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Links 11/05/2022: NVIDIA Shifting a Bit to Software Freedom



  • GNU/Linux

    • Audiocasts/Shows

      • VideoUS Begins Massive Crackdown On Piracy Sites - Invidious

        Streaming sites promised to be this incredibly convenient tool to watch media but everybody got greedy and piracy is on the rise again but it will get much harder as time goes on especially as governments start to build regulation for an internet connected world.

      • Jupiter BroadcastingLinux Action News 240

        NVIDIA has announced its plans for an open-source GPU driver. Christian Schaller, the Director for Desktop, Graphics, Infotainment and more at Red Hat, gives us the inside scoop on this historic announcement.

      • LHS Episode #466: HamAnon

        Hello and welcome to the 466th installment of Linux in the Ham Shack. In this short-topics episode, we discuss the ARDC's grant program for amateur radio clubs, the Hamvention mega prize, privacy in ham radio, Pop! OS, Fedora 26, Ubuntu 22.04 and a little bit about Hamshack Hotline. Thanks for listening and have a great week.

      • FLOSS Weekly 680: Asahi Linux on M1 Hardware - Hector Martin, Linux on Macs

        Hector Martin of Asahi Linux schools Doc Searls and Jonathan Bennett with a massive sum of fresh, deep and interesting facts about Apple's new M1 hardware, and Asahi's promise and progress toward doing everything on it.

      • Linux Made SimpleFedora 36

        Today we are looking at Fedora 36. It comes with Gnome 42, Linux kernel 5.17, and uses about 1.5GB of ram when idling.

      • VideoFedora 36 Run Through - Invidious

        In this video, we are looking at Fedora 36.

      • Video: Red Hat Summit Day 1 Keynote
      • Video: Red Hat Summit Day 2 Keynote
    • Kernel Space

      • Graphics Stack

        • NVIDIA Releases Open-Source GPU Kernel Modules

          NVIDIA is now publishing Linux GPU kernel modules as open source with dual GPL/MIT license, starting with the R515 driver release. You can find the source code for these kernel modules in the NVIDIA Open GPU Kernel Modules repo on GitHub.

          This release is a significant step toward improving the experience of using NVIDIA GPUs in Linux, for tighter integration with the OS and for developers to debug, integrate, and contribute back. For Linux distribution providers, the open-source modules increase ease of use. They also improve the out-of-the-box user experience to sign and distribute the NVIDIA GPU driver. Canonical and SUSE are able to immediately package the open kernel modules with Ubuntu and SUSE Linux Enterprise Distributions.

          Developers can trace into code paths and see how kernel event scheduling is interacting with their workload for faster root cause debugging. In addition, enterprise software developers can now integrate the driver seamlessly into the customized Linux kernel configured for their project.

        • Christian Schaller: Why is the open source driver release from NVidia so important for Linux?

          Today NVidia announced that they are releasing an open source kernel driver for their GPUs, so I want to share with you some background information and how this will impact Linux graphics and compute going forward.

          One thing many people are not aware of is that Red Hat is the only Linux OS company who has a strong presence in the Linux compute and graphics engineering space. There are of course a lot of other people working in the space too, like engineers working for Intel, AMD and NVidia or people working for consultancy companies like Collabora or individual community members, but Red Hat as an OS integration company has been very active on trying to ensure we have a maintainable and shared upstream open source stack. This engineering presence is also what has allowed us to move important technologies forward, like getting hiDPI support for Linux some years ago, or working with NVidia to get glvnd implemented to remove a pain point for our users when it came to the NVidia driver and Mesa fighting over the OpenGL driver .so file. We see ourselves as the open source community’s partner here, fighting to keep the linux graphics stack coherent and maintainable and as a partner for the hardware OEMs to work with when they need help pushing major new initiatives around GPUs for Linux forward. And as the only linux vendor with a significant engineering footprint in GPUs we have been working closely with NVidia for a couple of years now trying to help prepare the ground for NVidia moving to a model with an open source kernel driver. An effort that has now borne fruits in terms of todays announcement from NVidia about releasing an out of tree kernel driver for their GPU. People like Kevin Martin, the manager for our GPU technologies team, Ben Skeggs the maintainer of Nouveau and Dave Airlie, the upstream kernel maintainer for the graphics subsystem, Nouveau contributor Karol Herbst and our accelerator lead Tom Rix have all taken part in meetings, code reviews and discussions on how to make this happen with NVidia over the last Month. So let me talk a little about what this release means (and also what it doesn’t mean) and what we hope to see come out of this long term.

        • 9to5LinuxNVIDIA Finally Releases Open-Source Linux GPU Kernel Modules

          NVIDIA today announced that they have started publishing their GPU kernel modules for Linux systems as open-source on GitHub as a first towards providing the community with an open NVIDIA graphics driver.

