Techrights Bulletin for Thursday, November 05, 2020 ┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅┅ Generated Fri 6 Nov 00:09:46 GMT 2020 Created by Dr. Roy Schestowitz (roy (at) schestowitz (dot) com) Full hyperlinks for navigation omitted but are available in the originals The corresponding HTML versions are at techrights.org Older bulletins can be found at: http://techrights.org/txt-archives ╒═══════════════════ INDEX ═══════════════════════════════════════════╕ Bulletin articles (as HTML) to comment on (requires login): http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/14th-anniversary/#comments http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/epo-looting/#comments http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/irc-log-041120/#comments http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/rms-anniversary-of-the-fsf/#comments http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/the-epo-orange-one/#comments http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/wipo-swpats-and-hey-hi/#comments Followed by Daily Links (news picks): http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/linux-5-9-4/#comments http://techrights.org/2020/11/05/linux-5-9-5/#comments ╒═══════════════════ ARTICLE ═════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** Our_Fourteenth_Anniversary_Also_Marks_a_Milestone,_Concludes_a_Record Year,_and_There’s_Some_‘Hope’_(for_‘Change’)_Going_Ahead ***** Posted in Site_News at 11:49 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz We’ll have posted 30,000 blog posts later this winter [EMOM Techrights] Summary: Our 14-year anniversary is coming shortly; here are some preparatory notes This coming Saturday (third day of England’s lock-down, so no chance of going out for purposes like celebrating) we celebrate not just 14 years (see our tenth), as noted in our_recent_post_about_the_anniversary. We also celebrate_a record_year. “We’ve been missing some opportunities to cover important issues…”Just this afternoon we received a new Raspberry Pi as a gift for the site (we’ll set it up to help run the site later today, tomorrow and this coming weekend). This has_been_keeping_us_busier. [Techrights birthday] One more thing that keeps us busier than usual is election coverage. Here’s the election status from the GOP-leaning WSJ (as of an hour ago). [Biden-Trump status] This lesser_evil is a bit of an early ‘gift’ to us (it’s not great, but a lot less menacing than another 4 years of US fascism orchestrated by GOP). We’re going to use the banner above for a little ‘local’ (in-home) party and then carry on as usual. We’ve been missing some opportunities to cover important issues, including GitHub leaks (their code leaked), retaliation against Microsoft’s complicity with the RIAA and so much more. This seems to have done a lot of damage to GitHub’s monopoly; time will tell… █ ╒═══════════════════ ARTICLE ═════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** [Meme]_EPO_as_a_Looted_Institution_Where_Crime_is_the_‘Norm’_Nowadays ***** Posted in Deception, Europe, Finance, Patents at 11:09 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz Organised looting/raiding by EPO administration, impoverishing or emptying the coffers of what used to be (still is, for now) a rich institution [Three cats, three bowls: EPO Pensions, Ernst, Battistelli, Campinos] [All_Nazi] Summary: Criminal_misuse_of_EPO_funds is still being covered up by Benoît Battistelli, António_Campinos, and their former ‘boss’ (now subservient to them) Mr. Erst, who normalised EPO corruption like his parents had ‘normalised’ Nazism in Germany ╒═══════════════════ ARTICLE ═════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** IRC_Proceedings:_Wednesday,_November_04,_2020 ***** Posted in IRC_Logs at 2:39 am by Needs Sunlight [GNOME_Gedit] [GNOME_Gedit] #techrights_log #boycottnovell_log [GNOME_Gedit] [GNOME_Gedit] #boycottnovell-social_log #techbytes_log Enter_the_IRC_channels_now ╒═══════════════════ ARTICLE ═════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** Richard_Stallman’s_Talk_at_the_35th_Anniversary_of_the_FSF ***** Posted in GNU/Linux, Videos at 3:26 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz Uploaded 4 hours ago by the FSF https://media.libreplanet.org/mgoblin_media/media_entries/2426/rms.webm ╒═══════════════════ ARTICLE ═════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** [Meme]_António_Campinos_is_the_EPO’s_‘Fanta’_(Making_EPO_Fascism_Seem Acceptable,_Gentle,_Caring_and_Kind) ***** Posted in Deception, Europe, Patents at 11:22 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz Make EPOnia “Great” Again [Three soda drinkers: European panzer office] [EPO panzer] Summary: António ‘Fanta’ Campinos (a rebranded Battistelli) is just a thinly- veiled disguise/camouflage on an inherently authoritarian regime (almost nobody at the EPO fell for that PR trick as examiners are well educated and many work overseas in Germany) Coca-Cola_collaborated_with_the_Nazis_in_the_1930s,_and_Fanta_is_the_proof In 1933, the year Adolf Hitler took power in Germany, Coca-Cola’s local unit sold 100,000 cases. The subsidiary’s finances were in shambles, however. Enter 30-year-old German businessman Max Keith, a giant of a man with an imperious air and a massive greatcoat. Keith, a “born leader” who terrified subordinates but commanded their respect, took over Coca- Cola Germany’s books and quickly put them in order. He then revolutionized sales, breaking records every year and eventually heading the company. One of Keith’s first marketing triumphs was supplying massive amounts of Coke to the 1936 Berlin Summer Olympics. At that time, Hitler was riding high. Not only did German athletes win the most gold medals, German boxer Max Schmeling had recently beaten black American Joe Louis in New York. (Schmeling watched a film of the match at a lunch with Hitler, who slapped him with glee every time Schmeling landed a punch.) Nazi Germany was preparing to conquer Europe, and that September, Hitler’s second-in-command Hermann Göering announced a self- sufficiency regime, severely limiting imports and discouraging foreign companies. Coca-Cola’s Atlanta-based president Robert Woodruff sought to protect his European business, just as many other U.S. executives did. As Mark Pendergrast points out in For God, Country & Coca-Cola, “Some, like Henry Ford, were in fact Nazi sympathizers, while others, such as Walter Teagle of Standard Oil, avoided taking sides but saw nothing wrong with doing business with the Nazis. Like his friend and hunting companion Teagle, Woodruff practiced expediency.” Woodruff enlisted a German banking envoy to convince Göering to let him keep exporting flavor syrup to Germany. Keith, meanwhile, began producing much of the syrup he needed domestically, and briefly considered smuggling the remaining ingredients in. Then in 1937, a rival German soda maker on a trip to the U.S. discovered Coke bottle caps with Hebrew writing on them, indicating they were kosher. The company quickly claimed Coca-Cola was run by Harold Hirsch, a Jew on the American company’s board. German Coke sales plummeted. Keith told Woodruff he should sack Hirsch, but he refused. So Keith took steps to identify Coke with Nazism, including sending sales teams to mass patriotic events. ╒═══════════════════ ARTICLE ═════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** The_EPO_is_Pushing_Illegal_Software_Patents_Together_With_WIPO ***** Posted in Deception, Europe, Patents at 9:42 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz ‘Rebranding’ algorithms [Three_Buttons:_AI-related_patents,_computer-implemented_inventions,_software patents] Summary: The dictatorship at the EPO (the one which nobody can vote out) continues to trample on and laugh at the law, including the EPC, by pushing for endless expansion of patent scope THE EPO maladministration and/or mis-governance under Benoît_Battistelli and António_Campinos has led to approval rates (among EPO staff) near 0%. Even Donald Trump didn’t sink this low. “It’s not an institution of scientists but of barons and their lawyers.”Seeing the latest pure_nonsense (warning: epo.org link) from the EPO’s “news” section this morning, we’re reminded of who the EPO nowadays ‘conspires’ with instead of scientists. It’s no secret that WIPO has its share of criminals and corruption (it_is_well_documented and at times it was compared to the EPO). It’s not an institution of scientists but of barons and their lawyers. They’ve occasionally promoted software patents (events, reports, statements), even in Europe where they’re simply_not_allowed. Nowadays they misuse the hype surrounding buzzwords like “HEY HI” (AI) in order to push this agenda and this week is no exception. In the EPO’s own words: “The two-day event was initially planned to take place in Tallinn, Estonia but moved to an online format in light of the pandemic. [...] In his welcome, EPO President António Campinos announced a new direction for the conference. Starting in 2021 the Office will organise a new “Patent Knowledge Week”, offering greater flexibility as well as extended focus on topics related to patent knowledge.” “Donald Trump may be going away (maybe physically dragged out of the White House), but the same tyranny and tyrants aren’t leaving the EPO. There’s simply no mechanism (like elections) to remove these thugs.”But here’s the key part, basically rebranding algorithms or computer programs “AI-related patents” (i.e. the usual). It says this: “Another key topic at this year’s event was Artificial intelligence (AI). Several sessions underlined the impact of this technology on the patent system and shared lessons on searching for and analysing AI-related data. Irene Kitsara, WIPO IP Information Officer, delved into some of the findings of their 2019 Technology Trends report on AI, including their experience in developing an AI taxonomy and other key lessons learned from searching for AI-related patents. Her talk covered AI’s relationship to intellectual property, and what it could mean for the future of people, tools and administrations.” It’s clear, even based on the text above, that whoever wrote and then checked it has no idea what he/she/they are talking about. This is a symptom of high offices being run by patently incompetent people, who lack not only the education/qualifications but also the training/experience required to grasp the job. We end up reading a bunch of pure nonsense, basically a salad of buzzwords, being upheld to justify illegal practices. We saw that in the (apparently outgoing) Trump administration’s handling of environmental issues. Donald Trump may be going away (maybe physically dragged out of the White House), but the same tyranny and tyrants aren’t leaving the EPO. There’s simply no mechanism (like elections) to remove these thugs. █ ╒═══════════════════ DAILY LINKS ════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** Links_5/11/2020:_Linux_5.9.4_and_Early_Indications_Biden/Harris_Have_Won ***** Posted in News_Roundup at 2:50 am by Guest Editorial Team [Biden_Trump] [GNOME bluefish] **** Contents **** * GNU/Linux o Distributions o Devices/Embedded * Free_Software/Open_Source * Leftovers * **** GNU/Linux **** o **** Desktop/Laptop **** # ** From_Linux_to_Windows_and_Back ** Then a few days ago I began to think of using Windows again. I’m still not sure why. Maybe it is this Covid thing. One feels more and more frustrated and tied down. That feeling finds different pegs to express itself upon. I felt fed up with my Linux version of Zoom, I couldn’t see my students most of the time. I felt irritated with my Linux version of Microsoft Teams, I could see only four faces of my colleagues at a time (on the rare occasions that they switched on their cameras). I couldn’t scan from my mother’s all-in-one printer- cum-scanner. I couldn’t buy a new printer-cum- scanner because the new ones weren’t supported in Linux either. Maybe Windows would be better. I would be able to see more people, use more devices, feel happier and the sky would be blue again. So I got my university’s ever-helpful IT folks to install Windows and MS Office on my laptop. That was two days ago. And today I am back to Linux. Why? Well, yes it is true that lots of devices work better with Windows, especially the newest ones. The apple of my eye, the stylus my university gave me to write on a whiteboard during online classes, directly converts my handwriting into computer text on Microsoft OneNote. More features of my mother’s printer-scanner work now. Even the sound on YouTube is better. The sound hardware company Realtek has special device drivers for sound under Windows. Nothing like that for Linux. I can hear it fine there, to be sure, but there is an extra oomph in my headphones under Windows. The other side is that Windows grabs you with a bear hug. It takes much more space on my hard disk. It eats up a huge amount of RAM. Opening programs takes longer than on my Linux installation. And sometimes they still don’t work. I opened a complicated file made on a previous version of MS Word in the latest MS Word on my laptop. It froze. I tried again, it froze again. Then I tried it on the open source LibreOffice which I had been using on Linux. It sprang onto my screen in a fraction of a second. Starting and closing Windows can be a pain. It wants to install