Today there are many Twitter clients available for Ubuntu, but if you are someone who prefers to use a CLI to view and share tweets from Ubuntu , this article is for you.

        Using the terminal makes certain tasks more efficient and even faster than a graphical interface. This is because the command line tools do not use too many resources , making them a great alternative to graphical applications, especially if you use older hardware.

        You will see below how any user can tweet directly from the Ubuntu command line through the Rainbow Stream application. In order to carry out the whole process, you will learn how to install the application by giving it access to use your Twitter account before starting to tweet through it.

      • How To Install Apache Flink on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS - idroot

        In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Apache Flink on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. For those of you who didn’t know, Apache Flink is a framework and distributed processing engine for stateful computations over unbounded and bounded data streams. Flink has been designed to run in all common cluster environments, perform computations at in-memory speed and at any scale. Apache Flink provides data-source and sink connectors to systems such as Amazon Kinesis, Apache Kafka, Alluxio, HDFS, Apache Cassandra, and ElasticSearch where Apache Flink does not provide its own data-storage system.

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

    • Games

      • SB Game Hacker APK Download 2021 – #1 Game Hacker App

        The best source of entertainment these days are Android games since we have moved on streaming web series season one by one. These series are endless and the drawback is that we need to wait for a lot of time for the next one to show up. What we love about these games is their petite size, unique privileges as well as and exclusive premium plan. We get addicted to these games once we begin playing. This is where SB Game Hacker APK download 2021 is useful for your phone.

    • Desktop Environments/WMs

      • K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt

        • Testing and Download the KDE Plasma 5.23 Beta Desktop Environment

          A available beta version of the custom Plasma 5.23 shell is for testing. You can test the new release through the Live build from the openSUSE project and the build from the project KDE Neon Testing edition . Packages for various distributions can be found on this page . The release is expected on October 12th.

        • Spyware: KDE Plasma, like Gnome, the anti-FOSS eye-candy blackmail

          The terminology used by such corporations is very deceptive on its own. Spying on the user and collecting data without really his conscious consent, is just spying. Whether you call it telemetry, or user feedback, or kuserfeedback-1.0.0, it is still spying. The software that is written for spying is called spyware. ms-Windows users pay dearly to other spyware sellers to clean their machines from spyware. While you are at it, looking at the source, also take a look at Ksystemstats as well.

          So what distributions promote and co-sign the safety of using free open software that are spyware?

          Better ask which distributions DON’T and will come out saying it that they condemn such practices and the use of such software.

          Why is this so important? Why is it that you, or anyone else, gave up on closed source non-free non-libre software to come to Linux or BSD, or Solaris, ot any unix?

          Exactly! This crap doesn’t belong in linux or any computer. If you volunteer to provide your data or report a bug with your own intention and choice, that is different, than some sub-system in the background copying and feeding your data to some datacenter KDE/plasma has setup to do data-mining.

          Alternatively someone can criticize us being superficial and hypocritical, because KDE has the decency to advertise they are officially doing this, while others are doing it secretly. We are not all knowing all catching of all problems and issues on FOSS, we report on what we find important.

    • Distributions

      • 12 Best alternatives to replace Windows 10 to some extent

        It is undeniable that Windows 10 captures the largest market for operating systems in computer users. But if you’re considering getting windows 10 then you need to also consider other alternatives which also give a good user experience and an easy-to-access interface. Below is the list of best alternatives to Windows 10.

      • Arch Family

        • The 8 Best Arch-Based Linux Distributions

          Arch Linux’s flexibility and customization options make it a primary choice of an operating system for Linux users. The performance-boosting features of Arch make it an absolute delight for the end-users.

          If you are battling with Arch’s complex installation procedure, you can always delve deeper into how Arch-based distros work and then take it on from there.

          Here are a few top choices of Linux distros for Arch lovers who want to make the most out of this flexible operating system.

      • IBM/Red Hat/Fedora

      • Debian Family

        • Sparky 2021.09

          Sparky 2021.09 of the (semi-)rolling line is out; it is based on Debian testing “Bookworm”.

