Bryan Lunduke: "the same wonderful person who brought us that Windows 95 Linux theme did the same for MacOS 9! He calls it "Platinum9" (Platinum was the name of the default appearance style of MacOS 8 and 9). And it's pretty close to the real thing!"
Farewell, February --we're wrapping up the month with another great week. Here are the latest updates on the Apache community's activities...
In the February 2022 survey we received responses from 1,173,621,471 sites across 271,199,972 unique domains and 11,774,714 web-facing computers. This reflects a gain of 5.91 million sites, 1.36 million domains and 73,800 computers.
OpenResty experienced the strongest growth this month, both in overall sites and domains, with increases of 10.4 million sites and 546,000 domains. This represents a large 13.0% increase in its number of sites, but a more modest 1.4% increase in domains. Its market share in the domains metric now stands at 15.1%, an increase of 0.13 percentage points since January.
nginx closely followed OpenResty with a growth of 538,000 domains, helping it to maintain its leading 26.7% market share. nginx also saw strong growth in web-facing computers, which increased by 53,500. In contrast to its gains in these metrics, nginx lost 12.1 million sites this month (-3.2%), however it retains its position as the most commonly used web server with 31.1% of all sites using it.
Cloudflare continues to make strong gains amongst the million busiest websites, where it saw the only notable increases, with an additional 3,200 sites helping to bring its market share up to 19.4%. Apache, Microsoft and nginx all experienced losses in this metric; however, Apache and nginx still hold the top two positions with market shares of 23.3% and 22.1%.
One of the unfortunate things about the Linux community is that it loves to hate on certain projects, like Snaps. Is all the hate warranted? In some case, yes, but in many cases, no!
The 5.17-rc6 kernel prepatch has been released.
The transition to virtual conferencing has enabled work from home for office teams and eLearning for students. A new era is ushering in, given the use of technology for imparting education, managing workloads, and leading by example.
Whiteboards have become the thing of the present, considering how often you need to present your thoughts to other people over virtual mediums. Given the rise in virtual presentations, it’s time to move over to whiteboards to do your bidding.
Without further ado, you should try these seven open-source whiteboard applications on your Linux system for a seamless experience.
Linux Terminal Emulator is a truly useful and valuable tool for novice or super clients. Terminal Emulators assist you to utilize and collaborate with the shell of Linux systems. It provides you complete access to unleash the power of the system.
Furthermore, Linux Terminal Emulator is the most ideal approach to study commands of Linux without having a trained subsystem of Linux. There are no online terminals and bash editors accessible in the market to execute several commands and examine the results. If you don’t have a Linux system then you can explore the basics of system or test scripts and much more. Moreover, online terminal emulators and bash editors will assist you with excursion from this circumstance.
On the other hand, if we talk about bash editors then firstly we convey that there are two types of bash editors i.e. console-based editors and graphical user interface editors. Bash editors are used in order to write code or modify configuration files.
We have come to another letter where we are going to better document something PastSelf thought it knew, but clearly didn't. In this case we are going to start recovering from a RAID array after a reinstall. For reasons we won't get into, PastSelf had to reinstall the home server for the 2nd time this week. [Let us just say that PastSelf is no longer allowed to use sudo without supervision and move on.] In the reinstall, we could not get the /dev/sdb and /dev/sdc RAID array to be fully recognized and realized that we had also made the original ones too small for what we needed [which is what started the whole problem when we tried to grow a partition but forgot that the external backup always becomes /dev/sda for some reason and /dev/sdb was not the RAID drive but the / drive. Live and learn, live and learn.]
I remember the first time I went to an "un" conference. It was a chaotic event at first, with lots of socializing and sharing of personal projects, but it gradually coalesced into a mostly self-organized technical event. It didn't happen with magic, but with sticky notes. People wrote ideas for talks and presentations on those colorful adhesive notepads, and stuck them to a common wall, and other people grouped similar ideas into clusters, and eventually everyone knew where to congregate to discuss specific topics. It was a beautiful and satisfying thing to witness, and it gave me a new respect for sticky notes. So I was happy to recently discover that the KDE Plasma Desktop has digital sticky notes, and in many ways they're even more useful than the physical ones. The application is called KNotes, and if you have random ideas that you feel like jotting down, it's probably something you want to consider for your own Linux desktop.
