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Links 20/12/2022: Kodi Nexus RC 1 and $96+ Banana Pi



  • GNU/Linux

    • Chris HannahOne of Those Linux Evenings

      It's an interesting story, and he takes you through the various stages of the debugging process. But I had to share the part where he eventually discovered the fix on an online forum: [...]

    • Server

      • Kubernetes BlogKubernetes 1.26: Introducing Validating Admission Policies | Kubernetes

        In Kubernetes 1.26, the 1st alpha release of validating admission policies is available!

        Validating admission policies use the Common Expression Language (CEL) to offer a declarative, in-process alternative to validating admission webhooks.

        CEL was first introduced to Kubernetes for the Validation rules for CustomResourceDefinitions. This enhancement expands the use of CEL in Kubernetes to support a far wider range of admission use cases.

        Admission webhooks can be burdensome to develop and operate. Webhook developers must implement and maintain a webhook binary to handle admission requests. Also, admission webhooks are complex to operate. Each webhook must be deployed, monitored and have a well defined upgrade and rollback plan. To make matters worse, if a webhook times out or becomes unavailable, the Kubernetes control plane can become unavailable. This enhancement avoids much of this complexity of admission webhooks by embedding CEL expressions into Kubernetes resources instead of calling out to a remote webhook binary.

    • Audiocasts/Shows

      • David RevoyOverview of my Krita Digital Painting Workflow − end 2022 - David Revoy

        These steps make it easier to make my Digital Painting at the end of 2022, and you'll see many of my artworks with a similar process: a large sketch or storyboard, then a thin temporary line-art, then a silhouette on multi layer, then a color flat, a shading and to finish with a paint-over and post-effect. This is a tutorial doesn't dive into the details, but keeps an overview of the workflow, the goal is to give an idea of the full path and to give tips on the way. I hope showing my recipe will inspire you to start a drawing to test something you'll find interesting and find your own path.

      • Late Night Linux – Episode 208 - Late Night Linux

        It’s our 2022 in review episode which features Linux in space, gaming wins and fails, Raspberry Pi drama, the year of user-facing AI, Canonical and Microsoft, the rise of Mastodon, and more.

      • VideoThe SCREEN Act and Why It is the WRONG Solution - Invidious

        Today we talk about the newly proposed SCREEN act and why it is not a good solution to protecting kids online.

    • Graphics Stack

      • Khronos Group Welcomes Inseye as Associate Member
      • Khronos Finalizes Vulkan Video Extensions for Accelerated H.264 and H.265 Decode

        In April 2021, the Vulkan€® Working Group at Khronos€® released a set of provisional extensions , collectively called ‘Vulkan Video’, for seamlessly integrating hardware-accelerated video compression and decompression into the Vulkan API. Today, Khronos is releasing finalized extensions that incorporate industry feedback and expose core and decode Vulkan Video functionality to provide fully accelerated H.264 and H.265 decode.

      • CollaboraJason Ekstrand is a 2022 Khronie Award recipient! [Ed: Awards from corporations to corporations]

        With such a talented team contributing to various realms of software development, it is a gratifying moment when one of our teammates receives recognition. This year, our fellow colleague Jason Ekstrand is the recipient of a Khronie Award from the Khronos Group!

        "The Khronie Awards are presented to individuals who have made significant contributions in advancing the work of Khronos Working Groups towards their goals."

    • Applications

      • OpenSource.comExplore the features of the Linux Double Commander file manager | Opensource.com

        Double Commander is a graphical dual-pane file manager for Linux, in the tradition of Midnight Commander (mc). While Midnight Commander (like the DOS application Norton Commander before it) has its fans, its audience is limited by the fact that it only runs in a terminal window. Not everyone wants to use a "flat" interface embedded in a terminal to browse their file system, and so Double Commander provides a similar interface in a way that feels familiar to many desktop users.