          Changes: – repositories set to Debian “Bookworm” and Sparky “Orion Belt” – all packages updated as of September 17, 2021 – new backgrounds: desktop, login manager, plymouth & boot screen, etc. – Linux kernel 5.10.46 (5.14.6 & 5.15-rc1 in Sparky unstable repos) – GCC 10 still as default, but GCC 11 is also installed – no more Sparky Advanced Installed GUI; the Advanced installer works in text mode only now; the first window lets you choose the standard version of the installer or DEV version with disk encryption and LVM support; – ‘sparky-upgrade’ text based tool is also preinstalled in CLI iso – packages removed from iso: mc, gparted – new package installed: lfm – Calamares 3.2.43

        • SparkyLinux 2021.09 Rolling Paves the Way for Debian Bookworm-Based SparkyLinux 7 “Orion Belt”

          SparkyLinux 2021.09 is the first release in the semi-rolling line to move to the new upstream Debian Testing repositories, which are now prepared for the next major release of one of the oldest and most acclaimed GNU/Linux distributions, Debian GNU/Linux 12 “Bookworm.”

          As such, SparkyLinux 2021.09 is here to pave the way for the next major stable series of the Debian-based distro, SparkyLinux 7.0 “Orion Belt,” which will be based on the Debian GNU/Linux 12 “Bookworm” series.

        • Ben Hutchings: Debian LTS work, August 2021



          In August I was assigned 13.25 hours of work by Freexian's Debian LTS initiative and carried over 6 hours from earlier months. I worked 1.25 hours and will carry over the remainder.

          I attended an LTS team meeting, and wrote my report for July 2021, but did not work on any updates.

        • SFSget improved and folder hierarchy reconsidered

          Just a short note, that I have been working on "sfsget", the SFS downloader and installer. Various refinements, including much more aware of installing to the main desktop instead of as a container. This revamp was triggered with Chromium, which is not really suitable for running in a container. It has its own sandbox, which is effectively a container. Easy Containers are "crippled root" and the Chromium sandbox does not work in a container -- it would be a sandbox-within-a-sandbox. So Chromium would have to run with "--no-sandbox" in a container.

      • Canonical/Ubuntu Family

    • Devices/Embedded

    • Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

      • SaaS/Back End/Databases

        • SD Times news digest: Android for Cars App Library 1.1, MariaDB announces a technical preview of NoSQL listener capability, and Rezilion funding - SD Times

          MariaDB released the technical preview of the NoSQL listener capability to define a port and protocol pair that accept client connections to a service.

          “We’ve opened up a port on MaxScale to listen for traffic that contains NoSQL data that we then store and manage in a MariaDB database,” Rob Hedgpeth, Director, Developer Relations at MariaDB, wrote in a blog post.

          When the MongoDB client application issues MongoDB protocol commands, either directly or indirectly via the client library, they are transparently converted into the equivalent SQL and executed against the MariaDB backend. The MariaDB responses are then in turn converted into the format expected by the MongoDB client library and application.

      • FSF

        • GNU Projects

          • GIMP 2.10.28 Released! How to Install via PPA in Ubuntu 20.04

            GIMP announced the 2.10.28 release of the popular image editor. The release includes mainly bug-fixes and stability improvements.

            The source tarball of version 2.10.26 is available to download 2 weeks ago. Due to a build bug, the project team skipped it and announced GIMP 2.10.28 as the latest stable release with fixes.

          • Weekly recap — 19 September 2021

            This is a brown paper bag release: 2.10.26 was inadvertently released with a tiny annoying bug, so the team skipped that version entirely. Either way, if you are a Windows user, I definitely recommend upgrading.

            This version comes with a bunch of fixes for this platform, especially for cases when GIMP used to be slow with a network drive being temporarily unavailable (not GIMP’s fault, but rather a 3rd party component used by the program).

            In other news, GIMP 2.99.x now has a Preferences switch between various Windows APIs for graphic tablets support, thanks to Luca Bacci. Basically, this means support for more tablets. Oh, and Jehan’s patch to support cloning on multiple layers at once has been merged and will be part of 2.99.8, hopefully in the coming October.

      • Programming/Development

        • Rust

          • The future of Rust

            Despite its name, the Rust programming language has never looked so shiny and new. Way back in 2016, Stack Overflow’s annual survey of developers crowned Rust the “most loved” programming language. They voted their love again in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021. Presumably, when 2022 rolls around, that devotion to Rust will persist.