          The open-source Linux GPU kernel modules have a dual GPL/MIT license and they will be available starting with the upcoming NVIDIA 515.x.x series of their proprietary graphics driver, which entered public beta testing today with an updated installer, updated RTD3 video memory utilization threshold, improved Vulkan support, updated NVIDIA X Server Settings, and other changes.

          As you can expect, NVIDIA open-sourcing their Linux GPU kernel modules will open the door to new contributions from the Linux community to make the NVIDIA graphics driver usable on more systems and to provide users with an out-of-the-box user experience, with Canonical, Red Hat, and SUSE as the first Open Source companies to package the new open-source GPU kernel modules for their Ubuntu, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and SUSE Linux Enterprise distributions.

    • Applications

      • Docker Desktop for Linux Available to Download

        Docker Desktop for Linux Available to Download, A proverb says: Better late than never. Docker complied and Docker Desktop for Linux, complementing Docker Desktop for Mac and Windows. This was the second most requested developer request on Docker’s roadmap.

      • MedevelLios is properly the best open-source Linux OCR

        Lios stands for "Linux-Intelligent-Ocr-Solution" which is an open-source, free OCR solution that converts any text in image, PDF into a readable text.

        Lios is a free and open source software for converting prints to text using either a scanner or a camera. It supports multiple languages out-of-the-box, without the need to install or configure any.

      • MedevelTantivy is a lightweight full-text search engine

        It is closer to Apache Lucene than to Elasticsearch or Apache Solr in the sense it is not an off-the-shelf search engine server, but rather a crate that can be used to build such a search engine.

      • MedevelOrange is an open-source fast desktop search engine

        Orange is a super lightweight open-source desktop search engine that allows you to search for and inside your local files and folders.

        Its compact tiny size because it is written using Tauri; a revolutionary Rust-based framework for building desktop using web technologies.

    • Instructionals/Technical

      • Linux JournalHow to Use the VI Editor in Linux | Linux Journal

        If you’re searching for info related to the VI editor, this article is for you. So, what’s VI editor? VI is a text editor that’s screen-oriented and the most popular in the Linux world. The reasons for its popularity are 1) availability for almost all Linux distros, 2) VI works the same throughout multiple platforms, and 3) its user-friendly features. Currently, VI Improved or VIM is the most used advanced counterpart of VI.

        To work on the VI text editor, you have to know how to use the VI editor in Linux. Let’s find it out from this article.

      • Tutorial To Install Cockpit On Ubuntu 22.04 LTS

        Cockpit is a free and open-source web-based graphical interface for servers. If you are not comfortable with the command-line interface in Linux-based servers then you can use Cockpit to manage your server.

      • TechRepublicHow to deploy the Apache Solr enterprise-grade search platform on Ubuntu Server 22.04 | TechRepublic

        If you have massive amounts of data to be searched, Apache Solr might be exactly what you need. Jack Wallen shows you how to deploy this useful tool.

      • LinuxiacHow to Install Docker Desktop on Ubuntu: A Step-by-Step Guide

        Docker Desktop is now available for all developers using a Linux desktop environment. Here’s how to install Docker Desktop on Ubuntu.

        Linux support for Docker Desktop has been the most requested feature among the Docker community for 12 months. In response to these needs, Docker Inc. announces at DockerCon 2022, its annual conference, that Docker Desktop is now available for Linux.

        Initially, Docker Desktop’s Linux version is designed for Ubuntu, Debian, and Fedora.

        Some Linux developers who have only used Docker Engine may be unaware of Docker Desktop, so let’s go over what Docker Desktop is.

      • Linux Made SimpleHow to install Rig of Rods on a Chromebook



        Today we are looking at how to install Rig of Rods on a Chromebook. Please follow the video/audio guide as a tutorial where we explain the process step by step and use the commands below.

      • ZDNetKeep tabs on your Linux servers from macOS with Servercat | ZDNet

        If you work with Linux servers, then you'd probably like to keep track of those machines from a single location. However, you probably don't want to install a challenging application or service to make this happen.

      • Network WorldDemystifying &&, ||, and ! on Linux | Network World

        &&, || and ! operators can run tests and take actions based on the test results, but they can be a little tricky until you understand the logic.

      • HowTo ForgeHow to Install KVM Libvirt Virtualization on OpenSUSE
    • Distributions

      • Arch Family

        • TechRadarBest Arch-based Linux Distros Of 2022

          The best Arch-based Linux distros provide impressive customizability. Arch adheres to a rolling release model, which means you can install it once and keep updating it till eternity.

          For all its advantages, Arch remains one of the most cumbersome distros to configure and install. In fact, even though the installation process is one of the best documented ones, it’s elaborate and involved enough to scare away everyone except hardcore geeks.

      • Debian Family

        • Sexism processing travel reimbursement

          According to the DebConf travel funding rules, volunteers need to buy their own tickets and then wait for a reimbursement to come later.