      • Kodi FoundationKodi Nexus RC 1

        Here we go folks, ramping things up and we have the first Release Candidate (RC) for Kodi "Nexus".

        As always, thanks go out to all contributors for their work. We are nearing 4,000 commits since v19 "Matrix" was first released on February 19th 2021. For everyone that has contributed, both those in Team Kodi and all other devs that choose to roll up their sleeves and fix an issue. Everyone appreciates you for making Kodi better.

        We also want to thank all those users who provide endless support on the forums, we appreciate you, and all the support anyone provides to our users.

    • Instructionals/Technical

      • TecAdmindf Command - Check Disk Space in Linux - TecAdmin

        Do you use Linux? If so, then you know that it is a powerful operating system with a lot of tools and options to help you manage your system. One of the most useful tools that Linux provides is the df command, which allows you to check your disk space. In this blog, we will take a look at how to use the df command to check your disk space in Linux.

      • TecMint30 Most Commonly Asked Linux Interview Questions

        If you have already achieved your Linux certification and are looking forward to securing a Linux job, it pays a great deal to prepare for an interview that tests your knowledge of the ins and outs of Linux.

        In this guide, we present to you some of the most commonly asked questions in Linux interviews and answers.

      • It's FOSSHow to Downgrade Flatpak Packages in Linux - It’s FOSS

        Technically, minor or point release updates are released to solve issues. But things may get worse when some updates break your current workflow.

        Whether a Flatpak package or Snap, everything breaks at some point when there is an issue. Being a sandboxed packaging solution, it may not affect the entire system, but if you encounter a bug that makes your app experience worse, you may regret the update.

        For example, the previous update of Black Box was bundled with certain bugs, and I could not select text! Developers have solved this issue now, but until they did not, I downgraded that specific package to make things work.

      • nixCraftHow to add Mastodon verification for the Discourse forum

        Discourse is a free and open-source Internet forum software. Mastodon is also free and open-source software for running self-hosted social networking services such as Twitter. Let us see how to add a Mastodon verification link to your forum. Here is how it looks when verification is done correctly:

      • DebugPointHow to Find Out Ubuntu Version: 6 Methods

        A simple guide, showing five methods to find the installed Ubuntu version of your desktop and servers via GUI and CLI methods.

        Usually, if you are well-known about the Ubuntu release cycle, you probably know what Ubuntu desktop or server version you are running in your system. Generally, there are two Ubuntu versions per year and one LTS (long-term support) version every two years.

        Having said that, it’s always a good idea to check what version you are running for development projects and compatibilities. Here’s how to find the Ubuntu version.

      • “most” is an advanced alternative for the less command

        The pager programs like more, less, and “most” are often used to fit the output of a particular command that is too big to fit on one screen. So, what is the difference between them?

      • DebugPointLinux Command Learning Series#4: How to Find Out Ubuntu Version: 6 Methods

        Usually, if you are well-known about the Ubuntu release cycle, you probably know what Ubuntu desktop or server version you are running in your system. Generally, there are two Ubuntu versions per year and one LTS (long-term support) version every two years.

        Having said that, it's always a good idea to check what version you are running for development projects and compatibilities. Here's how to find the Ubuntu version.

      • Linux CapableHow to Install Linux Kernel 6.1 on CentOS Stream EL9/EL8

        On December 11, 2022, Linux Kernel 6.1 was released with a significant new addition – initial Rust language support in mainline Kernel. Users of CentOS Stream 9 or 8 may find upgrading to the latest Kernel will bring better performance due to hardware possibly not supported on the existing Kernel or through improvements in code on existing hardware support, amongst other features. The following tutorial will teach you how to upgrade your Linux Kernel using the ELRepo repository.

      • IT Pro TodayHow to Use AppImage to Distribute Software on Linux

        The open source AppImage tool enables developers to make their Linux software available for all Linux distributions. Here's a look at how AppImage works.