        • Java

          • All the changes between JDK 11 and the Java 17 LTS release

            If you were to look at the features in Java 17, the most recent long-term support (LTS) release from Oracle, you’d probably be disappointed. There’s only 14 JDK enhancement proposals (JEP) included in the release, and none of them are particularly exciting. In fact, some of the JEPs are downright depressing, such as the deprecation of the Applet API for removal or the removal of the experimental AOT and JIT compilers.

            There are no ‘big bang’ JDK releases anymore. In the past, there would be a highly anticipated feature such as Java modules or Lambda expressions that would delay a release until the feature was complete. The Java world doesn’t work like that anymore. Releases now happen every six months. If a feature is complete, it goes into the release. If not, it gets targeted to the next release. But a new release happens every six months, and feature enhancements happen incrementally over time. So if you want to know what’s new in the latest LTS release, you really need to look over the various changes that were made and enhancements that were added between Java 11 and 17. Starting with Java 12, here is a list of them:

  • Leftovers

    • Integrity/Availability

    • Environment

    • Finance

    • AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

    • Monopolies

      • Patents

        • Wait To Rule On Hirshfeld's Arthrex Authority, Fed. Circ. Told

          The Federal Circuit should hold off on deciding whether acting U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director Drew Hirshfeld has the authority to review Patent Trial and Appeal Board decisions, the agency said Wednesday, saying any challenge to its procedures was still "premature."

          Earlier this month, Vilox Technologies Inc. urged the appeals court to remand a Patent Trial and Appeal Board ruling that invalidated a data display patent challenged by Unified Patents under the U.S. Supreme Court's Arthrex ruling, which held that PTAB judges were unconstitutional and that giving the USPTO director the authority to review the board's rulings fixes the problem....

        • How Koh might sway SEP law and cut backlogs at Ninth Circuit

          Seven IP lawyers say the judge from California’s northern district court would change the appellate venue for the better if her nomination went through, this time

        • European Biotech Patent Law Webinar [Ed: Giant patent litigation firm pushing for patents on life and nature in Europe]

          D Young & Co will be offering its next European biotech patent law update on September 21, 2021. The webinar will be offered at three times: 9:00 am, noon, and 5:00 pm (BST). D Young & Co European Patent Attorneys Simon O'Brien and Antony Latham will provide an update of new and important EPO biotechnology patent case law.

        • FCBA Remote Program on Gender Inequality Among Federal Circuit Advocates [Ed: Misusing feminism to make lobbyists [1, 2] seem beneficial or benign]

          The Federal Circuit Bar Association (FCBA) Rules, Nexgen, and Diversity Committees will be offering a remote program entitled "Gender Inequality Among Federal Circuit Advocates" on September 23, 2021 from 4:00 pm to 5:00 pm (ET). Jenny Wu of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP will moderate a panel consisting of Paul R. Gugliuzza and Rachel Rebouche of Temple University Beasley School of Law, Heidi Keefe of Cooley LLP, and Neema Kumar of Sandoz. The panel will discuss a recent empirical study regarding gender disparity among the advocates who appear before the Federal Circuit in its patent cases and discuss what can be done to improve diversity in patent litigation.

        • Program Commemorating 10th Anniversary of America Invents Act [Ed: This was a step in the right direction for the USPTO, but corrupt Trump with his longtime ally Iancu worked to sabotage this progress]

          The US*MADE Coalition and Alliance for Automotive Innovation will be hosting an in-person and virtual program "Honoring the 10th Anniversary of the America Invents Act" from 12:30 pm to 2:00 pm (ET) on September 22, 2021. The event will take place at the Ballroom at the Reserve Officers Association in Washington, DC.

        • Op Ed: Reflections on the American Invents Act on its Tenth Year Anniversary [Ed: So Michelle Lee now works for Jeff Bezos. Talk about revolving doors...]

          The America Invents Act (AIA), which passed on September 16, 2011, brought about some of the most significant changes to our patent system in over 50 years. The Act included an assortment of reforms from a transition to first inventor to file in the United States, the establishment of processes for third party challenges to granted patents at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), the creation of the first regional offices of the USPTO, providing inventors the option for accelerated patent examination, and more.