          For DebConf18 (Taiwan) and DebConf19 (Brazil), some of the Albanian women asked to have the tickets purchased in advance. Debian changed the rules for these women but not for anybody else.

      • Canonical/Ubuntu Family

    • Devices/Embedded

    • Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

      • Web Browsers

        • Mozilla

          • Thunderbird7 Great New Features Coming To Thunderbird 102

            Welcome back to the Thunderbird blog! We’re really energized about our major 2022 release and cannot wait to put it in your hands. Thunderbird 102 includes several major new features for our global community of users, and we’re confident you’ll love them. So grab your favorite beverage, and let’s highlight seven features from Thunderbird 102 we’re most excited about.

      • FSF

        • Licensing/Legal

          • A Federal Hearing about Rights under GPL - Conservancy Blog - Software Freedom Conservancy

            In our previous update regarding our copyleft enforcement lawsuit against Vizio, we talked about how Vizio “removed” the case to USA federal court (namely, the Central District of California), and how we filed a motion to “remand” the case back to state court. While this all seems like minor legal wrangling early in a case, this very first skirmish in our case goes to the very heart of the right for software repair for consumers. While it won't be a final decision in the case, this motion will be the first indication whether the federal courts view the GPL as purely a copyright license, or as a contract, or as both. That question has been central to legal debate about the GPL for decades, and, thanks to our case, for the first time, a federal Court will directly consider this question.

            Our view (and the view of many attorneys whose opinions we trust) and which is supported by substantial case law, is that the GPL functions as both a copyright license and a contract, and that third parties who receive distribution of GPL'd (and LGPL'd) software are third-party beneficiaries. We've done both copyright-based and contract-based enforcement, and both have their advantages. Contract-based enforcement as a third-party has advantages that are central to the GPL's policy goals. Consumers are the first to discover violations in the first place. Consumers are the most likely to utilize complete, corresponding source code (CCS) to enhance their use of the products they have purchased. Third-party, contractual based enforcement gives consumers legal authority when they ask companies for access to the source code that should be available to them. In other words, this approach gives consumers the ability to ask the Court directly for the most important thing that copyleft assures: a right to receive the CCS and “the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the executable”. Indeed, in our suit we have asked only for access to the source code, not for any money.

      • Programming/Development

        • TechCrunchGoogle’s Flutter 3 adds support for macOS and Linux desktop apps
        • 9to5GoogleFlutter 3 brings Linux and macOS apps, Material You, more - 9to5Google

          Flutter, Google’s massive cross-platform app development framework, has reached version 3, bringing Material You, Linux, & macOS support, and more.

        • Perl/Raku

          • PerlMy Favorite Modules: Errno

            The open or die idiom is fairly ubiquitous in Perl. To be useful, the exception should say something about what went wrong: open ... or die "Open error: $!", for example.

            The $! built-in variable (a.k.a. $ERRNO or $OS_ERROR if use English; is in effect) gives you access to the C language errno variable, which through the magic of Perl interpolates an error message appropriate to the error given.

            But there are times when some error analysis is in order. Fortunately, $! is a dualvar, so if you access it in numeric context rather than string context, you get the actual numeric value of the error code. But for both portability and maintainability you don't want to compare $! to a numeric literal. Thus, Errno.

        • Python

          • Python Software Foundation News: The 2022 Python Language Summit

            Every year, just before the start of PyCon US, around 30 core developers, triagers, and special guests gather for the Python Language Summit: an all-day event of talks where the future direction of Python is discussed. The summit in 2022 was the first in-person summit since 2019, due to disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic in 2020-21.

          • LWNThe 2022 Python Language Summit (PSF blog) [LWN.net]

            Over on the Python Software Foundation (PSF) blog, Alex Waygood has a report from this year's Python Language Summit. There are reports from each of the nine sessions, including "Python without the GIL", The 'Faster CPython' project: 3.12 and beyond", "F-Strings in the grammar", lightning talks, and more.

  • Leftovers

    • Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

      • Public KnowledgePublic Knowledge Cheers Senate Confirmation of Alvaro Bedoya As FTC Commissioner - Public Knowledge

        Today, the U.S. Senate voted to confirm Alvaro Bedoya as a Commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission. Mr. Bedoya has long been a powerful advocate for consumers and a trailblazing professor. Public Knowledge proudly welcomes this consumer champion to the FTC.

        The following can be attributed to Charlotte Slaiman, Competition Policy Director at Public Knowledge:

        “Congratulations to Alvaro Bedoya, who has now cleared his final hurdle to become an FTC Commissioner. Bedoya’s perspective, expertise, and experience will be a crucial addition to the Commission. I know we can trust Commissioner Bedoya to stand up to powerful corporations and look out for the interests of the most vulnerable.



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