      • VMware vSphere Virtual Machine Snapshots Explained - buildVirtual

        VMware snapshots are a feature in VMware virtualization software that allows administrators to create a point-in-time copy of a virtual machine (VM). Snapshots allow administrators to roll back the VM to a previous state if something goes wrong.

      • UNIX CopHow To Install Glances on Ubuntu 20.04 | 22.04 LTS

        Glances is a cross-platform system monitoring tool written in Python. Glances is developed by an awesome community. If you want to join us, please open|find an opened issue scheduled in the next release. Add a simple message in the issue to inform the community that you want to contribute.

      • UNIX CopHow To Install BleachBit on Ubuntu 20.04 | 22.04 LTS

        BleachBit is a free and open-source disk space cleaner, privacy manager, and computer system optimizer. The BleachBit source code is licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3.

        It can do identifying and removing Web cache, HTTP cookies, URL history, temporary files log files and Flash cookies for Firefox, Opera, Safari, APT and Google Chrome

      • UNIX CopHow To Install gThumb on Ubuntu 20.04 | 22.04 LTS

        In this small guide, we will show you how to install gThumb on Ubuntu systems.

        gThumb is a free and open-source image viewer and image organizer with options to edit images. It is designed to have a clean and simple user interface and follows GNOME HIG, it integrates well with the GNOME desktop environment.

      • UNIX CopHow To Install TagSpaces on Ubuntu 20.04 | 22.04 LTS

        In this guide, we will show you how to install TagSpaces on Ubuntu systems

        TagSpaces is an open-source data manager and file navigator. It helps organize files on local drives by adding tags to files. Users get the same user interface to manage their files on different platforms. TagSpaces is compatible with Windows, Linux, Mac, Android, iPhone, Firefox and Chrome. The application requires neither internet connection, nor user’s registration to run both on desktop and portable devices.

      • UNIX CopHow to install Shotwell on Ubuntu 20.04 | 22.04 LTS

        In this guide, we will show you how to install Shotwell on Ubuntu systems.

        Shotwell is an image organizer designed to provide personal photo management for the GNOME desktop environment. In 2010, it replaced F-Spot as the standard image tool for several GNOME-based Linux distributions, including Fedora in version 13 and Ubuntu in its 10.10 Maverick Meerkat release.

      • UNIX CopHow To Install Chkrootkit on Ubuntu 20.04 | 22.04 LTS

        In this guide, we will show you how to install Chkrootkit in Ubuntu systems.

        chkrootkit (Check Rootkit) is a common Unix-based program intended to help system administrators check their system for known rootkits. It is a shell script using common UNIX/Linux tools like the strings and grep commands to search core system programs for signatures and for comparing a traversal of the /proc filesystem with the output of the ps (process status) command to look for discrepancies.

      • DebugPointWriting a Macro in LibreOffice Calc: Getting Started

        Planning to automate stuff in LibreOffice? Start writing your first LibreOffice Calc macro using this guide.

        LibreOffice provides a way to write your macro to automate various repetitive tasks in your office application. You can use Python or basic for your macro development. This tutorial focuses on writing a macro in LibreOffice with a ‘Hello World’ macro in the Basic programming language.

      • TecAdminThe stream or file "/var/www/html/storage/logs/laravel.log" could not be opened: failed to open stream: Permission denied - TecAdmin

        One of my Laravel applications started showing the following error after I restarted the instance.

      • Linux CapableHow to Install EPEL on CentOS Stream EL9/EL8

        EPEL, which stands for Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux, is an open-source and free repository that provides extra packages for Enterprise Linux which can be beneficial on CentOS Stream 9 or 8 distributions. The following tutorial will teach you how to install and enable EPEL on your CentOS Stream system.

      • Linux CapableHow to Increase DNF Speed on Rocky Linux EL9/EL8

        DNF is a package manager for RPM-based distributions such as CentOS Stream, Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), and Rocky Linux. The following tutorial will cover how to increase DNF performance, centering around download speed by adding parallel downloads and configuring the fastest mirrors.