When you work with containers on Kubernetes, you often group applications together in a pod. When you launch a container or a pod into production, it's called a deployment. If you're using Kubernetes daily or even just weekly, you've probably done it hundreds of times, but have you thought about what exactly happens when you create a pod or a deployment?
I find it helpful to have an understanding of the chain of events on a high level. You don't have to understand it, of course. It still works even when you don't know why. I don't intend to list each and every little thing that happens, but I aim to cover all of the important ones.
Here's a visual map of how the different components of Kubernetes interact:
When using Linux on mobile devices such as Laptops, it is very important to tune the right kernel parameters in order to optimize battery life. Tlp is a highly customizable, free and open source command line utility released under the GPLv2 license (the source code is hosted on github) created with this exact goal. In this tutorial we see how to install Tlp on some of the most used Linux distributions, and how to configure it.
The purpose of this tutorial is to cover the step by step instructions to add a new static route via Netplan on Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish.
Static routes are necessary when you have two or more networks that your computer needs to send traffic to. This is not a normal scenario for a home network, but is rather common in offices, schools, etc.
Normally, all network traffic is routed to the default gateway, which is a router that will then determine where to send the data to next. When adding more static routes, it adds more gateways. It is like telling your computer to send data destined to a certain network to a different router than the default.
If you have a GUI installed on Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish, but the desktop environment does not start automatically at boot, it is possible to start the GUI from the command line, or even configure the system to boot into the GUI automatically.
In this tutorial, you can follow our step by step instructions to manually start the GUI from command line, or configure the GUI to start automatically upon system boot in Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish.
The SSH protocol operates on port 22 by default. In order to accept incoming connections on your SSH server, you will need to ensure that port 22 is allowed through the firewall.
In this tutorial, you will learn how to open SSH port 22 on Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish. The only prerequisite is that you must already have SSH installed. If you have not already installed it, see our guide on how to install SSH server on Ubuntu 22.04.
The GCC compiler is used to compile C programs on a Linux system and the G++ compiler is used to compile C++ programs. Both have numerous versions available for installation on Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish.
In this tutorial we will install multiple versions of GCC and G++ compilers using the apt install command. Furthermore, by use of the update-alternatives tool you will learn how to easily switch between multiple GCC and G++ compiler versions and how to check the currently selected compiler version on Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish.
The purpose of this tutorial is to cover the step by step instructions to install, enable, and disable SELinux on Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy Jellyfish.
In some Bash scripts, there is an option to pass arguments to the script when you are executing it. This allows the user to specify more information in the same command used to run the script.
If you plan on giving users the option to pass arguments in your Bash script, it is important to include some type of error checking to verify that the expected number of arguments have been passed. Additionally, you can have your script react differently depending on the number of arguments that are passed. And this is why you will need to detect the number of arguments passed to the script.
In this tutorial, you will learn how to check the number of arguments passed to a Bash script on a Linux system. We will go over a few examples so you can see what this functionality looks like inside of a Bash script.
If you are writing a Bash script and have some information that may change during the execution of the script, or that normally changes during subsequent executions, then this should be set as a variable.
Setting a variable in a Bash script allows you to recall that information later in the script, or change it as needed. In the case of integers, you can increment or decrement variables, which is useful for counting loops and other scenarios.
In this tutorial, you will learn how to set variables and use them in a Bash script on a Linux system. Check some of the examples below to see how variables works.
An if statement in a Bash script is the most basic way to use a conditional statement.
In simple terms, these conditional statements define “if a condition is true, then do that, otherwise do this instead.” The if statements become more complex when you nest them together, or in other words put one if statement inside of another if statement. You can make the nest as deep as you want, though it will continue to grow in complexity.
In this tutorial, you will learn how to use nested if statements in a Bash script on a Linux system. Check some of the examples below to see how nested if statements work.