updates again and again. Even otherwise it takes a long time for my desktop to be usable. And then everything is slower than on Linux. Mine is a relatively new laptop. But this must be torture on an older machine, I thought. o **** Audiocasts/Shows **** # ** i386_|_Coder_Radio_386 ** Chris attempts a Lizard intervention and gets sucked into Mike’s Green tinted data center paradise. Plus our thoughts on the Raspberry Pi 400, and Apple’s secret weapon. # ** The_Linux_Link_Tech_Show_Episode_879 ** pi 400, 3d printing, power woes fixed # ** Democratizing_AI ** H2O.ai is driving an open AI movement. Doc Searls and Jonathan Bennet talk with Sri Ambati, the founder of H2O.ai, about the H2O Driverless AI; it is an automatic machine learning platform for the enterprise and helps data scientists across the world in every industry be more productive and get more accurate results. They talk about how H2O.ai responding to COVID-19 challenges with their expertise and new AI Apps that help companies get results with AI. They also discuss the future of AI and the importance of an open AI movement. o **** Kernel Space **** # ** Linux_5.9.4 ** I'm announcing the release of the 5.9.4 kernel. This is only a bugfix for the 5.9.3 kernel release which had some problems with some symlinks for the powerpc selftests. This problem was caused by issues in going from git->patch->quilt- >git and things got a bit messed up. To resolve this, I reverted the offending patch and a prerequsite one, and then used 'git cherry-pick' to backport the patches properly, which preserved the links correctly. Many thanks to Marc Aurèle La Franc and others for helping me notice this and provide some solutions for it. If you had no issues with these files in 5.9.3, no need to upgrade at this time. The updated 5.9.y git tree can be found at: git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/ stable/linux-stable.git linux-5.9.y and can be browsed at the normal kernel.org git web browser: https://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/stable/ linux-s... thanks, greg k-h # ** Stable_kernel_5.9.4 ** Greg Kroah-Hartman has released stable kernel 5.9.4. # ** BPF_binaries:_BTF,_CO-RE,_and_the_future_of_BPF_perf_tools ** Two new technologies, BTF and CO-RE, are paving the way for BPF to become a billion dollar industry. Right now there are many BPF (eBPF) startups building networking, security, and performance products (and more in stealth), yet requiring customers to install LLVM, Clang, and kernel headers – which can consume over 100 Mbytes of storage – to use BPF is an adoption drag. BTF and CO-RE eliminate these dependencies at runtime, not only making BPF more practical for embedded Linux environments, but for adoption everywhere. These technologies are: – BTF: BPF Type Format, which provides struct information to avoid needing Clang and kernel headers. – CO-RE: BPF Compile-Once Run- Everywhere, which allows compiled BPF bytecode to be relocatable, avoiding the need for recompilation by LLVM. Clang and LLVM are still required for compilation, but the result is a lightweight ELF binary that includes the precompiled BPF bytecode and can be run everywhere. # ** Two_address-space-isolation_patches_get_closer_[LWN.net] ** Address-space isolation is the technique of removing a range of memory from one or more address spaces as a way of preventing accidental or malicious access to that memory. Since the disclosure of the Meltdown and Spectre vulnerabilities, the kernel has used one form of address-space isolation to make kernel memory completely inaccessible to user-space processes, for example. There has been a steady level of interest in using similar techniques to protect memory in other contexts; two patches implementing new isolation mechanisms are getting closer to being ready for merging into the mainline kernel. # ** The_rest_of_the_5.10_merge_window ** Linus Torvalds released 5.10-rc1 and closed the 5.10 merge window on October 25; by that time, 13,903 non-merge changesets had been pulled into the mainline repository. Of those, over 6,700 were merged since LWN’s summary of the first half of the merge window. A fair number of interesting features found their way into the kernel among those commits; read on to catch up with what’s coming in 5.10. # ** Constant-action_bitmaps_for_seccomp() ** The seccomp() system call allows user space to load one or more (classic) BPF programs to be run whenever the calling process invokes a system call. Those programs can examine (to an extent) the arguments to each call and inform the kernel whether the call should be allowed to proceed or not. This feature is used in a number of containerization solutions (and beyond) as a way of reducing the kernel’s attack surface. In some situations, though, using seccomp() can result in a significant performance reduction. There are currently two patch sets in circulation that are aimed at reducing the overhead of seccomp() for one common use case. The argument-inspection feature of seccomp() is useful in a number of settings; it can, for example, block a write() call to any file descriptor other than the standard output. But many real-world use cases do not take advantage of this capability; instead, they make decisions based only on which system call is being invoked while paying no attention to the arguments to those calls. It turns out that the BPF mechanism is far from optimal for this case, which must be implemented as a long series of comparisons against the system- call number. The overhead of these comparisons can be reduced by using smarter algorithms (checking for the most commonly used system calls first, for example), but there are limits to how fast it can be. This overhead makes every system call slower. Much of this work is wasted. If a seccomp() configuration of this type allows read() once, it will allow it every time, but the kernel must work it out the hard way each time regardless. If there were some way of knowing that a given seccomp() filter program allows or denies specific system calls without looking at their arguments, it would be possible to implement those decisions much more quickly. # ** AMD_Sends_In_Green_Sardine_Support_For_Linux_5.10,_Hawaii BACO_Reset_–_Phoronix ** While the Linux 5.10 merge window passed a week and a half ago, similar to the Navi Blockchain SKU being added as a “fix”, the Green Sardine enablement is also being submitted as a fix for this current kernel version. At the start of October AMD sent out Linux driver bits for Green Sardine as a forthcoming APU platform. The Green Sardine hardware enablement from the graphics perspective basically has the AMDGPU driver follow the Renoir/Vega code paths but with different firmware files and other minor alterations. Green Sardine might be the Linux codename for the “Cezanne” Ryzen 5000 series APUs. o **** Applications **** # ** Repo_Review:_Stretchly_Break_Time_Reminder ** Stretchly is a helpful program that reminds you to periodically take short breaks when you are working on the computer. According to the application, “Taking regular breaks when using a computer is scientifically proven to be important for your physical and mental well-being.”, and Stretchly is specifically designed to help you take these breaks. By default, it will remind you to take a short 20 second break every 10 minutes, and a longer 5 minute break every 30 minutes. When you start Stretchly, it will run in the system tray. Clicking on the icon will open up a menu from which you can quickly check how long it will be until the next break starts, and also easily skip to the next long or mini breaks, or pause all breaks for a certain amount of time. # ** BpyTop_–_Resource_Monitoring_Tool_for_Linux ** BpyTOP is another Linux command-line utility for resource monitoring among many other utilities like a top, Htop, Bashtop, etc. bashtop users can expect similar features in bpytop since bpytop is ported from bashtop and completely written in Python. Bpytop is available for various linux distributions and macOS. o **** Instructionals/Technical **** # ** How_to_create_a_user_in_MongoDB ** MongoDB has mongod (Mongo Deamon) to run an instance of MongoDB on your computer or server. # ** Install_and_use_Kali_Linux_on_Android_without_root_–_Linux Shout ** We generally use the Linux operating system on Desktop or Laptop because on Android it is not stable to use GUI-based Linux OS, however, the command line will be. Yes, we can set up Kali on Android, which is popular and known for its security testing tools. So, let’s start with the tutorial, and yes you don’t need to do any modification in your Android OS that would temper the warranty of your phone. # ** GIMP_Tutorial:_Create_A_Mandala_Using_Your_Name ** I haven’t been to some of my favorite sites for a while, having other events that were keeping me busy – you know, Life. However, I happened to go to one of my favorite GIMP sites the other day – GIMP Learn. I know I can always find something new to learn, and that day was no exception. One of the most talented people on the site, a lady named Pat625, had posted a fine tutorial a while back, and I was just now able to go through it. The actual tutorial is here, and it is wonderful, so I thought I’d share it with you. Create a new file, 1,000 px X 1,000 px, with a white background. Using the guides you can pull from the left-side and top rulers, place them at 500 px. If you will check the bar at the bottom of your window, you will see “Add Guide” and it will show you when your guide is at 500 px. Your canvas will look like this: # ** How_to_install_Netbeans_12_on_a_Chromebook ** Today we are looking at how to install Netbeans 12 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. If you have any questions, please contact us via a YouTube comment and we would be happy to assist you! # ** How_to_install_FreeCAD_in_Ubuntu_20.04 ** Today we are looking at how to install FreeCAD in Ubuntu 20.04. The process is rather easy as you can see in the video tutorial. A person opens a terminal and runs the command below in it. Enjoy! # ** How_to_install_FreeCAD_on_Ubuntu_20.04_–_YouTube ** In this video, we are looking at how to install FreeCAD on Ubuntu 20.04. # ** Things_To_Remember_Before_Upgrading_Production_Server ** Server security is the topmost priority for every system administrator. Besides having third-party security tools like Firewall, DDoS protection, etc. it is extremely important to keep every piece of code up-to-date on your production server. When your application is in production, upgrading it is riskier. If your server is powered by Linux, Linux distributions keep releasing new versions every now and then. Each major release contains bug fixes, security updates, and new tools. Upgrading a production server without any preparation is a big mistake. An unprepared upgrade can cause permanent data loss, poor server performance, and customer loss. In this article, I will list some important steps to take before initiating a server upgrade. # ** Inserting_content_in_the_middle_of_a_Jekyll_post ** Do you wish to insert content (such as advertisement or a link) right in the middle of the Jekyll page? We can do that by using the content as an array and a forloop. Here is how. o **** Games **** # ** Game_Zone:_Slain_–_Back_From_Hell ** The game mechanics resemble the first Castlevania, but much more difficult. And, despite all its positive aspects, it seems that the game’s creators put an insane difficulty just to artificially lengthen its duration. Other than that, the mechanics are bad. The character does an automatic animation when performing a sequence of three sword attacks. Now, if you need to jump, it won’t happen, because the character will be locked in the animation sequence. And, as the game is very dynamic, it will kill Bathorin many times. But, as he already died, it doesn’t stop the game from continuing. The character just respawns at the nearest check-point. Yes, the game has this flaw. There is no way to save anywhere you want, but only at check-points, which can be very frustrating, depending on the stage you are in. Other than that, when striking with the sword, the character advances one step for each sequence of three sword hits. In abyss edges, or with nearby traps (and the game has many), this can kill the character easily. # ** Money_for_the_Vultures_is_finished_with_the_final_DLC_for Desperados_III_|_GamingOnLinux ** The fantastic tactics game from Mimimi Games is finished, with the final Money for the Vultures now available for Desperados III allowing you visit a location from previous games. Desperados III: Money for the Vultures – Part 3: Once More With Feeling (what a mouthful!) brings the Season Pass to a conclusion and leads the gang back to “Eagles Nest”, the legendary bandit fortress in the middle of the desert. This area, they say, is bigger and looks better than it ever has in Desperados and a fitting location to end Money for the Vultures. Looks like a whole lot of fun to sneak through. # ** Unity_Technologies_committed_to_supporting_the_Linux Editor_for_the_Unity_game_engine_|_GamingOnLinux ** While Unity itself has long supported producing Linux builds of games and applications built with it, the actual Editor for Linux is still not fully supported – but that will change. To be clear, there is a Linux version of the Unity Editor right now and that’s been a thing since 