      • Linux Shell TipsDNF vs YUM Commands: What's the Difference?

        This article guide explains the nature and differences between the Yum package manager and the DNF package manager in Fedora and Red Hat-based Linux distributions.

        The first step to being a Linux user is choosing a preferred Linux operating system distribution. A key identifier in each Linux distribution is the package manager used to perform operating system tasks like installing, updating, upgrading, and removing packages or software collections.

        Some popular package managers include APT (Advanced Packaging Tool) for Debian and Ubuntu distributions, ZYPPER for SUSE Linux Enterprise, and PACMAN for Arch Linux distribution.

    • Desktop Environments/WMs

      • GNOME Desktop/GTK

        • GStreamer 1.20.5 stable bug fix release

          The GStreamer team is pleased to announce another bug fix release in the stable 1.20 release series of your favourite cross-platform multimedia framework!

          This release only contains bug fixes. It should be safe to update from 1.20.x.

  • Distributions and Operating Systems

    • Fedora and Red Hat

      • Fedora ProjectMy Experience as a Fedora Intern - Fedora Community Blog



        As my internship with Fedora comes to an end, I reflect on my experiences over the past five months. I began my internship in May, applying to a Community Architect position posted through Red Hat. I was unfamiliar with the Fedora community, but was eager to learn and contribute to the communities. Marie Nordin, the former Fedora Community Action and Impact Coordinator guided me the whole way. She taught me about the passion and enthusiasm the open source community respects within community involvement.

        Marie and I began the internship preparing for the summer’s Fedora Hatch events. We put together promotional content for the Hatches taking place around the globe. Marie guided me through the process of ensure each Hatch was properly promoted. I communicated with the organizers to ensure that the promotional tweets and Community Blog posts were all agreed upon. The Hatches allowed me to acquaint myself with the involved Fedora contributors. This allowed me to feel more confident and comfortable within the community.

      • Red HatGitOps Cookbook: Kubernetes automation in practice | Red Hat Developer

        With the advent of practices such as infrastructure as code (IaC), software development has pushed the boundaries of platforms where you can run applications. This becomes more frequent with programmable, API-driven platforms such as public clouds and open source infrastructure solutions. While some years ago developers were only focusing on application source code, today they also have the opportunity to code the infrastructure where their application will run. This gives control and enables automation, which significantly reduces lead time.

        A good example is with Kubernetes, a popular open source container workload orchestration platform and the de facto standard for running production applications, either on public or private clouds. The openness and extensibility of the platform enables automation, which reduces risks of delivery and increases service quality. Furthermore, this powerful paradigm is extended by another increasingly popular approach called GitOps.

      • Red HatStream processing with ksqlDB in OpenShift Streams for Apache Kafka | Red Hat Developer

        This is the first article in a three-part regarding existing solutions to manipulate Kafka stream data with SQL, the well-known query language widely used to manipulate relational databases.

      • Red HatHow to contribute to LLVM | Red Hat Developer

        LLVM is a collection of compiler toolchain technologies that underpins many modern programming languages, including Rust, Julia, and Swift. The LLVM community is welcoming to new contributors and a great place to get into compiler development.

        This article is a fairly detailed guide for LLVM contributions. Generally speaking, it's fine to just put up a patch, and somebody will be happy to guide you through the more idiosyncratic parts of the LLVM contribution process. However, a lot of the early patch review feedback tends to be the same, and this article should help you avoid some of the common issues.

      • A quarter on the Red Hat OSCI and Testing Farm team - Martin Pitt

        For the last quarter I have worked in Red Hat’s Testing Farm (TFT) and “Operating System CI” (OSCI) and teams, on a temporary rotation. TFT develops and runs the Testing Farm (TF) infrastructure, an API which you tell “go run a test with $these parameters, it allocates a bunch of cloud instances, sets them up, runs your test, and returns the result. OSCI builds upon this to implement Fedora’s and RHEL’s gating tests for package updates, image builds, upgrades, and so on. Everytime you look at Fedora’s bodhi and see these, you are looking at results provided by these teams...