Two popular games should be much better on Linux and Steam Deck with the latest update to Proton Experimental. What is Proton? It's a compatibility layer designed to run Windows games from Steam on Linux. See more about it in our full guide.
Not only are dbrand working to bring out a fancy case for the Steam Deck with a built-in stand, they've also announced their own Tempered Glass Screen Protector.
Yes it's true, Gabe Newell of Valve really did go around delivering a Steam Deck to various people and now there's an official video on it.
Minecraft is a popular sandbox survival game that is based on voxel blocks world. In Minecraft players can build anything from a simple home, gardens, castles, and camps.
Minecraft was originally designed back in 2009, as it gains popularity, many developers attempt their own free, open-source versions of it.
In this article, we will provide you with a quick list of open-source Minecraft alternatives for gamers, and developers.
“Even though the migration has only just been completed, it is already clear that we have chosen the right platform for the future. SUSE Rancher and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server are the perfect combination for our requirements.” Frank Bayer Senior Architect for Operating Systems and Container Services IT System House, Federal Employment Agency.
Every six months (in January and August) the CentOS board has the opportunity to reelect, or replace half of the directors. This staggered approach was adopted so that we are never in a situation where the entire board (or even a significant majority) is replaced, leaving no experienced directors.
In the January 2022 board meeting, the CentOS Board selected two new directors to replace outgoing directors Jim Perrin and Karanbir Singh - Celeste Lyn Paul and Amy Marrich. In the February meeting, these new directors attended as full members for the first time.
In this interview I speak with Amy about her road to the board, and what she brings to the conversation.
Fedora test days are events where anyone can help make sure changes in Fedora work well in an upcoming release. Fedora community members often participate, and the public is welcome at these events. If you’ve never contributed to Fedora before, this is a perfect way to get started.
There are two upcoming test weeks in the coming weeks. The first is Monday 28 February through Monday 07 March. It is to test GNOME 42. The second is Monday 07 March through Sunday 13 March. It focuses on testing internationalization. Come and test with us to make the upcoming Fedora 36 even better. Read more below on how to do it.
Automation skills have been a hot commodity over the past few years. Companies may want to use automation to free their employees from rote work, like applying the same security patch across hundreds of machines, so they have more time to participate in high-value innovation efforts.
Ansible technology has been at the forefront of hot automation skills. For example, the 2021 Stack Overflow survey found Ansible technology to be the eighth most loved tool—with similar results found in the 2020 edition of this survey. And if you do a LinkedIn job search, the results include thousands of jobs where "Ansible" skills are mentioned. As automation grows, there has never been a better time to expand your Ansible skills and knowledge.
Coming six months after Armbian 21.08, the Armbian 22.02 release is here to introduce initial support for Raspberry Pi devices. The Raspberry Pi 4 Model B board is currently supported with 64-bit builds using Raspberry Pi Foundation’s kernels 5.15 LTS and 5.16, as well as Debian’s flash-kernel tool.
While the Raspberry Pi support is still marked as WIP (Work in Progress), it would appear that the community is reporting success in running Armbian on various 64-bit Raspberry Pi boards, including the older Raspberry Pi 3 Model B and Raspberry Pi CM3 and CM4.
The Armbian project, which is a Debian-based distribution for Arm-based single-board computers (SBCs) and development boards, has a lengthy release announcement for Armbian 22.02. Beyond lots of updates and bug fixes (of course), Armbian has added support for Debian unstable ("sid"), Raspberry Pi images, a new Extensions build framework, build automation (continuous integration and continuous deployment) improvements, and more. There is also upcoming support for Ubuntu 22.04 images.
Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, Issue 724 for the week of February 20 – 26, 2022.
To simplify migration from Lomiri to the current version of Mir for developers, this release introduces MirOil. This is a supported API to assist with the migration. Read more about this library on the UBports forum.
We introduced support for onscreen keyboards with Mir 2.6 and that works with a range of applications but Qt only supports the older zwp_text_input_manager_v2 protocol. So, we’ve added exclusive support for Qt applications to Mir this release.