2015 in experimental form. Back in April 2019 they announced that the Linux Editor would be moving from experimental into preview, meaning it was on the road to a full release. Later in May 2019, Unity then actually properly announced the Unity Editor for Linux with a planned release date with Unity 2019.3. Sadly it didn’t happen when expected, it was delayed with no exact date other than 2020 which they’re now announcing again they’re not going to hit. In a forum post going into more detail, the good news is that Unity appear to be firmly committed to bringing the Unity Editor for Linux into official status. # ** DualSense_Controller_on_Linux:_Works_Well_with_Some Limitations_–_Boiling_Steam ** Do you ever get that impulse to buy that new, shiny electronic device on a whim? Just get in the car and drive the fifteen or thirty minutes to get to Walmart or Best Buy and buy it, without waiting the two or three days when ordering online? You know where this is going. After learning that Sony’s new DualSense controller for the PlayStation 5 has been released prior to the console itself, and discovering that it’s compatible with devices other than Sony’s own, I immediately went to my local Target store after getting an oil change for my car. Heh… the amount of time that you spend at the electronics department, viewing every sort of gadget that the store has. It’s everybody’s little toy store. That shot of endorphins that spike to your head after buying the device, taking it home, and unboxing it for the first time. And taking pictures of it for the sake of review, like this one. o **** Desktop Environments/WMs **** # ** LXQt_0.16.0_is_Out:_A_Lightweight_Qt_Desktop_Environment For_Linux ** In the last few months, we witnessed the massive release of the two most popular Linux desktop environments, GNOME 3.38, and KDE Plasma 5.20. If you’re specifically waiting for the new release of a lightweight desktop like Xfce 4.16, you should check out one of the best contenders LXQt, which has just launched a new version, LXQt 0.16.0. o **** Distributions **** # ** Linux_desktop_distributions:_Best_of_2020 ** It’s time to crown the best of the best Linux desktop distributions for 2020. I’m going to say this up front: Chances are pretty good your distribution isn’t on this list. If not, there’s no need to fret. The very fact that you are using Linux on the desktop should be reward enough. Why? Because you are using an operating system that is superior in many ways. It may not be perfect (no operating system is), but it’s still Linux, which means you’re working with a desktop platform that’s flexible, reliable, and fun to use. In the end, I have to claim a few of the vast number of distributions to be somehow above the rest. With the exception of a couple of distributions, this is never an easy task. And this year, it’s even harder because some of the usual candidates have fallen by the wayside. But who knows what next year will bring? Besides, the one thing you can count on with the Linux community is that they are always working hard to develop something new and impressive. Such is the case with this year’s candidates. With that, let’s get on with the list. ‘ # ** 11_Linux_Distributions_You_Can_Rely_on_for_Your_Ancient 32-bit_Computer ** If you’ve been keeping up with the latest Linux distributions, you must have noticed that 32-bit support has been dropped from most of the popular Linux distributions. Arch Linux, Ubuntu, Fedora, everyone has dropped the support for this older architecture. But, what if you have vintage hardware with you that still needs to be revived or you want to make use of it for something? Fret not, there are still a few options left to choose from for your 32-bit system. In this article, I’ve tried to compile some of the best Linux distributions that will keep on supporting 32-bit platform for next few years. # ** This_obscure_Linux_OS_could_have_changed_the_world,_and it’s_on_sale_right_now ** Contrary to popular belief, Apple did not invent the concept of the app store; another US software developer came up with a working equivalent as far back as 2001. Lindows (now known as Linspire after a legal battle with Microsoft), had a feature called Click ‘n’ Run – or CNR (not as catchy) – which allowed users to click one button to install an application. Lindows was a Linux-based distribution that wanted to encourage its users to embrace a subscription model, which included handing over personal details. But it was too far ahead of its time, with infrastructures like CDN and payment gateways still in their infancy. # **** PCLinuxOS/Mageia/Mandriva/OpenMandriva Family **** # ** PCLinuxOS_Family_Member_Spotlight_–_Snubbi ** I live in Denmark on Zealand, in the western part, not far from the sea. We live in an old half-timbered house from 1776. I have spent the last seven years renovating it completely, so we do not have to think about repairs in the future. The weather in Denmark has changed a lot in the last 20 years, as has the rest of the weather in the rest of the world. We have just had 10 days with 31-32oC (87.8-89.6oF) degree heat. That is a lot in Denmark, when the average daytime temperature is 18.4oC (65oF) in August. [...] My interest in Linux started in 1998. There was an article in a Danish newspaper. It sounded interesting, but I forgot about it until there was a CD with Red Hat 5.2 in a Danish IT magazine in February 1999. I used Windows 95 at that time. I got a larger hard drive in my old Olivetti computer, and installed it as a dual boot with Windows 95. I was immediately sold. In March 1999, I deleted Windows, and installed openSUSE 6.0. I have only used Linux since. Why did I switch to Linux? What interested me was that it was free and open, and you could do whatever you wanted with it. I have tried further 14 other distributions down the road. The fact that PCLinuxOS is a rolling release is a big plus. PCLinuxOS is rock solid stable, with tons of packages available in the repos. If you want a solid, stable, dependable Linux operating system, then you cannot go wrong with this distro. The forums are full of helpful members that will help with all sorts of issues. This is the way Linux should be. It is the distro for me, and here I intend to stay. What specific equipment do you currently use with PCLinuxOS? My desktop is an Intel Core i7-9700 4.7GHz 8- Core CPU. My laptop is a Lenovo ThinkPad L540 Processor: 2.6 GHz, Intel(R) Core(TM) i5- 4300M CPU @ 2.60GHz. My wife and daughter have a Lenovo ThinkPad T400 IntelCore2Duo processor P8400 (2.26GHz), 3-MBL2 cache. All computers with PCLinuxOS MATE, so we call ourselves the Linux family. # ** PCLinuxOS_Screenshot_Showcase ** # ** The_Social_Dilemma ** Thanks to profiling and classification, social networks have become giant echo chambers, real bubbles that keep people away instead of bringing them closer, and create an illusion about the perceived reality that is very powerful and real. I already had the opportunity, using YouTube, to access a channel of extremist ideas, in political terms, with a YouTuber who had a strong speech against his opponents, and often insulted people who did not share his opinion. I will not mention the channel or YouTuber, since he does not deserve advertising or any other means to spread his extremist views. And, I accessed his channel a long time ago when it was a small channel, and when videos from his channel appeared on my timeline again, I chose to ignore them. It was content that is not important to me. Okay, his videos never appeared on my timeline again. Some time passed, about two years, more or less, and I was curious: Did that guy’s channel close? No more videos of him ever appeared on my timeline, and I thought he had shut down his channel and given up. I looked for the channel, searching in YouTube, and there was his channel, firm and strong, with over 100 thousand subscribers. And I was speechless: Yeah, being rude and spreading hate speech is worth it. Gee, I’m doing it wrong, with my innocent Linux videos. I should speak ill of others and gain followers. However, this classification that applications make of the public transformed the internet into echo chambers, which separated people by their tendencies, their profiles. The danger of that? It was simple: minorities think they are majorities, think that everyone thinks the same way (because the algorithm hides different ideas) and creates a distorted view of reality. Thus, groups of people on social networks cannot be analyzed as majorities, or minorities. In fact, it’s not even possible to know its size, since the algorithms make it difficult for people with different characteristics to interact, creating bubbles and filling these bubbles with certain groups, each classified in a different way, which is not transparent to its users. # ** Welcome_From_The_Chief_Editor ** That was the lesson that my wife and I received early in October. The person delivering that message? My seven year old son, Ryan. On an otherwise calm October 11, that “calm” was shattered when Ryan’s grandmother — my 78 year old mother — fell at her home next door while cooking dinner, hit her head on the kitchen cabinets, and was unconscious. My 15 year old niece ran over to our house, crying and telling my wife that Grandma had fallen, and there was blood everywhere, and she wasn’t waking up. Now, my wife and I have the same occupation. We’re both respiratory therapists, just at different hospitals. We are quite accustomed to dealing with emergency situations. As for me … I was at work at a small hospital 40 miles away. My wife was at home, with the kids (Ryan and Lexi), cleaning the house. Quickly, my wife asked if anyone had called 911, as she quickly put on some different clothes other than the ragged ones she was wearing to clean the house. Hearing this, and unbeknownst to anyone else, Ryan picked up the phone and called 911 himself, for his grandmother. # **** IBM/Red Hat/Fedora **** # ** More_Changes_Begin_Lining_Up_For_Fedora_34 ** Fedora 33 was just released at the end of October but already a number of change proposals are building up for Fedora 34 due out next spring. Fedora 34 has already seen some proposals around security enhancements, a 64-bit ARM KDE Plasma desktop spin, further compressing the install media, switching the KDE spin to using Wayland by default, and more. Over the past day there have been some additional change proposals published. # ** Council_policy_proposal:_Policy/process_for_adding video_content_to_YouTube_channel_–_Fedora_Community Blog ** The Council is putting out a new process to allow community members to publish videos on the official Fedora Project YouTube Channel. The objective behind this proposal is both to encourage more people to contribute and to bring more attention to the channel. The proposal has three parts: the content, the format, the process. # **** Debian Family **** # ** Ben_Hutchings:_Debian_LTS_work,_October_2020 ** I was assigned 6.25 hours of work by Freexian’s Debian LTS initiative and carried over 17.5 hours from earlier months. I worked 11.5 hours this month and returned 7.75 hours to the pool, so I will carry over 4.5 hours to December. [...] I updated linux (4.9 kernel) to include upstream stable fixes, and issued DLA-2420-1. This resulted in a regression on some Xen PV environments. Ian Jackson identified the upstream fix for this, which had not yet been applied to all the stable branches that needed it. I made a further update with just that fix, and issued DLA-2420-2. # **** Canonical/Ubuntu Family **** # ** Ubuntu_Touch_OTA-14_brings_support_for_more_phones, bug_fixes,_and_more ** The developers of the Ubuntu Touch operating system for smartphones and tablets have released Ubuntu Touch OTA-14. Coming just a little over a month after OTA-13, the biggest changes include support for installing the Linux-based operating system on additional hardware, including mobile devices running Android 9. Among other things, that means you can now install Ubuntu Touch on Google Nexus 6P or Xiaomi Redmi 4X smartphones or a Sony Xperia Z4 tablet. It also means that when the Volla Phone ships, the Ubuntu version of that smartphone should be fairly well supported. # ** Ubuntu_21.04_Daily_Builds_Are_Available_to_Download ** Ubuntu 21.04 daily builds are now available for download, kickstarting official development on the release that devs have dubbed the ‘Hirsute Hippo’. A new live .ISO will be produced each day between now and mid April, which is when the final stable release of Ubuntu 21.04 is due for release. There’s not an awful lot of “new” stuff to see in the images at the time of writing but that will change as development kicks into gear, new apps are packaged, and upstream development trickles on down. Many testers install an early daily build and update it every day until the final, stable release arrives — though naturally there’s high chance of hitting bugs, breakages and other bumps in the road during the ride to release town! # ** Ubuntu_21.04_daily_builds ** # ** Ubuntu_Groovy_Gorilla_on_Raspberry_Pi ** On the 22nd of October, the 20.10 release was launched, an Ubuntu Desktop image optimised for the Raspberry Pi. It brings together Ubuntu and Raspberry Pi for educators, inventors and entrepreneurs, bringing the world’s most open platform to the world’s most accessible hardware. o **** Devices/Embedded **** # ** Librem_5_Linux_phone_mass_production_begins,_shipments start_mid-November ** The Librem 5 has been under development for several years. It was one of the first modern Linux smartphones to be announced, and Purism has been one of the major forces behind the modern surge in phone-friendly Linux operating systems. The smartphone will be able to support a variety of open source operating systems, but it will ship with a mobile version of Purism’s PureOS that features the phosh (phone shell) user interface designed by Purism to make the OS touch-friendly. Since phosh is open source, it’s also been adopted as one of the optional user interfaces for other smartphone Linux projects such as postmarketOS and Manjaro Mobile. If you buy a PinePhone Community Edition phone with either of those operating systems pre-installed, phosh is the default user interface. But the Librem 5 is a bit more powerful than the PinePhone. It has a faster processor and a larger battery. It also has a much higher price tag – the PinePhone sells for $150 to $200, while the Librem 5 costs $749. # ** Raspberry_Pi_400_is_a_PC-in-a-keyboard_for_$70_and_up ** Raspberry Pi has been selling tiny, inexpensive computers and accessories since 2012. But while Raspberry Pi hardware has become popular with enthusiasts and home users, the organization’s single-board computers were originally targeted at students, educators, and makers. The new Raspberry Pi 400 is something different: a full-fledged computer stuffed inside a keyboard. It’s basically a modern take on the Commodore 64 and similar personal computers from decades past. A key difference? The Raspberry Pi 400 is incredibly affordable, with prices starting at just $70. # ** Raspberry_Pi_security_add-on_helps_evaluate_Connected_Home over_IP_spec ** Infineon’s “Optiga Trust-M eval kit” is a Pi add-on for evaluating the ZigBee Alliance’s Connected Home over IP home automation standard. The eval kit is built around a Trust-M Shield2Go board equipped with the EAL6+-compliant Trust-M security chip. Infineon Technologies, which is primarily known in these pages for its widely used Optiga TPM security chips, has announced a Raspberry Pi add-on equipped with a different security technology called Optiga Trust. Specifically it integrates an Optiga Trust- M Shield2Go board equipped with its Optiga Trust- M security chip, which complies with the Common Criteria Certified EAL6+ (high) spec. Although the Optiga Trust-M eval kit can be used to evaluate the Trust-M technology, which provides anchor of trust security technology for connecting IoT devices to the cloud, it’s primary purpose is to evaluate the ZigBee Alliance’s Connected Home over IP automation standard. # ** ICOP_VEX2-6415_SBC_runs_DOS,_QNX,_Linux,_Windows_on Vortex86EX2_“Dual_OS”_x86_processor ** DM&P Vortex86EX2 is a dual-core x86 processor that supports legacy ISA and PCI interfaces, and designed in a way that makes it capable of running two OS independently, easy with its own BIOS, without the need for virtualization, nor a hypervisor. At the time, we also covered the Vortex86EX2 evaluation board from the company, but the first commercial product that has come to my attention is ICOP VEX2-6415 Vortex86EX2 SBC designed for automation and IoT, and which the company says support “Windows Embedded Compact 7, Windows Embedded Compact 6, various of (sic) Linux distribution, QNX, and even the legacy but still popular DOS”. # ** Librem_5_Laptop_Mode ** The Librem 5 can now change from factors easily. Connect it to a powered USB-C dock to enable desktop mode. Or connect it to a laptop dock to turn your phone into a fully working laptop. The software is quickly improving around connection and detachment of the docks. Settings has a new section to configure any attached displays. You’ll also find a new dock toggle in the top dropdown. This allows you to drag around windows freely as well as disables the onscreen keyboard. # **** Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications **** # ** Next_year’s_Android_flagships_will_put_this_year’s flagship_phones_to_shame ** # ** Samsung_One_UI_3_with_Android_11_to_rollout_soon: Some_Galaxy_phones_to_get_it,_yours_may_not_be_on_the list ** # ** Nokia_launches_new_4K_streaming_box_to_bring_Android to_big_screens ** # ** Hands-on:_T-Mobile’s_Android_TV_dongle_is_great_for TVision,_but_there’s_no_other_reason_to_buy ** # ** Micromax’s_two_new_budget_phones_promise_a_clean interface_and_two_years_of_Android_upgrades ** # ** Spectralink_Introduces_the_Versity_92_Series_Android Smartphone_that_Delivers_Voice-Critical_Communication for_Frontline_Workers ** # ** [Update:_Rolling_out]_YouTube_for_Android_gets_new sheet-based_UI_for_video_descriptions ** o **** Free, Libre, and Open Source Software **** # **** Web Browsers **** # **** Mozilla **** # ** TenFourFox_Development:_TenFourFox_FPR29b1 available ** TenFourFox Feature Parity Release 29 beta 1 is now available (downloads, hashes, release notes). Raphaël’s JavaScript toggle is back in the Tools menu but actually OlgaTPark gets most of the credit this release for some important backports from mainline Firefox, including fixes to DOM fetch which should improve a number of sites and adding a key combination (Command- Option-R in the default en-US locale) to toggle Reader View. These features require new locale strings, so expect new language packs with this release (tip of the hat to Chris T who maintains them). The usual bug and security fixes apply as well. FPR29 will come out parallel with Firefox 78.5/83 on or about November 17. # **** Productivity Software/LibreOffice/Calligra **** # ** The_Document_Foundation_Calls_On_Apache_OpenOffice To_Work_Together ** Twenty years ago, in 2000, the OpenOffice (OO.org) source code was open sourced by Sun Microsystems. I remember it well. Back then, in my naivete as a Windows user, I was excited about the announcement. It wasn’t as a contributor or programmer, but I was excited about the growth potential for an office suite other than Microsoft Office, which has/had always been consistently priced out of my reach or budget. In those days, OpenOffice was managed and developed by Sun Microsystems. This was after Sun purchased StarOffice from its German owners in 1999. Prior to that, StarOffice originated as StarWriter in 1985. THEN came along Microsoft’s introduction of the OOXML (Office Open XML) document format, which especially created havoc for users of anything other than Microsoft Office. We see them today, represented with the familiar *.docx, *.xlsx and *.pptx file extensions. For quite a while, OO.org users were stymied in their attempts to open, read, or edit OOXML documents. Kludgy extensions and workarounds were presented (from what I remember), but none of them “cured” the problem. Plus, Oracle was incredibly slow to address the issues and concerns over the lack of OO.org users to be able to read these new office document file formats. I remember having to ask users of MS Office (at that time) to PLEASE send me any Office files in the older *.doc/*.xls/*.ppt formats, just to ensure that I would be able to open, read, and possibly edit those files. For a file format that was presented as a unifying force for office documents, it sure seemed to create a LOT of havoc for users of anything that was not Microsoft created or blessed. # **** CMS **** # ** Senaite:_An_Open-source_Enterprise-grade_Laboratory Information_Management_System_(LIMS) ** Senaite is a free open-source self-hosted laboratory information management system (LIMS) that built for enterprise. It offers several features which are cost and resources effective with a rich set of add-ons and a strong supportive community of developers behind it. In this article we demonstrate Senaite’s features and how it helps enterprise through an efficient management for labs, lab equipments and reduce the turnaround time. # **** Programming/Development **** # ** Rejuvenating_Autoconf_[LWN.net] ** GNU Autoconf, a widely used build tool that shines at compatibility with a variety of Unixes, has accumulated many improvements since its last release in 2012 — and there are patches awaiting review. While many projects have switched to other build systems, interest in Autoconf remains. Now, a small team (disclaimer: including me) is rejuvenating it, working through some deferred maintenance and code review. A testable beta is now out, a new stable release is due in early November, and interested parties can build on this momentum to further refresh the rest of the GNU Build System (also known as Autotools). [...] Autoconf has built-in support for various compiled languages: C, C++, Objective C, Objective C++, Fortran, Erlang, and Go. More crucially, it performs feature detection with knowledge of a wide variety of POSIX platforms. If you are building new software that has few arcane dependencies and your users are all on modern Linuxes plus FreeBSD, or if you want to make Ninja build files, perhaps you’d be better served using alternatives such as CMake, SCons, or Meson — and indeed many projects have switched away from the GNU Build System over the years, including GTK+ and KDE. Complaints that the GNU Build System is slow, complex, and hard to use have been aired (including in LWN’s comment threads) for years. However, if your customers need to be able to build a shared library on Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, IRIX, and all the BSDs, then Autoconf will come in handy. # ** R_Programming:_A_Step-by-Step_Tutorial_for_Beginners ** In this article, we will explore another type of programming language used in the data science field. Apart from the Python programming language, R programming is one of the most popular programming languages used for statistical analysis of data. R programming is not only limited to statistical analysis but also expand its functionalities to a graphical representation of data. R was primarily written in C and Fortran programming languages. A group of statisticians, also known as R Development Core Team, developed R programming and under GNU General Public License 4 distribution. R’s reputation in the field of data science is quite impressive. R programming is quite unique in implementation compared to C, Pascal, Python, Java, and other programming languages. [...] In this example, different age groups plots in a graphical way. This might not be a good representation, but what I want to emphasize in this article is the usage of ggplot or R programming in general. Using the ggplot package, you can incorporate beautification in your graphs, too. Anyways, there are a lot of packages available that you can explore in CRAN or in R depending on your needs. Furthermore, most of these packages are open source and free. Don’t be afraid to use this resource out; you’ll be amazed at how it improves your programming process! # **** Perl/Raku **** # ** News_regarding_GraphViz2_|_Ron_Savage_ [blogs.perl.org] ** Ed J has taken over maintenance of my suite of GraphViz2 modules. The first change has been to split it into multiple distros, so that anyone using just GraphViz2 will have a much smaller download and only 6 pre-reqs. Another change is to rework the decision, which I copied from the original www.graphviz.org, and which meant nodes and port names were joined with a colon. For e.g. MS Windows users wanting to represent disk names like C:, this is clearly problematic. # **** Python **** # ** The_recurring_request_for_keyword_indexing_in Python_[LWN.net] ** Python has keyword arguments for functions that is a useful (and popular) feature; it can make reading the code more clear and eliminate the possibility of passing arguments in the wrong order. Python can also index an object in various ways to refer to a subset or an aspect of the object. Bringing the idea of keywords to indexing would provide a way to get the clarity benefit for indexing operations; doing so has been discussed in Python circles for a long time. Some renewed interest, in the form of lengthy discussions on the python-ideas mailing list and a new Python enhancement proposal (PEP), look like they just might take keyword indexing over the finish line. Back in 2014, PEP 472 (“Support for indexing with keyword arguments”) was created to push the idea, but it was rejected in 2019, largely because it failed to “gain any traction” in the interim. Since then, it has featured twice in lengthy python-ideas threads. Caleb Donovick raised it roughly a year ago, which generated a lively thread. Then, in May, Andras Tantos brought it up again, though he did not get much of a response for several months. But when Stefano Borini, one of the PEP 472 authors, replied in July, the ball started rolling. # ** My_Favorite_Technical_Blogs_and_Mailing_Lists |_Caktus_Group ** I keep up with what’s happening in my field by following a number of blogs and an occasional email list. I don’t read everything posted in all of these, but by scanning the topics in a feed reader, I can keep up with what’s going on, without wasting a lot of time. # ** Introduction_to_Scrapy:_Web_Scraping_in_Python |_Codementor ** Scrapy is an open-source web scraping framework, and it does a lot more than just a library. It manages requests, parses HTML webpages, collects data, and saves it to the desired format. Hence, you don’t need separate libraries for every other step. You can also use middlewares in