    • Debian Family

    • Devices/Embedded

      • CNX Software$96+ Banana Pi BPI-M2S Amlogic A311D/S922X SBC offers dual GbE, optional PoE and WiFi 5

        The company provides more information and Android 9, Ubuntu 20.04, and Debian 10 OS images in the wiki. But note that, as usual, some of the information is wrong or incomplete, for instance, they shamelessly copied the preliminary specifications from the first CNX Software article, which stated there are three buttons based on the 3D renders, while there are now only two buttons following a small design change, and did not update the info. Also worth noting is that the Linux BSP hosted on GitHub relies on U-boot 2015.1 & Linux kernel 4.9.236.

    • Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

  • Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

    • Web Browsers/Web Servers

      • Mozilla

        • Installing Windows (2022) | Will's Blog

          I work at Mozilla. We get a laptop refresh periodically. I got a new laptop that I was going to replace my older laptop with. I'm a software engineer and I work on services that are built using Docker and tooling that runs on Linux.

          This post covers my attempt at setting up a Windows laptop for software development for the projects I work on after having spent the last 20 years predominantly using Linux and Linux-like environments.

          Spoiler: This is a failed attempt and I gave up and stuck with Linux.

        • The Register UKGoogle, Mozilla to collaborate with Apple on fresh Webkit browser benchmark [Ed: Mozilla does not compete with Google, it works for Google; sort of like Canonical and Microsoft]

          Apple, Google and Mozilla are teaming up to develop a new version of the Speedometer browser benchmark that they say will score web browser performance in a novel way: one that reflects user journeys, not under-the-hood streamlining.

          Speedometer was originally released in 2014 by Apple's WebKit team and measures web app responsiveness; version 2 was released in 2018. The WebKit, Chrome and Mozilla Developer teams confirmed in tweets they're now collaborating on version 3.

          The Speedometer project's page states that its goal is to build a benchmark in which higher scores indicate an actual user benefit. "Historically benchmarks haven't done a great job at this and have actively competed for attention with the needs of real sites," Mozilla's developer account said in a tweet.

          Speedometer originally included implementations of todo apps in vanilla Javascript as well as the Ember, Backbone, AngularJS, jQuery, Flight and React frameworks. Version 2 added support for additional modern JavaScript frameworks and libraries.

    • FSFE

      • FSFEFSFE is hiring an office coordinator [Ed: They still say "Free Software Foundation Europe" despite trademark issues (the FSF does not like this)]

        We are looking for an office coordinator for 25-35 hours per week in our Berlin office. As part of our office management team you will be the administrative backbone of our operations. Our ideal candidate has experience as an office administrator, secretary, event organiser, or another relevant administrative role.

    • Programming/Development

      • Daniel MiesslerWould You Put AI Art In Your House?

        What about you? Does your brain instantly rebel against this idea? And if so, do you think there’s a justifiable reason? Or are you letting society tell you what to like? If you have a real reason this isn’t real art I’m willing to be that kind of enthusiast. But it’d have to be a real reason, not one based on gatekeeping or peer pressure.

      • BootlinUpdated Buildroot support for STM32MP1 platforms, ST BSP v4.1 - Bootlin's blog

        Back in December 2021, we announced the buildroot-external-st project, which is an extension of the Buildroot build system with ready-to-use configurations for the STMicroelectronics STM32MP1 platforms. Later on, in July 2022, we updated it to the lastest Buildroot LTS 2022.02 and version 4.0 of ST BSP version.

        More specifically, this project is a BR2_EXTERNAL repository for Buildroot, with a number of defconfigs that allow to quickly build embedded Linux systems for the STM32MP1 Discovery Kit platforms. It’s a great way to get started with Buildroot on those platforms.