          Many of the AIA reforms strengthened our patent system. For example, as a former Director of the USPTO, I cannot overstate the importance of the Agency’s ability to set its own fees and create an operating reserve. This enabled the USPTO to get through periods of government shutdown and to invest in longer-term initiatives such as much-needed information technology upgrades, hire more examiners to reduce the patent application backlog and provide additional training for examiners. The transition to a first inventor to file system was needed to harmonize the U.S. with the rest of the world. The establishment of the first regional offices of the USPTO made our intellectual property system more accessible to all, and of course, prioritized examination, allowing inventors to accelerate the examination of certain patents, makes business sense.

          After passage by Congress, the attention turned to the USPTO, and its massive effort to implement the AIA. Then-USPTO Director David Kappos and his dedicated team at the Agency worked hard to implement the AIA in view of numerous proposed rules, soliciting input from stakeholders along the way. By 2013, the USPTO had completed substantially most of the initial AIA rulemaking, including for the post-patent grant review proceedings.

          In 2015, I became Director of the USPTO, and the AIA changes had been in place for barely a few years. Leading the USPTO is a great honor that comes with a tremendous responsibility. As a result, I undertook as a priority to assess how these fledgling and complex reforms were going, and to make improvements where needed. Under my leadership, the USPTO continued to solicit feedback on the AIA reforms via numerous requests for comments to proposed rules and stakeholder engagements. This resulted in the implementation of multiple changes, including to the claim construction standard of soon-to-expire patents to be consistent with the (Phillips) standard used in district court litigation, submission of new testimonial evidence with a patent owner’s preliminary response, the addition of a Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11-type certifications requiring a duty of candor in papers filed in AIA trials to prevent misuse of the proceedings, and more.

        • U.S. Says It Supports a Covid Vaccine Patent Waiver, But Document Reveals It Is Dragging Feet at WTO [Ed: Nations governed by patent cartels that willingly kill millions of people, needlessly, just to artificially inflate the prices of needles with juice in them]

          On September 14, the United States declined to support as-is a proposal at the World Trade Organization (WTO), put forward by South Africa and India in October 2020, to suspend key intellectual property rules that relate to the Covid-19 vaccine. While the United States expressed frustration about ​“lost momentum” around negotiations over the intellectual property waiver, global health advocates say they are disappointed that the Biden administration has declined to take an active role in pushing such negotiations forward. The developments come despite the Biden’s administration’s much lauded pledge that it supports waiving intellectual property rules for Covid-19 vaccines. ​“This is a global health crisis, and the extraordinary circumstances of the Covid-19 pandemic call for extraordinary measures,” U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said on May 5. ​“The Administration believes strongly in intellectual property protections, but in service of ending this pandemic, supports the waiver of those protections for Covid-19 vaccines. We will actively participate in text-based negotiations at the World Trade Organization needed to make that happen.”

        • Design Patent Term: 3€½, 7, 14, and now 15 years? [Ed: Zero. Design patents ought not exist at all. They're already covered by trademarks.]

          New design patents have a term of 15 years from patent issuance — that is a 1 year bump from the 14 year term familiar to many patent attorneys. The straight 14-year term took hold in 1982. In the years leading up to 1982, most design patents also had a 14 year term, but applicants had the option of instead obtaining a term of 7 years or 3€½ years at a lower fee. In 1980, all design patents had an application fee of $20, and the issuance fee was $10, $20, or $30, depending upon whether the applicant wanted 3€½, 7, or 14 years of patent term. In 1930, the prices were $10, $15, and $20.

        • Software Patents

          • Dallas Invents: 143 Patents Granted for Week of Aug 31 [Ed: Lots of these are just bogus software patents which courts (or PTAB) would toss out]

            Dallas Invents is a weekly look at U.S. patents granted with a connection to the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metro area. Listings include patents granted to local assignees and/or those with a North Texas inventor. Patent activity can be an indicator of future economic growth, as well as the development of emerging markets and talent attraction. By tracking both inventors and assignees in the region, we aim to provide a broader view of the region’s inventive activity. Listings are organized by Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC).

          • Parus Files Second Patent Lawsuit Against Apple for Infringement of its Proprietary Voice-Browsing and Device Control Technology
          • PTAB Affirms Patentability of Parus Claims

            Parus Holdings, Inc., a pioneer in voice-enabled technologies, is pleased to announce today that it has won an important victory against Apple in a patent dispute over its voice-user interface technologies for retrieving information. The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected in its entirety Apple's attempt to invalidate key Parus patents.