scrapy. Middlewares are sort of ‘plugins’ that add additional functionalities to scrapy. There are plenty of open-source middlewares that we can attach to scrapy for extra features. This article will teach you how to collect data from webpages using scrapy. More specifically, we will be scraping Craigslist, and collect some real state data from their webpage. It would be good to have some prior HTML/CSS experience but you can proceed even if you are not familiar with HTML as a tiny portion of this article has been dedicated to HTML. # ** Public_key_cryptography:_SSL_certificates ** In the context of public key cryptography, certificates are a way to prove the identity of the owner of a public key. While public key cryptography allows us to communicate securely through an insecure network, it leaves the problem of identity untouched. Once we established an encrypted communication we can be sure that the data we send and receive cannot be read or tampered with by third parties. But how can we be sure that the entity on the other side of the communication channel, with which we initiated the communication, is what it claims to be? In other words, the messages cannot be read or modified by malicious third- parties, but what if we established communication with a malicious actor in the first place? Such a situation can arise during a man-in-the-middle attack, where the low-level network communication is hijacked by a malicious actor who pretends to be the desired recipient of the communication. In the context of the Internet, and in particular of the World Wide Web, the main concern is that the server that provides services we log into (think of every service that has your personal or financial data like you bank, Google, Facebook, Netflix, etc.) is run by the company that we trust and not by an attacker who wants to steal our data. In this post I will try to clarify the main components of the certificates system and to explain the meaning of the major acronyms and names that you might hear when you deal with this part of web development. # **** Shell/Bash/Zsh/Ksh **** # ** How_to_keep_an_eye_on_field_numbers ** Both AWK and cut use numbers rather than names when operating on fields. * **** Leftovers **** o ** Joe_Biden_believes_Democrats_will_be_‘winners’_and_urges Americans_to_‘unite’_and_‘heal’ ** Joe Biden has said he is confident of winning the US presidency but held back from declaring a win as he secured the key battleground states of Michigan and Wisconsin. Mr Biden, who has received more than 71,000,000 votes, the most votes in US history, was joined by his running mate Kamala Harris at the news conference, as he edges closer to the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency. “I will govern as an American president,” Mr Biden said, before adding: “There will be no red states and blue states when we win. Just the United States of America.” Speaking in Delaware, as votes continued to be counted for several US states, Mr Biden said: “It’s clear that we’re winning enough states to reach 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency.” o **** Science **** # ** Inherited_Neanderthal_Gene_Encodes_Genetic_Risk_for_COVID- 19 ** Svante Pääbo created the science of detecting Neanderthal DNA in archeological samples (and living humans) almost single-handedly (see Neanderthal Man: In Search of Lost Genomes). So it will come as little surprise to many that he published a paper in September describing his discovery of a gene derived from our Neanderthal ancestors (and inherited by modern humans) that encodes a risk factor for infection with the etiological agent for COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2. The paper, entitled “The major genetic risk factor for severe COVID-19 is inherited from Neanderthals” and published in Nature, builds on genetic association studies that disclosed a gene cluster located on human chromosome 3 that relates to respiratory failure in response to COVID infection. Separately, other researchers had shown that this cluster was a “major risk factor” for severe COVID symptoms in 3,200 infected, hospitalized patients. In this paper, Dr. Pääbo and his collaborator show that the genetic element responsible for this phenotype resides in a 50 kilobase (kb) genomic segment inherited from our Neanderthal ancestors and is disproportionately found in humans from South Asia (50%) as compared with Europeans (16%). o **** Integrity/Availability **** # **** Proprietary **** # **** Pseudo-Open Source **** # **** Entrapment (Microsoft GitHub) **** # ** Short_Topix:_Could_Microsoft_Be_Looking To_Linux_For_The_Next_Version_Of_Windows? ** I know … it sounds like a horror film, huh? But TechRepublic’s Jack Wallen and ZDNet’s Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols both think it might be a good idea. I just know you’re screaming at the top of your lungs about now. If you are like many Linux users, most of whom are Microsoft “refugees anyways, there are many, many reasons for your skepticism and fear. For years, Microsoft professed its intense hatred of Linux. They bragged about how they were planning to “eradicate the cancer known as Linux from the computing world. Then, almost overnight, Microsoft professed its “love for Linux. Microsoft joined the Linux Foundation. Linux users RAGED! The “enemy was making itself comfortable … in their OWN HOUSE! Most Linux users were afraid that it was the same ol’ Microsoft up to its usual games, which involved the “triple E threat: embrace, extend, extinguish. MICROSOFT WAS GOING TO EXTINGUISH LINUX FROM WITHIN! Actually, there are still many Linux users who haven’t strayed far from initial assessment. Even in the PCLinuxOS forum, we hear it fairly regularly. Ignoring for a moment Microsoft’s history of hatred towards Linux, can such a move possibly be all bad? We don’t have to look far to see the possible benefits. Back in 1999, macOS was rebased, partly, on Berkley BSD, leading to Apple joining the *nix family. Anyone would be hard pressed to argue with the results of Mac OS X (we’re not talking about the costs associated with Apple products/hardware, nor the restrictive closed environment that constrains Mac OS X). Believe it or not, Windows isn’t the flagship Microsoft product any longer. It doesn’t even come close to being a leading income producer for Microsoft. Instead, Microsoft finds its biggest profit leaders to be things like its cloud-based Office 365, and other “software-as-a-service (SaaS) products. Its Azure cloudspace is quite lucrative. Microsoft migrating Windows to Linux does make sense. Instead of having a whole bevy of programmers working on proprietary, closed-source software, most of the heavy lifting would have been done by the FOSS and Linux community. You can be certain that Microsoft will tinker with the final product. They literally can’t help themselves in that regard. # **** Security **** # ** Why_Paying_to_Delete_Stolen_Data_is_Bonkers_— Krebs_on_Security ** Companies hit by ransomware often face a dual threat: Even if they avoid paying the ransom and can restore things from scratch, about half the time the attackers also threaten to release sensitive stolen data unless the victim pays for a promise to have the data deleted. Leaving aside the notion that victims might have any real expectation the attackers will actually destroy the stolen data, new research suggests a fair number of victims who do pay up may see some or all of the stolen data published anyway. The findings come in a report today from Coveware, a company that specializes in helping firms recover from ransomware attacks. Coveware says nearly half of all ransomware cases now include the threat to release exfiltrated data. “Previously, when a victim of ransomware had adequate backups, they would just restore and go on with life; there was zero reason to even engage with the threat actor,” the report observes. “Now, when a threat actor steals data, a company with perfectly restorable backups is often compelled to at least engage with the threat actor to determine what data was taken.” Coveware said it has seen ample evidence of victims seeing some or all of their stolen data published after paying to have it deleted; in other cases, the data gets published online before the victim is even given a chance to negotiate a data deletion agreement. “Unlike negotiating for a decryption key, negotiating for the suppression of stolen data has no finite end,” the report continues. “Once a victim receives a decryption key, it can’t be taken away and does not degrade with time. With stolen data, a threat actor can return for a second payment at any point in the future. The track records are too short and evidence that defaults are selectively occurring is already collecting.” o **** Monopolies **** # **** Patents **** # ** Artificial_inventors ** The question of artificial intelligence as an inventor – and what it means for drug discovery For more than 200 years, patents have been used as a means of granting exclusive property rights to an inventor, preventing novel and inventive contributions from being taken by anyone else. Recent developments in artificial intelligence (AI) technology, however, have thrown the current system – in which patents are awarded only to humans – into question. This could have dramatic consequences for drug discovery. Patents are a central part of how pharmaceutical companies do business. Companies invest significant amounts of money into long and complex R&D cycles throughout the development of their products. Patent protection allows them to protect this investment, and continue to develop innovative new drugs and bring them to market. But, in the case of AI crunching masses of data to assist in identifying a new drug candidate, issues can arise around the question of inventorship. This could pose the risk that a patent for a drug identified using AI technology won’t be enforceable, thereby straining the current financial model for recovering costs of drug development. And if pharma companies can’t protect their innovations with a patent, they’ll simply stop spending money on AI research, leaving many valuable new cures, particularly for rare diseases, undiscovered. # **** Software Patents **** # ** Second_Fortress_Amicus_Filed ** On November 3, 2020, Unified Patents, together with CableLabs, filed a second amicus brief in the refiled Intel Corp. v. Fortress Investment Group LLC, et al., and took the opportunity to help educate the Court on Fortress’ now- frequent practice of using high- interest recourse loans to acquire questionable patents for serial assertion. A copy of the as-filed brief can be found below, and a copy of the original brief, which went into detail about litigation financing and other forms of serial NPE assertion, is also listed below. ╒═══════════════════ DAILY LINKS ════════════════════════════════════════╕ ****** 11.05.20 ****** ***** Links_5/11/2020:_Linux_5.9.5,_SparkyLinux_5.13,_Collabora_Online_6.4.0 ***** Posted in News_Roundup at 4:23 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz [GNOME bluefish] **** Contents **** * GNU/Linux o Distributions o Devices/Embedded * Free_Software/Open_Source * Leftovers * **** GNU/Linux **** o **** Desktop/Laptop **** # ** My_new_PC_arrived! ** I’ll publish later a blog-post to describe the setup I selected and review if digital-painting/ video/CGgraphics feels good with it on GNU/Linux o **** Audiocasts/Shows **** # ** Ubuntu_Podcast_from_the_UK_LoCo:_S13E33_–_New_shoes_on_the table ** This week we’ve been hacking Steam controllers and making fast home directories. We round up the Ubuntu community news, discuss the 21.04 codename, Raspberry Pi images for Ubuntu MATE, Trisquel 9.0, snap speed improvements and turn our lights on and off from GNOME Shell. We also round up some news from the rest of the tech world. o **** Kernel Space **** # ** Dell_enables_Linux_hardware_privacy_controls ** Working from home has come with problems a few of us ever considered before. Just ask well-known New Yorker writer and pundit Jeffrey Toobin who was caught, uh, amusing himself, on a Zoom call. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could be sure your webcam and microphone were off? Dell thinks so, which is why they’ve offered Linux kernel code to support its Dell Privacy controls. # ** Linux_5.9.5 ** I'm announcing the release of the 5.9.5 kernel. All users of the 5.9 kernel series must upgrade. The updated 5.9.y git tree can be found at: git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/ stable/linux-stable.git linux-5.9.y and can be browsed at the normal kernel.org git web browser: https://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/stable/ linux-s... thanks, greg k-h # ** Linux_5.4.75 ** # ** Linux_4.19.155 ** # ** Linux_4.14.204 ** o **** Benchmarks **** # ** AMD_Ryzen_9_5900X/5950X_Linux_Gaming_Performance ** After just publishing the results of 200+ Linux benchmarks under many diverse workloads for the Ryzen 9 5900X and Ryzen 9 5950X we see the 16~20% performance lift is very real and very broad from obscure open-source niche software through high profile programs… What about the Linux gaming performance? This article offers a first look at the Ryzen 9 5900X/5950X Linux gaming performance compared to Zen 2 and the Core i9 10900K while being the first of several Linux gaming performance articles coming out this month. This article is intended to offer a first-look at the Linux gaming performance with the Ryzen 5900 series while further tests are forthcoming. For this comparison was the Intel Core i9 10900K up against the Ryzen 9 3900XT, Ryzen 9 3950X, Ryzen 9 5900X, and Ryzen 9 5950X at stock speeds and 2 x 8GB DDR4-3600 memory throughout. # ** AMD_Ryzen_9_5900X_+_Ryzen_9_5950X_Dominate_On_Linux ** o **** Applications **** # ** Glimpse_Image_Editor_on_Linux:_A_Free_Cross-Platform_Photo Editor ** The Glimpse image editor is the best photo editing tool for Linux distributions. Many users have been complaining about why there is no Adobe Photoshop on Linux? How I edit photos on Linux? Well, the Glimpse is not as powerful as Adobe Photoshop; no doubt, this tool is one of the best alternatives to Adobe Photoshop for Linux distributions. Glimpse has a lot of features to edit your photo like a professional editor. Installing the Glimpse on Linux distributions is a very straight forward process. o **** Instructionals/Technical **** # ** Join_the_peer_to_peer_social_network_Scuttlebutt_using OpenBSD_and_Oasis ** SSB is decentralized, meaning there are no central server with clients around it (think about Twitter model) nor it has a constellation of servers federating to each others (Fediverse: mastodon, plemora, peertube…). SSB uses a peer to peer model, meaning nodes exchanges data between others nodes. A device with an account is a node, someone using SSB acts as a node. The protocol requires people to be mutual followers to make the private messaging system to work (messages are encrypted end-to end). # ** How_To_Install_Rar/Unrar_on_Centos_8_–_idroot ** In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Rar/Unrar on CentOS 8. For those of you who didn’t know, RAR is the most popular tool for creating and extracting compressed archive (.rar) files, but unfortunately, the Rar tool doesn’t pre-installed under Linux systems, we need to install it using third-party tools to open, extract, uncompress or unrar archive files. 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 through the step by step installation of Rar/Unrar on CentOS 8. # ** How_To_Install_TYPO3_on_Ubuntu_20.04_LTS_–_idroot ** In this tutorial, we will show you how to install TYPO3 on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. For those of you who didn’t know, TYPO3 is an enterprise open source content management system based on PHP. It’s intended for ease of use to allow owners and enterprises to create powerful and dynamic content websites. If you’re looking for a functional, higher performance content management system to manage your websites or blogs and 100% free, then you’ll find TYPO3 to be helpful. 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 through the step by step installation of TYPO3 CMS 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. # ** How_To_List_/_Start_/_Stop_Docker_Containers_–_LinuxBuz ** A Docker container is a lightweight and executable package of software that has everything you need to run an application, In simple term, a container is a running instance of an image. You can run multiple containers using the same image at the same time on the host operating system. # ** How_to_Backup_an_Arch_Linux_System_–_Linux_Hint ** To this day, I dread losing my week’s long hard work to an unprecedented hard-drive malfunction. It happened to me once, and I’m sure some of you can relate to this. I’ve learned my lesson since and have always made sure to keep a backup ready. In this post, you’ll see how to back up your ArchLinux system with rsync. For those of you who are unfamiliar, rsync is a free and open-source Linux utility that synchronizes files in a remote computer with an external HDD. For this reason, it serves as a means to secure your files by transferring it to a backup server. # ** How_to_Install_MATE_desktop_in_ArchLinux_–_Linux_Hint ** MATE is a free and open-source desktop environment that is compatible with a variety of Linux distribution. It features a graphical interface that is both straightforward and functional. It is meant to be an unofficial successor to GNOME 2 and an alternative to the GNOME 3 shell as many users were unhappy with the changes. As such, it has preserved and maintained the GNOME 2 code. In this short, step-by-step guide, you will see how to set up the MATE desktop environment on ArchLinux. # ** How_to_Manage_Containers_Using_Podman_and_Skopeo_in_RHEL_8 ** One of the challenges developers faced in the past is getting applications to run reliably across multiple computing environments. Oftentimes, applications didn’t run as expected or encountered errors and failed altogether. And that’s where the concept of containers was born. # ** How_to_Run_an_Offline_OCR_Tool_on_a_Chromebook_|_Beebom ** Chromebooks are generally looked down upon when it comes to performing heavy operations related to digital publishing, media conversion, photo editing, and so on. However, there are certain ways you can perform many of the tasks if you have the penchant to solve problems. In this article, we are taking a look at how to run a powerful offline OCR tool on a Chromebook. You will be able to convert images and non-searchable documents using a powerful OCR service. So on that note, let’s go ahead and find the instructions to perform OCR conversion on a Chromebook. # ** How_to_Set_Up_FDE_in_ArchLinux_–_Linux_Hint ** Full disk encryption (FDE) is one of the best security measures you can take to protect data in your device’s storage. As the name implies, FDE encrypts the contents (files, software) of a storage drive in its entirety, including the operating system itself. FDE can be activated in Linux, Windows, and macOS, as well as Android systems. With FDE enabled on your device, you will need to provide an encryption key on each login attempt. Once you enter the correct encryption key, the disk is decrypted, and your device will boot as usual. FDE should not be confused with File Level Encryption (FLE), as the latter only protects individual files that have been encrypted manually by the user. It should also be noted that Full Disk Encryption only works as long as the user has logged out of the system. Once an authorized user logs into the system, Though not adequate on its own, FDE serves as a great first step toward securing your data from unauthorized access. In this tutorial, you will learn how to set up ArchLinux with Full Disk Encryption with UEFI firmware mode and in a GPT disk partition. # ** How_to_install_Olive_Video_Editor_on_Linux_|_FOSS_Linux ** Olive Video Editor being cross-platform, can work on multiple operating systems, including Linux, Windows, and macOS. Here’s how to install it on a Linux PC. # ** How_to_install_Tor_on_Ubuntu_20.04?_–_Linux_Hint ** In this post, you will learn how to install Tor. As most of you are probably familiar with it, Tor is the go-to option for people who wish to remain anonymous on the web. It secures the personal information of its users, conceals their IP address, their browsing history, and even allows them to communicate without having to worry about their ISPs or some hackers monitoring them. Users can access both deep web and clear net with Tor. This brief tutorial will show you how to install the Tor browser on ubuntu 20.04 for a more private, secure web experience. # ** How_to_install_the_Apache_Cassandra_NoSQL_database_server on_Ubuntu_20.04_–_TechRepublic ** Wanting to up your database game? If so, you’re probably need a NoSQL database. Jack Wallen shows you how to install Apache Cassandra to scratch that itch. # ** How_to_make_Debian_Linux_faster ** As a Linux user, you may have experienced a decrease in the speed of your system over time. There can be a number of common suspects that lead to lower system performance, including a large number of heavy applications at startup, sub- optimal configurations, and many other factors. In this article we will discuss some ways to help you improve your system’s performance. The commands and procedures mentioned in this article have been run on a Debian 10 system. # ** How_to_move_MediaWiki_into_a_Linux_container_|_Enable Sysadmin ** In this next installment of this moving services to Linux containers series, we look at how MediaWiki can operate in a containerized environment. # ** How_to_send_Linux_application_logs_to_AWS_CloudWatch ** AWS CloudWatch is a monitoring service provided by the AWS cloud. AWS provides default monitoring for server parameters like CPU Utilization, Network In, Network Out, etc. AWS CloudWatch can be used for custom monitoring like disk utilization and memory (RAM) utilization. For custom monitoring, we need to follow some steps to get it monitored. In the same way, AWS CloudWatch can be used to monitor the server or application logs. As this is not a default feature from AWS for obvious reasons, we can configure it as per our requirements. It will depend on the user what logs we need to send to AWS CloudWatch for monitoring. # ** Install_and_Configure_NFS_–_Linux_Hint ** Network File System (NFS) is an application that allows users to access and modify files on a remote computer as if they are accessing the local storage of their own computer. It is what is called a distributed file system, and it serves as a centralized filing system for a large network of computers. NFS works with networks shared by systems with different operating systems. The administrator can also select which sections of the mounting information are made available to the client systems. This article shows you how to install and configure NFS on your ArchLinux system. # ** Installing_Apache_Cassandra_on_Ubuntu_20.04_–_Linux_Hint ** Cassandra is used by thousands of firms worldwide to save and retrieve thousands of terabytes of data in an environment that is both painstakingly detailed yet easily accessible. Its reliability, along with its high fault tolerance, has earned the reputation it holds today. The DB Engine Ranking puts Cassandra at the top of their wide column store ranking. In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to set up Apache Cassandra, one of the best NoSQL databases systems that is both free and open-source, which offers high linear scalability, along with low latency operability. It was originally conceived to support the inbox search feature on Facebook and has since improved until it was hailed as the most time- efficient and scalable distribution database. # ** Installing_Sublime_Text_3_on_Ubuntu_20.04_–_Linux_Hint ** Sublime Text is a fast, reliable, and versatile shareware source code editor used by many front and back-end web developers around the world. The vanilla editor can be personalized and customizable, with hundreds of plugins available on the web. It supports well over 20 programming languages, including C++, Ruby, Python, and Java. For the speed, swiftness, and intuitive IDE, Sublime Text 3 has it all to offer that every app developer should at least give it a try. In this brief tutorial, you’ll see how to install Sublime Text 3 on Ubuntu 20.04 as a user with Sudor privileges. If you have root access, don’t include Sudo before the commands. # ** Installing_and_Configuring_Fail2ban_on_Ubuntu_20.04_– Linux_Hint ** Fail2ban is a Python-based utility that provides security against cyber attacks like DDoS attacks, bot attacks brute-forcing, and such. It is both free and open-source and can be used on POSIX systems, which include a local firewall. To summarize how Fail2ban works, it actively looks out for signs of potential password authentication abuses to filter out IP addresses and regularly update the system firewall to suspend these IP addresses for a certain period. This brief guide will show you how to set up Fail2ban on your Ubuntu 20.04 system. # ** Tutorial/Walkthrough:_Full_Disk_Backup_&_Restore_with Rescuezilla_–_YouTube ** I’ve recently had a chance to test out Rescuezilla, which is an awesome utility you can use to take a full backup image of your hard disk (among other things). In this video, I show off the process of capturing a backup and saving it in a network share, and then I go over the process of recovering it. # ** Set_up_Postman_on_Ubuntu_20.04_–_Linux_Hint ** Developing an API from scratch can be a tedious process. Its management can also be equally exhausting and demanding. It’s an entire project that requires rigorous oversight and dedication and encompasses a wide range of life cycle processes. Fortunately, we have Postman to make things easier for us. Postman is a utility that is used to create the Application Programming Interface (API), as well as automate their testing, publishing, and management. From its rather humble beginnings as a browser extension, it has gradually evolved into one of the most preferred collaborative platforms for API development. Postman is compatible with almost every commercial operating system, as well as Linux. This guide will teach you how to install and get started with Postman on Ubuntu 20.04. # ** Configure_Arch_Linux_Themes_with_GNOME_tweaks_–_Linux_Hint ** You’re probably familiar with GNOME tweak if you’re an advent user of GNOME 3. GNOME tweak is fairly easy to use, and it features a great many options to choose from to personalize how the interface looks on ArchLinux. In this article, how to tweak and customize your ArchLinux themes with a tool called GNOME tweak is explained. o **** Games **** # ** FBX_importer_rewritten_for_Godot_3.2.4_and_later ** I’m Gordon MacPherson (RevoluPowered), a C++ contractor from the United Kingdom. I’ve worked in games for a while now, building upon general software development experience from electronics and RF equipment. I found Godot while working on personal game projects, and started being involved as a contributor a bit over a year ago. In particular, I was very lucky to work as a consultant at Prehensile Tales for IMVU’s Godot projects. This work involved adding support for the FBX 3D asset exchange format to Godot. # ** Tactical_turn-based_combat_with_two_versions_of_America, Möbius_Front_’83_is_out_now_|_GamingOnLinux ** The latest game from Zachtronics is out now with Möbius Front ’83, a turn-based tactical strategy game that has America face off against America from an alternate universe. Note: key provided by their PR team. “The year is 1983 and the United States of America must defend itself from an enemy it could have never imagined— an America from an alternate universe that will stop at nothing to seize control of the country’s heartland! In Möbius Front ‘83 you will fight tactical, turn-based battles with the cutting-edge military hardware of the early 1980s. Use every tool available — powerful tanks, fast- moving attack helicopters, long-ranged artillery, tenacious infantry, and more — to control the complex and rapidly-changing battlefield of the era.” # ** If_you_play_World_of_Warcraft_on_Linux_with_Wine,_check out_WowUp_for_addons_|_GamingOnLinux ** While it’s true that World of Warcraft doesn’t support Linux, it has been playable on Linux for years thanks to the Wine compatibility layer and it appears even sorting addons is now a breeze. I don’t personally play WoW, however, I am aware of just how popular the addon scene is for this MMO and how WoW continues to have plenty of Linux players. Recently, I came across an open source tool called WowUp, which is a “World of Warcraft addon updater” and it has quite an impressive feature list. Not only is it open source with a Linux version, I’ve also been shown by our livestreamer just how easy it is to use with WoW and Wine together. Our livestreamer usually shies away from setting things up and she had no issues using it, which is partly thanks to it having a nice clear interface. # ** Hacking_and_social_deduction_game_Untrusted_enters_Beta_| GamingOnLinux ** Up for a little mystery, hacking and trying to figure out who is out to get you? Untrusted is an online multiplayer (10 to 16 players) hacking/ social deduction game. Inspired by the classics Werewolf/Mafia, “in Untrusted, hackers from the fictional NETSEC group are tasked in hacking a specific server on a computer network. NETSEC members must use their skills and wits to outsmart the undercover AGENTs that will try each night to perform arrests or have other players become snitches for them.”. # ** Why_I_Stopped_Using_Linux_for_Gaming_–_YouTube [Ed: Chris Titus trolling again or click-baiting with "Why I Stopped Using Linux for Gaming"] ** Yeah… this happened, 2020 one heck of a year. # ** Minecraft_has_a_first_snapshot_up_for_the_huge_Caves_& Cliffs_update ** # ** Valve_rolls_out_Steam_Playtest_to_devs,_new_Steam_Beta_up with_Linux_improvements_|_GamingOnLinux ** Valve announced last night that they’re beginning the proper roll-out of Steam Playtest, a system that allows developers to bring in testers without messing with beta keys. Additionally, a new Steam Client Beta is up. For developers, this new Steam Playtest (announcement) system is going to be extremely useful. Usually when developers want to invite players to test, they have to mess about with manually producing keys and sending them out. Keys have long caused issues, and while this won’t replace other methods like handing out keys, it sounds better. We actually mentioned this feature a while ago, when Valve were testing it with the first title. The idea is that Steam store pages get a big button for users to request access, and developers can manually invite users too. # ** Check_out_our_exclusive_Linux_demo_of_the_RTS_‘Liquidation –_Echoes_of_the_Past’_|_GamingOnLinux ** Liquidation – Echoes of the Past is an upcoming real-time strategy game from Kiwi Brothers Studio, and we have an exclusive early Linux tech demo for you. It’s somewhat related tech-wise to Loria, another RTS that’s already available for Linux as Liquidation – Echoes of the Past is being built with an upgraded version of some tech used in it along with the Unity game engine in collaboration with the Loria developer. o **** Desktop Environments/WMs **** # **** K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt **** # ** Introducing_User_Feedback_in_Dolphin ** I’m happy to announce that the next version of Dolphin will introduce support for reporting of some telemetry data to the KDE servers. It’s important to stress the the data will be submitted only if the user actively enables the feature from the Dolphin settings. Telemetry data can be very helpful to developers, but it may seem uninteresting to an end user. My personal opinion is that enabling telemetry is actually one of the easieast ways to contribute to KDE, if not the easieast. You just need to enable the reporting and you go on with your usual workflow. Dolphin relies on the KUserFeedback framework to submit the data, which is already used by other projects such as Plasma or Kate. o **** Distributions **** # **** SUSE/OpenSUSE **** # ** openSUSE_Developers_Kickoff_Leap_15.3 ** Members of the openSUSE community are separated by great distances, but that didn’t keep them from coming together virtually on Nov. 4 to kickoff the development of the next release;openSUSE Leap 15.3! Several people attended the kickoff, which lasted a couple hours, and the kickoff started with a video from Release Manager Lubos Kocman. The kickoff video shared some news about the development and shared the Roadmap. Leap 15.3 follows the same setup established in the Open Build Service for the openSUSE prototype Jump, which is a new way for building the community distribution using SUSE Linux Enterprise sources and binaries to make the distributions virtually alike. # **** Arch Family **** # ** Best_Linux_Operating_Distro ** Linux is a great operating system which is powerful and allows users to customize their operating system. Still, you know that Linux operating systems are a little bit complex for the new user. Apart from it, the use of the Linux system also differs according to the users’ requirements. Hence it is important to know about the best Linux operating distros to use according to the requirements. This article has some of the best Linux operating distros as per their features and their popularity among Linux users. # ** Best_Linux_Distros_to_Install_On_a_USB_Stick ** # **** IBM/Red Hat/Fedora **** # ** Second_release_of_koji-osbuild ** We are happy to announce the second release of koji-osbuild, the project to integrate osbuild-composer with koji. This is a bugfix release to fix issues uncovered after its first deployment. Below you can find the official changelog from koji-osbuild-2. All users are recommended to upgrade # **** Debian Family **** # ** SparkyLinux_5.13_Is_Now_Available_for_Download_with Latest_Debian_Buster_Updates ** SparkyLinux 5.13 comes about four months after SparkyLinux 5.12 and it’s synced with the Debian GNU/Linux 10.6 Buster software repositories as of November 3rd, 2020. This means that if you want to install SparkyLinux, you’ll get all the latest updates and security patches out of the box in your new installation. As expected, the new ISO release includes various updated components like Linux kernel 4.19.152 LTS for 64-bit and 32-bit computers, Linux kernel 5.4.72-v7+ LTS for ARMhf platforms, Mozilla Firefox 78.4.0 ESR web browser, Mozilla Thunderbird 78.4.0 email client, LibreOffice 6.1.5 office suite, and VLC 3.0.11 media player. # ** Sparky_5.13 ** A next point release of Sparky 5.13 “Nibiru” of the stable line is out. This release is based on Debian stable 10 “Buster”. Changes between 5.12 and 5.13: • system upgraded from Debian stable repos as of November 3, 2020 • Linux kernel 4.19.152 (PC) • Linux kernel 5.4.72-v7+ (ARMHF) • Firefox 78.4.0esr • Thunderbird 78.4.0 • VLC 3.0.11 • LibreOffice 6.1.5-3 • LXQt 0.14.1 • Xfce 4.12.5 • Openbox 3.6.1 # **** Canonical/Ubuntu Family **** # ** Ubuntu_Touch_OTA-14_Arrives_With_Improved_Android_9 Device_Support ** After Ubuntu Touch OTA-12 and OTA-13 this year, the UBports team has now announced the release of its fourteenth stable Over-the-air (OTA) update called Ubuntu Touch OTA-14. As usual, the new OTA means Ubuntu Touch will support more mobile devices, driver updates, hardware support, and other improvements. # ** Ubuntu_Groovy_Gorilla_on_Raspberry_Pi ** On the 22nd of October, the 20.10 release was launched, featuring an Ubuntu Desktop image optimised for the Raspberry Pi. It brings together Ubuntu and Raspberry Pi for educators, inventors and entrepreneurs, bringing the world’s most used open-source desktop to the world’s most accessible hardware. Learn more about the new release from our blog posts or catch up on YouTube for the full story and how to get started. Rhys Davies, Raspberry Pi Product Manager and Martin Wimpress, Desktop Engineering Director, were the hosts of the live event where we shared all the surprises that we prepared for you with our Raspberry Pi partners. # ** Get_Windows_7_Aero_Flip_3D_alike_Alt+Tab_Task Switcher_in_Ubuntu_20.04 ** Fancy some 3D effects on your Ubuntu Desktop? There’s a gnome shell extension that enables Windows 7 Aero Flip 3D style ‘Alt+Tab’ app window switcher in Ubuntu. Coverflow Alt-Tab is the extension works on Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 20.10, Ubuntu 18.04, and all other editions with Gnome 3 desktop. # ** The_Hunt_for_Rogue_Time_–_How_we_investigated_and solved_the_Chromium_snap_slow_startup_problem ** In October, we shared a blog post detailing significant snap startup time improvements due to the use of a new compression algorithm. In that article, we focused on the cold and hot application startups, but we did not delve much into the first-run setup scenario. While running our tests, we observed a rather interesting phenomenon, primarily on the Fedora 32 Workstation system. On a particular laptop, we noticed that the initial snap launch took about 60 seconds, whereas cold launches would take about 10 seconds. We decided to analyze this problem, and once we did, we realized there’s an amazing investigative story to be shared, including some really cool findings and general advice for developers on how to optimize their snaps. # ** Open_Infrastructure_Summit_2020:_Highlights_from Canonical’s_first_digital_OIS_|_Ubuntu ** Another Open Infrastructure Summit just passed, and yet this one was like no other OIS past. Head-sponsoring the first ever virtual OIS was an interesting experience to say the least, with more than 10,000 community members worldwide hoping on the hand-built OIS platform to see what’s new in the open infrastructure space, connect, and – why not? – get their hands on some goodies from their favourite brands! The theme of Open Infrastructure Summit 2020? Couldn’t be more pertinent: ‘The Next Decade of Open Infrastructure’. In other words, this conference was all about change, and evolving to meet with the tech demands to move forward. Canonical had much to say on the topic, with founder and CEO Mark Shuttleworth delivering a live keynote on what he predicts for the future of open infra, as well as a number of our team members giving technical talks on OpenStack related topics such as VNF, OVN, cloud and edge solutions, as well as pricing considerations. You can now access all of Canonical’s sessions on YouTube (see below) but also explore the OIS platform for the next several months to access content on-demand. # ** Ubuntu_at_ROS_World_2020:_Learn_how_to_do_more_for your_robot ** Come and connect with the Ubuntu robotics team on November 12th to answer all of your questions. This is the first time ROSCon has ever been virtual and is the first time it’s ever been free to attend, so we’re looking forward to seeing tons of new faces! We have ROS experts and field engineers ready and waiting to talk. Answers to all your Ubuntu, ROS support and security questions are just a few clicks away. We have someone stationed on the booth at all times. Come along, connect, ask all your questions and find out how Ubuntu can support your robot. And while you’re at it, grab an ROS T-shirt – we’re on the back! # ** MTS_selects_OpenStack_and_Canonical_for_cloud infrastructure_offering ** # ** MTS_selects_OpenStack_and_Canonical_for_next- generation_cloud_infrastructure ** MTS (NYSE:MBT; MOEX:MTSS), Russia’s largest mobile operator and a leading provider of media and digital services, announces the selection of Canonical’s Charmed OpenStack to power the company’s next-generation cloud infrastructure. MTS plans to leverage Charmed OpenStack’s advanced lifecycle management capabilities and flexible cloud-native architecture to better enable multi-vendor and cross-platform integration. Serving over 77 million subscribers in Russia, MTS has chosen to partner with Canonical, the publisher of Ubuntu, to further its efforts in building out a full- fledged digital ecosystem based on an open source platform. The