Plus, we have ensured that Mir 2.7 builds with the latest versions of Ubuntu (Jammy), Fedora (rawhide), Debian (sid), and Alpine (edge).
Learn more about Mir 2.7 release here, or explore its whitepaper and learn more about this open source display server.
Today Canonical announces it is collaborating with Vodafone to test a new technology that uses Anbox Cloud, and the power of smart mobile networks, to transform TVs, computers, wearables and other everyday objects into ‘cloud smartphones’.
The prototype Cloud Smartphone will be showcased on Vodafone’s stand at MWC 2022 in Barcelona, demonstrating the concept of a smartphone running entirely on the cloud while leaving basic functionality on the device a user holds. With the use of Canonical’s Anbox Cloud, Vodafone can test a software stack that allows for the implementation of running the Android operating system in the cloud by moving all the processing to a virtual machine. Because of this, the device of choice will only need to use basic video-decoding capabilities, enabling simple objects to take on smartphone tasks. The integration with functions remaining on the physical device like camera, location or available sensors, provides the user with an environment that shows no difference to what they are regularly used to having.
The ability to offload compute, storage and energy-intensive applications from devices (x86 and Arm) to the cloud enable end-users to consume advanced workloads by streaming them directly to their device. Anbox Cloud also allows developers to deliver an on-demand application experience through a platform that provides more control over performance and infrastructure costs, with the flexibility to scale based on user demand.
SmartCow’s Xavier NX based “Apollo Development Kit” ships with Nvidia’s Deepstream conferencing and RIVA conversational analytics SDKs. Features include a 128GB SSD, 4-MEMS mic, 2x speakers, audio I/O, mini-DP, 8MP camera, M.2, GbE, and an OLED.
We have covered several dozen carrier boards, dev kits, and edge AI systems built around Nvidia’s Jetson Xavier NX, but the Apollo Development Kit is the first we can recall that focuses primarily on audio AI. Developed by a Malta-based startup called SmartCow, this audio/visual dev kit blurs the line between a carrier board and an embedded system, as it ships with a stand and partial enclosure equipped with an OLED display. The kit is designed for AI-enhanced audio/video conferencing, public transport kiosks, and smart retail systems.
People often ask me for security advice, but before I can offer any recommendations usually I need to ask people specific questions about themselves to understand the threats they face. That’s because the security measures you take depend on your threats, and because everyone faces different threats, there are few one-size-fits all recommendations. When I wrote Linux Hardening in Hostile Networks, I intentionally split each chapter into three sections with each section recommending more extreme (and sometimes more complicated) hardening measures than the last. The reader was instructed to read up to their level of comfort and threat, and then revisit the more advanced sections later.
Each person not only faces different threats, the threats they face can change. Security needs to be flexible, and should be capable of offering strong protection by default, and extra protection during a crisis. Doors typically have a regular lock and a deadbolt, and many people only lock both at night or when they are leaving the house. We also expect to be able to lock our doors ourselves, with keys under our own control. Likewise our security measures should not only offer a strong defense, they should do it while maximizing our freedom and our control.
As you know, Arduino is all about open source, and now our Docs and Help Center sites now join the community club becoming open-source. Arduino lovers everywhere can now contribute to the content on official Arduino documentation websites through their public GitHub repositories.
Arduino Week takes place between 21-26 March, 2022, marking the first time we’ve expanded the birthday celebration into a full week of talks, events, launches and presentations. We’re reserving the last day of the week (Saturday, 26th March) for these community-driven events; putting the spotlight on your celebrations for the big finale.
We recently wrapped up the call for speakers, after we received a huge number of pitches and ideas for people who wanted to take part in the official Arduino Week event. Now we want to hear all about any events you’re planning to help us raise awareness and have fun with open-source hardware, software and services!
Following a short exchange of opinions with several community members, as of Saturday 26th of February 2022, TDF has suspended RusBITech’s membership in the Advisory Board.