      • Trademarks

        • Mariah Carey can't sell 'Black Irish' in Ireland due to earlier patent [Ed: Fantastic example of the mischievous, lying "IP" crowd (litigation profiteers) leaving people totally incapable of telling the difference between patents and trademarks, which are very different]

          Singer Mariah Carey is not able to sell her new liquor, called Black Irish, in Ireland or the EU because the name has been previously patented by an Irish company.

          Carrie said the name was derived from her father, who is Black, and her mother's Irish heritage.

          For more than a year, Carey's Irish cream liqueur has sought to use the Black Irish name, but been barred because Darker Still Spirits, an Irish liquor company, owns the name Black Irish European.

          Richard Ryan, co-director of Darker Still, is critical of Carey's continually trying to use the name.



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Jeff Geerling Shocked to Discover Many Metrics in YouTube Are Fake (His Audience Turns Out to be Much Smaller)
Maybe self-host all videos, don't rely on Google's "FOMO" cheating (addiction based on false assumptions)
 
Links 09/09/2025: “Torrents of Hate” and Political Crisis in France
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/09/2025: "Dedigitizing" and Forgejo on FreeBSD
Links for the day
Google News (Not Just Google Search) Lets Itself by Gamed by One Slopfarm - to the Point Almost Half of "Linux" News is Bot-Produced Plagiarism (LLM Slop With Slop Images)
That says a lot about what Google thinks of quality, even in Google News
Bill Gates-Funded Media Inadvertently Refutes the Microsoft Lie That in 2025 Microsoft Had Just Two Waves of Layoffs
There were about 12 rounds of layoffs so far in 2025
From theregister.co.uk to theregister.com (US) to The Register MS (Run by Microsoft Operatives) and theregister.ai
The best way to break this racket (or cycle of hype and harm) is to break the chains of funding
Open Source Initiative (OSI) Culture of Censorship Necessitates More Speech
The OSI bans dissent or people who merely point out that the OSI is abusive
How to Reach Us Discreetly (Other Than Encrypted E-mail)
We're still managing to maintain a 100% source protection record. We soon turn 19.
LLMs Are Vastly Worse Than a Waste of Energy and the Externalities Are Huge
Worse than just higher power bills for everybody
LLMs Versus Search (Not Replacing Search But Engaging in DDoS Attacks Against Web Sites That Permit Searching)
The state of the Web isn't just bad; it's utterly terrible
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, September 08, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, September 08, 2025
The UEFI 9/11 - Part IX - Shunning Old Computers (in 2023 the Certificate Was Updated/Overridden, Underlying Aim May Be Herding/Forcing People to Get TPM and Other 'Novel' Restrictions)
the "upgrade treadmill"
Rumour: Second Wave of Microsoft Mass Layoffs in September to Commence Third Week of September
That basically answers questions like, "Any specific date or time of the month?"
Gemini Links 08/09/2025: Reality, ROOPHLOCH 2025, and Writing Another Gemini Client
Links for the day
Updating Firmware is Not the Solution But Only Additional Risk, Disable "Secure Boot" Today
firmware blobs are buggy, secret, impossible to audit, and barely tested
Microsoft Tim's DevClass (Part of The Register MS/Situation Publishing) is Full of Slop
Looking at many sites that are full of slop images is becoming an eye sore and hallmark of text too likely generated by LLMs or 'assisted' (tainted) by them
Microsoft Trying to Fake Demand for Slop. At What Cost?
That's a giant demotion and broken promises
Sunlight is the Best Disinfectant and Kryptonite/Garlic to Vampires
Transparency (sometimes described by words like "Sunlight" or "Truth") is paramount
The Register MS Uses Slop in Articles About Slop
we are fairly certain it's slop or CG based on other people's work
Visiting a Web Page or a Public URL Should be Safe, Predictable, and Benign
It's probably too late to "fix" the Web
The Register MS (Situation Publishing) is Paid to Spread Mindless Hype for the "Hey Hi" Ponzi Scheme and That's a Serious Problem
"Sponsored by Zoom."
Links 08/09/2025: Burger King Cracked, Cox v. Sony Analysed