      • KDABThe Top 100 QML Resources by KDAB

        If you’re a reader of this blog, you probably know that we have a huge amount of quality material on QML and Qt Quick, among other topics. In fact, there is so much material that it can be hard to find what you need.

        If that sounds familiar, you’ll want to bookmark this page! This blog captures a snapshot of the top 100 resources we offer on QML and Qt Quick. This mix of blogs, instructional videos, and other resources has been organized into simple, easy-to-understand categories with simple descriptions added when necessary.

      • Perl / Raku

        • RakulangDay 20: Sigils are an underappreciated programming technology - Raku Advent Calendar

          Sigils – those odd, non-alphabetic prefix characters that many programmers associate with Bash scripting; the  $  in  echo $USER  – have a bit of a bad reputation. Some programmers view them as “old fashioned”, perhaps because sigils are used in several languages that first gained popularity last millennium (e.g. BASIC, Bash, Perl, and PHP). Other programmers just view sigils as rather pointless, as “just a way of encoding type information” in variable names – basically a glorified version of apps Hungarian notation (which isn’t even the good kind of Hungarian notation).

          Maybe sigils served a purpose in the bad old days, these critics say, but modern IDEs and editors give us all the type information we could want, and these tools have made sigils obsolete. Now that we have VS Code, we don’t have any reason to take the risk that someone might use sigils to write code that bears a suspicious resemblance to line noise, or perhaps to an extremely angry comic strip character.

        • Rakulang2022.51 Hijacking D3 - Rakudo Weekly News

          Anton Antonov has published another video, this time about their excellent new module Javascript::D3 to create beautiful graphs with Raku in Jupyter notebooks, or just even in HTML. It also comes with a blog post and comments on /r/rakulang. Check it out!

      • Python

        • Didier StevensNew tool: teeplus.py

          This new tool, teeplus.py, is an extension of the tee command.

          The tools takes (binary) data from stdin, and sends it to stdout, while also writing the data to a file on disk.

          While the tee command requires a filename as argument, teeplus.py takes no arguments (only options).

        • AdafruitThe Python on Hardware Newsletter: Over10k subscribers, subscribe now! #CircuitPython #Python #RaspberryPi @micropython @ThePSF

          The Python on Microcontrollers newsletter is the place for the latest news involving Python on hardware (microcontrollers AND single board computers like Raspberry Pi).

        • OpenSource.comHow I use Artipie, a PyPI repo | Opensource.com

          While developing with Python as a student, I found that I needed some private centralized storage. This was so I could store binary and text data files, as well as Python packages. I found the answer in Artipie, an open source self-hosted software repository manager.

          At university, my colleagues and I conducted research and worked with a lot of data from experimental measurements. I used Python to process and visualize them. My university colleagues at the time were mathematicians and didn't have experience with software development techniques. They usually just passed data and code on a flash drive or over email. My efforts to introduce them to a versioning system like Git were unsuccessful.

        • Linux HintSciPy Differential Evolution

          This article is about SciPy Differential Evolution (DE). SciPy is the library of the Python language, and Differential Evolution is the method or function of the SciPy library. Most people have been learning Python, whether they are developers or not, since Python’s numerous libraries and functions make it very secure and reliable. SciPy is frequently used for solving differential and algebraic equations, interpolation, optimization, etc. Here, we are discussing SciPy DE usage to help you understand how to implement the SciPy differential evolution function in Python applications.

      • Shell/Bash/Zsh/Ksh

        • University of TorontoMy dmenu wrapper script and what it will invoke for me

          Dmenu needs a wrapper script in order to do something useful, because all it does by itself is read autocompletion entries from standard input and write your selection to standard output. The traditional basic wrapper script runs a command found in your $PATH, or perhaps does some other single purpose action like passing a URL you entered to a browser. My wrapper script has always been a little more complicated, and has evolved to primarily do three different things: run commands (using a custom $PATH for dmenu), pass 'URLs' to my primary Firefox session, and start terminal sessions to local hosts, possibly using alternate usernames.