While TDF does not get involved in politics in any way, the apparent involvement of RusBITech with the Russian Federation’s military complex creates a serious moral concern in the current situation.
As the globe still navigates the twists and turns of the times, Collabora can confidently say we've been steadily on the rise. The demand for open source expertise continues to intensify and we've remained in stride in the field. We've added brand new members to our crew who are more than equipped to keep pace.
In this series, we share some of the inspiring stories of how WordPress and its global network of contributors can change people’s lives for the better. This month we feature a website developer and engineer from the US, who found the software and its community provide the impetus to keep her going forward.
WordPress gave Tonya Mork a new lease of energy after a health crisis from which she nearly died. She had spent two decades as an electrical and software engineer in high tech automated manufacturing. But when she discovered the WordPress software, teaching it to others became her new purpose. Through this discovery, she has gone on to help thousands of developers understand and build code in great depth.
[...]
For the first 22 years of Tonya’s life, she rose through the ranks from enlisted personnel in the US Navy to a highly sought after chief engineer with a multi million-dollar industrial automation engineering firm.
However, while she was working in engineering, her life was to change dramatically. In 2007, Tonya started to face health challenges that had an impact on all that she had known.
Thanks to, PWC 154 part 1 is so boring, I’m not going into details. Part two however is a bit of a head scratcher.
As a child, [David Windestal] already knew that a belt sander was the perfect motor for a banging radio-controlled car. Many years later, the realization of that dream is everything he could have hoped for.
The core of this project is a battery-powered belt sander by a well known manufacturer of gnarly yellow power tools. With an eye for using bespoke 3D printed parts, the conversion appeared straightforward – slap on (or snap on) a pre-loved steering mechanism, add a servo for controlling the sander’s trigger, and that’s pretty much job done. Naturally the intention was to use sandpaper as tread, which is acceptable for outdoor use but not exactly ideal for indoors. A thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) tread was designed and printed for playtime on the living room floor, where sandpaper may be frowned upon.
We’ve seen a wide variety of mask sanitization solutions, and now, [spiritplumber] from [Robots Everywhere] brings us a frugal and ingenious design – one that you barely even need tools for. This project might look rough around the edges but looks were never a prerequisite, and as a hacker worth their salt will recognize – this is an answer to “how to design a mask disinfector that anyone can build”.
Local shortages of masks have been threatening communities here and there, doubly so if you need a specific kind of mask that might be out of stock. This design could apply to a whole lot of other things where sterilization is desired, too – improving upon concepts, after all, is our favourite pastime.
Interfacing technology and electronics with the real world is often fairly tricky. Complexity and edge cases work their way in to every corner of a project like this; just ask anyone who has ever tried to operate a rover on Mars, make a hydroponics garden, or build almost any robotics project. Even those of us who simply own a consumer-grade printer are flummoxed by the ways in which they can fail when manipulating single sheets of paper. This robotic lawnmower is no exception, driving its creator [TK] to extremes to get it to mow his lawn.
Some of the most popular vintage computers are now more than forty years old, and their memory just ain’t how it used to be. Identifying bad memory chips can quickly become a chore, so [Jan Beta] spent some time putting together a cheap DRAM tester out of spare parts.
This little tester can be used with 4164 and 41256 DRAM memory chips. 4164 DRAM was used in several popular home computers throughout the 1970s and 1980s, including the Apple ][ series, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum and many more. Likewise, the 41256 was used in the Commodore Amiga. These computers are incredibly popular in the vintage computing community, and its not uncommon to find bad memory in any of them.
When people are thinking of the future of space travel, an idea that floats around is a spaceship with a giant solar sail pushed along by a massive laser. Inspired by the concept but lacking a giant laser, [Tom Stanton] build a small craft powered by a vortex cannon.