Links for the day
Gemini Links 08/09/2025: Socialist Computer Museum and GAFAM/ByteDance/TikTok-Dominated Net
Links for the day
Links 08/09/2025: Tim Crook Disappoints Apple Faithfuls and Zuckerberg Lies (Financial Fraud) for Cheeto King
Links for the day
EPO Workers Point Out that the EPO is Destroying the Planet Under the Guise of "Hey Hi" (It Also Grants Many Invalid Patents Illegally
On 12 March and 16 June 2025, staff representation met with the administration in the Local Occupational Health, Safety and Ergonomics Committee (LOHSEC) in Munich
Turn Off Microsoft's Restricted Boot ("Secure Boot")
We're still running a series on this issue
Social Control Media Sites Have Become Bot Farms (Not Limited to LLMs and Automation)
linkedin.com was nothing but trouble and losses for Microsoft
Deep in Debt With the Magnitude of Losses Quickly Growing, Microsoft "Open" "Hey Hi" Now Uses Broadcom for Vapourware, Pretending It'll Do OK Next Year
At some stage it'll collapse
You Can Tell Microsoft is in Trouble When Its Own Fans and Staff Blast it
"Microsoft sinks billions into chasing artificial intelligence fads to hype up its share price."
Multiple Undersea Cable Cuts and We're Still OK
Microsoft customers experience problems
Lawyers Who Think They Are Online Assassins Don't Deserve a Licence to Operate
they've become a laughing stock in their "sector"
Microsoft Windows Fell to 3.9% "Market Share" in Bahamas
Based on statCounter
How the European Union (EU) Fell Out of Love With Free/Libre Software
Lots of bribery
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, September 07, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, September 07, 2025
Gemini Links 07/09/2025: Scanner, Slop, and Chadobear
Links for the day
The UEFI 9/11 is 3 Days Away
Nobody denies that bad things will happen
Google Versus Journalism
Google played a big role in the demise of news sites
Gemini Links 07/09/2025: Advertising, Decentralized Archival, and Outsourcing to Bezos
Links for the day
Certificate Authority Let's Encrypt Has Almost Gone Down to Zero, Nearly Totally Extinct in Geminispace, the Few Capsules Still Using It Are Spam/Dead/Stagnant
This represents another decrease for Let's Encrypt; the last decrease was last week
Not Much Left in News Cycles
To be very clear, this does not describe "Linux" anything; it's true in just about every facet of news, except the paid-for fake "journalism" about "hey hi" (sites getting paid explicitly to maintain or rekindle hype)
Trying to Silence Techrights Was a Huge Mistake
Peter Thiel attacked a publisher for asserting, correctly, that he was gay. Now everyone knows it.
Throwing Away "Old" Computers (Mozilla and Other Climate Deniers)
Mozilla is not leftist
The UEFI 9/11 - Part VIII - Denial of Service and Selling Us WSL (Windows) Instead of "Risky" (Prone by Breakage by Microsoft) GNU/Linux
Restricted Boot (so-called 'SecureBoot') does not improve security. It is nothing but trouble. It's meant to trouble non-Windows users. In dual-boot setups, SecureBoot is a recipe for disaster because Microsoft keeps erasing or tampering with the boot sector, to paraphrase an associate
Slop is Extremely Rare in Geminispace, Slop Images Are Unheard Of (Despite Images Being Supported)
As long as Geminispace grows in terms of domains it's safe to predict the protocol will still be used in 2029 and hence Geminispace will turn 10
Links 07/09/2025: Robodebt Class Action, Fines, and Copyright Settlement
Links for the day
Links 07/09/2025: Yle Impersonated in Social Control Media, Boat-Attacking Orcas, Midjourney Sued Again
Links for the day
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, Linux Journal, and the Serial Slopper
Google won't tackle the issue because Google participates not only in relaying slop but also in generating lots of it
Links 07/09/2025: Google Fines in EU and "Your Internet Access Is at Risk"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/09/2025: Little Brother and Corporate Theatre
Links for the day
Links 07/09/2025: More Harms of Slop and Anthropic's Nightmare Scenario (Huge Legal Liabilities for Slop)
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, September 06, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, September 06, 2025