      • Rust

        • Dizietdiziet | Rust for the Polyglot Programmer, December 2022 edition

          I have reviewed, updated and revised my short book about the Rust programming language, Rust for the Polyglot Programmer.

          It now covers some language improvements from the past year (noting which versions of Rust they’re available in), and has been updated for changes in the Rust library ecosystem.

          With (further) assistance from Mark Wooding, there is also a new table of recommendations for numerical conversion.

  • Leftovers

    • Hardware

      • CNX SoftwarePinecil V2 Bluetooth LE soldering iron gets a web interface - CNX Software

        It’s now possible to make use of the Pinecil V2 soldering iron‘s Bluetooth LE connectivity through a web-based interface used to monitor and/or set the temperature and power of the RISC-V soldering iron.

        When the Pinecil V2 soldering iron was launched with a Bouffalo Lab BL706 RISC-V Bluetooth microcontroller last summer, we were told there were main potential cases to make use of the Bluetooth LE features: OTA firmware upgrade and remote telemetry and control. The latter is now being taken care of by Joric who has written a web application to visualize telemetry data and even control the temperature of the soldering iron.

    • Pseudo-Open Source

      • Openwashing

        • TechRepublicAcceldata launches new open-source data observability platform

          Acceldata has announced the release of a new open-source version of its data platform. Unlike many traditional data platforms, this new release is multidimensional, promising integrated insights from data pipelines, data quality tools and data systems.

    • Security

      • FOSSLifeEthical Hacking Insights from HackerOne Report

        Today’s ethical hackers are motivated by the desire to learn, to earn money, and to protect and defend, according to HackerOne’s 2022 Hacker-Powered Security Report. In fact, 92 percent of hackers say they can find vulnerabilities that scanners can’t, the report says.

      • Computer WorldThe trials and tribulations of Microsoft’s KB5012170 patch [Ed: 'Secure' boot is the opposite of security]

        KB5012170 is many things to many Windows users. First, it’s a patch that either installs with no problems or leads to a blue screen of death (BSOD). It can also be an indicator we have a problem getting updated drivers on our systems. It can demonstrate how users don’t keep up with Bios updates. And it shows that some OEMs enable Bitlocker on the systems they sell (not necessarily in a good way).

        In short, it’s a problematic patch that just keeps rearing its head.

        Also known as “Security Update for Secure Boot DBX,” KB5012170 was released earlier this year and makes improvements to the Secure Boot Forbidden Signature Database (DBX). Windows devices that have Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI)-based firmware have Secure Boot enabled. It ensures only trusted software can be loaded and executed on during the boot process by using cryptographic signatures to verify the integrity of the process and the software being loaded.

      • Bleeping ComputerMicrosoft: KB5021233 causes blue screens with 0xc000021a errors

        Microsoft is investigating a known issue leading to Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) crashes with 0xc000021a errors after installing the Windows 10 KB5021233 cumulative update released during this month's Patch Tuesday.

        The company warned over the weekend that "after installing KB5021233, some Windows devices might start up to an error (0xc000021a) with a blue screen."

        This known issue is likely caused by a mismatch between the file versions of hidparse.sys in system32 and system32/drivers in the Windows folder, "which might cause signature validation to fail when cleanup occurs."

        The list of affected platforms includes only client Windows 10 versions, from Windows 10 20H2 to the latest release, Windows 10 22H2.

    • AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

      • [Old] Points worth noting in the Estonia i-voting report | Stop at Zona-M

        Back in 2019, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) deployed an Election Expert Team (EET) to observe the 3 March parliamentary elections in Estonia. That team focused its assessment on the work of the election administration, the implementation of Internet voting, and the participation of national minorities in the electoral process. The final report, published in June 2019, contains some considerations and recommendations that anybody who still thinks online voting in actual political elections makes sense consider carefully....