Creating a vortex is hard enough, but creating a vortex with enough oomph to travel a longer distance and push something takes some doing. [Sam] started with some cheap solenoids, but had a few issues. Their interior nozzles were quite small, which restricted airflow. He used four valves all plumbed together to provide the volume of air needed. Additionally, he found that their response time was lacking. They couldn’t quite switch off quickly enough so instead of a puff of air, it pushed out something closer to a stream. To compensate, [Sam] 3d printed and tried a few different sizes of cone nozzles to see if that helped. Unfortunately, it did not. So he combined the nozzle with an expansion chamber that allowed the pressure wave to shorten, then it narrows to speed it up again. This provided a decent vortex.
Newton famously said, “If I see further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.” For 3D printing, though, it might be the reverse. If a printer prints larger than others, it is probably using work developed for smaller printers. There are a variety of very large 3D printers out there now and you frequently see claims in the press of “world’s largest 3D printer.” Roboze, for example, makes that claim with a build volume of 1 meter on each axis.
Not to dispute them, but depending on your definitions, there are FDM printers with bigger volume capacity. There are also many other machines claiming roughly the same size, from 3D Platform’s WORKBENCH XTREME to the re:3D Terabot. Of course, all of these come with a large price. But we’ve even seen a homebrew printer with an 800 mm x 500 mm bed. In addition, infinite bed printers are not that uncommon, although they do have some limitations. In particular, they are usually only large on one axis.
Ethernet cable testers are dime a dozen, but none of them are as elegant and multimeter-friendly as this tester from our Hackaday.io regular, [Bharbour]. An Ethernet cable has 8 wires, and the 9 volts of easily available batteries come awfully close to that – which is why the board has a voltage divider! On the ‘sender’ end, you just plug this board onto the connector, powered by a 9 volt battery. On the “receiver” end, you take your multimeter out and measure the testpoints – TP1 should be at one volt, TP2 at two volts, and so on.
In a surprise move that had everyone buzzing at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona today, the Linux Foundation, in collaboration with the GSMA, introduced a global, open-source project to address industry API interoperability leveraging GSMA OPG requirements and Linux Foundation's Developer Ecosystem.
Broadcom Software—an industry member of CISA’s Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative (JCDC)—uncovers an advanced persistent threat (APT) campaign against select governments and other critical infrastructure targets in a publication titled Daxin: Stealthy Backdoor Designed for Attacks Against Hardened Networks. The Symantec Threat Hunter team, part of Broadcom Software, worked with CISA to engage with multiple governments targeted with Daxin malware and assisted in detection and remediation.
According to a US official, the finding of the malware was communicated to the United States government, which then shared the information with its overseas allies. Symantec published its research on the tool, which it refers to as Daxin, on Monday.
The backdoor is a Windows kernel driver implementing advanced communication features that allows its operators to infect systems on highly secure networks and let them to communicate without detection, even when the systems can't connect to the Internet. These features are similar to the Regin malware discovered by Symantec in 2014, and which the company attributed to Western intelligence agencies.
Security updates have been issued by CentOS (389-ds-base, cyrus-sasl, kernel, openldap, and python-pillow), Debian (cyrus-sasl2, htmldoc, and ujson), Fedora (flac, gnutls, java-11-openjdk, kernel, qemu, and vim), openSUSE (ucode-intel), SUSE (php72 and ucode-intel), and Ubuntu (php7.4, php8.0).
he world's largest automaker is suspending production at a third of its factories, according to Reuters. Toyota says it will temporarily stop making cars at its Japanese factories after one of its suppliers was hacked.
The company in question is called Kojima Industries, which makes composite and plastic parts for Toyota, both for car interiors and also parts for Toyota's hybrid and fuel cell electric vehicles. Reuters quotes a Toyota spokesperson who described the event as a "supplier system failure."
I installed the Google Keyboard (Gboard) app on a hunch and discovered that all my problems went away. Great! If you’re looking for a quick solution to the above problems, this might be it.
However, I wasn’t satisfied with just finding a solution. I wanted to understand the underlying issues. (You may be a regular reader, and this shouldn’t come as a surprise.)
I began by resetting all user data (settings, dictionary, and typing predictions and completions) belonging to the Samsung Keyboard app, and the problem went away. Weird. Okay, so this suggests it was caused by one or a combination of my preferences.