  • Gemini* and Gopher

    • Personal

      • Santa Claus, Coca-Cola, Sprite, and vast amounts of cookies

        I was wrong when I mentioned that Coca-Cola created our modern image of Santa Claus [1]— it goes back into the mid-to-late 1800s [2]. But Coca-Cola's Santa Claus advertising *might* have been the inspiration for Sprite.

        And speaking of Santa and food products, here's a video that answers the question no one bothered to ask, how many cookies does Santa Claus consume on Christmas? [3] It's amazing he even survives the trip.

    • Technical

      • initial thoughts on stable diffusion's dataset



        i've come across this little article about stable diffusion's training dataset [2]. unlike dall-e's openAI, stability is rather transparent about this stuff, which is great. so. i wanna talk about the dataset — or rather, the fraction of the dataset [3] that's been organized and can be browsed. read the article first and then come back so i don't have to paraphrase it all lmao

        the fraction we can browse is composed of 12 million image-caption pairs, or "2% of the 600 million images used to train the most recent three checkpoints". so it's a lot but doesn't even scratch the surface.

      • Change the default character limit on your Mastodon instance

        For the sake of this post, we'll assume we want to change the default character limit to 2000 characters.


* Gemini (Primer) links can be opened using Gemini software. It's like the World Wide Web but a lot lighter.



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Open letter to the ACM regarding Codes of Conduct impersonating the Code of Ethics
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
With 9 Mentions of Azure In Its Latest Blog Post, Canonical is Again Promoting Microsoft and Intel Vendor Lock-in, Surveillance, Back Doors, Considerable Power Waste, and Defects That Cannot be Fixed
Microsoft did not even have to buy Canonical (for Canonical to act like it happened)
Links 28/03/2024: GAFAM Replacing Full-Time Workers With Interns Now
Links for the day
Consent & Debian's illegitimate constitution
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
The Time Our Server Host Died in a Car Accident
If Debian has internal problems, then they need to be illuminated and then tackled, at the very least in order to ensure we do not end up with "Deadian"
China's New 'IT' Rules Are a Massive Headache for Microsoft
On the issue of China we're neutral except when it comes to human rights issues
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 27, 2024
IRC logs for Wednesday, March 27, 2024
WeMakeFedora.org: harassment decision, victory for volunteers and Fedora Foundations
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 27/03/2024: Terrorism Grows in Africa, Unemployment in Finland Rose Sharply in a Year, Chinese Aggression Escalates
Links for the day
Links 27/03/2024: Ericsson and Tencent Layoffs
Links for the day
Amid Online Reports of XBox Sales Collapsing, Mass Layoffs in More Teams, and Windows Making Things Worse (Admission of Losses, Rumours About XBox Canceled as a Hardware Unit)...
Windows has loads of issues, also as a gaming platform
Links 27/03/2024: BBC Resorts to CG Cruft, Akamai Blocking Blunders in Piracy Shield
Links for the day
Android Approaches 90% of the Operating Systems Market in Chad (Windows Down From 99.5% 15 Years Ago to Just 2.5% Right Now)
Windows is down to about 2% on the Web-connected client side as measured by statCounter
Sainsbury's: Let Them Eat Yoghurts (and Microsoft Downtimes When They Need Proper Food)
a social control media 'scandal' this week
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, March 26, 2024
IRC logs for Tuesday, March 26, 2024
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
Windows/Client at Microsoft Falling Sharply (Well Over 10% Decline Every Quarter), So For His Next Trick the Ponzi in Chief Merges Units, Spices Everything Up With "AI"
Hiding the steep decline of Windows/Client at Microsoft?
Free technology in housing and construction
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
We Need Open Standards With Free Software Implementations, Not "Interoperability" Alone
Sadly we're confronting misguided managers and a bunch of clowns trying to herd us all - sometimes without consent - into "clown computing"
Microsoft's Collapse in the Web Server Space Continued This Month
Microsoft is the "2%", just like Windows in some countries