partnership is aimed at decreasing time-to-market and speeding up deployment of new services — including toward MTS’ expected future 5G deployment — as well as reducing the total cost of ownership (TCO) of cloud infrastructure. MTS also anticipates to enhance its core technology expertise and set up a competence center for developing OpenStack-based solutions. MTS plans to begin operationally rolling out the project next year, ultimately deploying Canonical’s Charmed OpenStack solution across 11 data centers in Russia. o **** Devices/Embedded **** # ** Librem_Mini_v2_Linux_Mini_PC_features_Intel_Core_i7-10510U Comet_Lake_Processor ** Purism launches their first Linux mini PC with Librem Mini powered by an Intel Core i7-8565U Whiskey Lake processor earlier this year, and now the company has unveiled an updated model with the same features, except that Librem Mini v2 mini PC features a slightly more powerful 10th generation Intel Core i7-10510U Comet Lake processor for the same $699 price tag. # ** Purism_Launches_2nd_Gen_Librem_Mini_Linux_PC_with_a_10th Gen_Intel_Core_CPU ** Eight months after unveiling the Librem Mini small factor PC, Purism is now launching the second generation, which is powered by an all-new 10th Gen Intel Core i7-10510U (Comet Lake) processor with clock speeds up to 4.9GHz, 4 cores and 8 threads, and Intel UHD Graphics 620, making it much faster and more efficient. Just like the first generation Librem Mini, the 2nd generation is using the same mini form-factor with same ports, as well as the same free firmware and Debian-based PureOS Linux operating system as Purism’s Librem laptops. Best of all, it has the same price tag as the first generation Librem Mini Linux PC. # ** Raspberry_Pi_400_Released ** Raspberry Pi has released the Raspberry Pi 400, which Eben Upton calls “a faster, cooler 4GB Raspberry Pi 4, integrated into a compact keyboard.” In the announcement, Upton explains the origins of the new form factor, saying, “Raspberry Pi has always been a PC company. Inspired by the home computers of the 1980s, our mission is to put affordable, high-performance, programmable computers into the hands of people all over the world. And inspired by these classic PCs, here is Raspberry Pi 400: a complete personal computer, built into a compact keyboard.” The Raspberry Pi 400 is priced at US $70 for the computer or US $100 for the Raspberry Pi 400 Personal Computer Kit, which, Upton says, offers the “best possible out-of-box experience: a complete PC which plugs into your TV or monitor.” # **** Open Hardware/Modding **** # ** Celebrating_future_engineers ** # **** Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications **** # ** Best_Action_Games_for_Android_in_November_2020 ** # ** The_Android_app_that’s_single-handedly_saving_my sanity ** # ** Google_One’s_VPN_is_rolling_out_on_Android;_here’s how_to_use_it ** # ** Good_News_For_Android_Users!_Google_Chrome_is Finally_Testing_a_Much_Needed_Feature_In_Incognito_mode ** # ** Nasty_malware_attacks_iPhones_and_Android_—_what_to do_now ** # ** Why_does_my_Android_get_hot?_6_fixes_for_phone overheating_—_and_how_to_prevent_it ** # ** Happy_13th_birthday,_Android! ** # ** Amlogic_S905X4_Android_TV_&_RDK_developer_kit_ships with_ATSC,_DVB,_or_ISDB_tuners ** # ** Can_You_Change_the_Wallpaper_on_Android_TV? ** # ** How_to_Schedule_Texts_on_Android ** # ** how_to_share_apple_music_on_android_Archives ** # ** OnePlus_Nord_N100_gets_its_first_Oxygen_OS_update: Here’s_what’s_new ** # ** Google_rolls_out_November_Android_security_patch_and more_updates_for_Pixel_4a,_Pixel_5 ** # ** Boyue_Likebook_Mars_and_Ares_receive_first_update since_Android_8.1 ** # ** Snokor_iRocker_Gods_Review:_Cheaper_AirPods_for Android ** # ** Motorola’s_moto_g9_power_has_battery_life_its Android_rivals_can_only_dream_of ** # ** YouTube_On_Android_Now_Has_Full_Screen_Description ** # ** Verizon’s_nationwide_5G_network_works_on_these Android_smartphones_[Updated] ** # ** European_Redmi_Note_8T_started_receiving_MIUI_12 with_Android_10 ** o **** Free, Libre, and Open Source Software **** # **** Productivity Software/LibreOffice/Calligra **** # ** Collabora_Online_6.4.0-released ** Cambridge, United Kingdom, November 2, 2020 – Collabora Productivity is excited to announce a new, major release of our product Collabora Online, version 6.4.0. This release adds a new easier to use interface with a notebook bar as well as excellent display of Microsoft file format documents. This release not only brings a fresh look, enhanced usability, improved interoperability, and extra functionality. It also marks a harmonization of our version numbering. Collabora Online jumps from 4.2 to 6.4, to align with our other Collabora Office products: for the desktop and mobile devices. Collabora Online offers privacy as well as the only truly open-source solution for working with and collaborating on rich documents in the cloud. # **** FSF **** # ** Celebrating_35_years_of_FSF_by_John_Sullivan ** # ** Celebrating_35_years_of_FSF_by_FSF_president Geoffrey_Knauth ** # ** FSF35_birthday_messages_from_around_the_world_part_I ** # ** FSF35_birthday_messages_from_around_the_world_part II ** # ** FSF35_closing_notes ** # ** A_prerecorded_message_from_RMS ** # ** Free_software_activism_successes_in_France_with Pouhiou_and_Eda_Nano ** This presentation featured Pouhiou from Framasoft, and Eda Nano, board member of April and member of La Quadrature Du Net. The conversation is an enthusiastic discussion of PeerTube and other free software initiatives in France, as well as some insights into the motivations of the two activists. # ** Free_software_design_and_Q&A_with_David_Revoy ** FSF staff welcomed the talented illustrator and artist David Revoy, who created the beautiful designs commemorating our “coral anniversary.” We discussed David’s path to becoming a free software designer and the the tools he uses, including his preference for Krita as a free software design program. He also gave us a behind the scenes look at his design process. # ** Happy_anniversary_from_Alper_Atmaca_and_Özcan_Oğuz ** A special anniversary video from our friends at the Free Software Association in Turkey (https://www.oyd.org.tr/en/) with a hidden message. # ** How_to_organize_local_free_software_groups ** FSF staff is joined by Bonnie Mehring (FSFE), Italo Vignoli (TDF), Roberto Beltran (Free software group Miami), Lioh Moeller, and Gian Maria Daffré (Country coordinators for FSFE Switzerland) to share experiences about how to organize free software groups and drive successful activism. # **** FSF **** # **** Licensing/Legal **** # ** Is_it_morally_wrong_to_write_inefficient_code? ** [...] 8. Therefore, writing inefficient code is morally wrong. I believe the argument as laid out above is valid, in that the conclusions follow from the premises, so we will focus our energies on determining if it is sound, that is all the premises are true. We will now break it down and look at each premise more carefully. # **** Openness/Sharing/Collaboration **** # **** Open Access/Content **** # ** Redesign_open_science_for_Asia,_Africa_and Latin_America ** To overcome this problem, Indonesia’s Institute of Sciences has developed a secure national data repository called the National Scientific Repository (RIN). Each submission is tagged with metadata for ownership. The institute has held workshops to train researchers on how to use the repository, and is convening a team of national and international researchers to assess its policies for data access and reuse. The team will ask whether the RIN’s policies are suitable for this stage of Indonesia’s research development, and whether they are implemented in such a way that researchers from around the country can practise them. Crucially, the team will include researchers from many different types of university, not just the largest ones. Going forward, the institute will monitor whether the repository improves research quality. Other countries will face different issues. But a commonality will be that all stakeholders — not just the rich or prestigious ones — should be involved in finding a solution. # **** Programming/Development **** # ** A_first_look_at_the_JIT ** We’ve made many attempts at a JIT over the years that aimed for the stars only to fall down. Our latest and by far most successful attempt went for simplicity instead, trading slight inefficiencies in the generated code for ease of implementation. If we exclude the run-time assembler library we use, asmjit, the entire thing is roughly as big as the interpreter. # **** Python **** # ** Deep_Learning_with_Open_Source_Python_Software ** Let’s clear up one potential source of confusion at the outset. What’s the difference between Machine Learning and Deep Learning? The two terms mean different things. In essence, Machine Learning is the practice of using algorithms to parse data, learn insights from that data, and then make a determination or prediction. The machine is ‘trained’ using huge amounts of data. Deep Learning is a subset of Machine Learning that uses multi-layers artificial neural networks to deliver state-of-the-art accuracy in tasks such as object detection, speech recognition, language translation and others. Think of Machine Learning as cutting-edge, and Deep Learning as the cutting-edge of the cutting-edge. # ** Getting_Started_with_PIP_on_ArchLinux ** PIP is a large suite of tools that are used to automate the installation and management of python packages and modules. The name pip is an acronym for PIP Install Packages. It is essentially a package manager for non-standard python packages, those not included in the standard python library. Every developer who’s ever worked python will tell you that the community packages are a must. Having PIP at your disposal when working with python saves you a lot of time scouring for updates on the web. In this post, you’ll learn all about setting up PIP on ArchLinux. # ** How_to_Learn_Programming_Online:_Best_Websites to_Start_With ** In a constantly changing world, more and more new professions appear and gain popularity. But there is one of a few industries that remains popular decades later. It is programming. Let’s face it: self education is hard and takes years — a good programmer should learn programming the whole life as the sphere is always developing. However, I believe that a good guide makes it a little bit easier to master a new coding language. Modern online courses are more efficient and easy to follow, compared to coding books or YouTube tutorials, they are considered to be the best way to learn programming. In this article, I will explain what criteria you should consider when picking the right course and give my recommendations about platforms to start with. # ** Become_an_Author_–_Matt_Harrison_interviews Brian_Okken ** Matt Harrison, author of many Python books, is putting together a course, Effective Book Authoring, to help other people write and publish books. As part of this course, he’s including interviews with people who have already written books, including me. This is that interview. # ** Python_Doesn’t_Have_Type_Coercion ** Many programming languages have something called type coercion; it’s where the language will implicitly convert one object to another type of object in certain circumstances. Python does not have type coercion. # ** Create_A_Form_Template_–_Building_SaaS_#78 ** In this episode, I created a template for one of my new forms on the new social media app that I’m building. We talked about context data, template styling, and special considerations for forms in templates. I had an empty template for the invite sending form to begin. I filled in a first attempt at the template with a header and displaying form errors. While building that, I added some context information that was needed for the display. * **** Leftovers **** o **** Science **** # ** Of_course,_homeopaths_are_promoting_homeopathy_for_COVID- 19 ** There’s no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic has represented a golden opportunity for antivaxxers and, of course, quacks of all varieties. It makes a sort of unfortunate sense, if you think about it. For one thing, when the pandemic first started, COVID-19 was this mysterious respiratory virus that could cause severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) with respiratory failure and death, and we didn’t know a lot about the biology of SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes it, except in comparison to other coronaviruses that had caused serious disease, such as the original SARS and SARS-Middle Eastern respiratory syndrome (SARS- MERS) and was much more dangerous and lethal to the elderly and people with significant comorbidities (i.e., diabetes) than it was to younger people. Early on, the virus seemed more lethal overall because testing was insufficiently widespread to detect everyone infected with it, meaning that only symptomatic (and sometimes only very symptomatic) patients were tested. However, as the pandemic dragged on it became apparent that, although COVID- 19 is considerably more lethal than influenza, even the H1N1 strain, a large fraction of COVID-19 cases are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic, particularly among people under 50. It also became apparent that these younger patients could spread the virus even while asymptomatic, thus fueling the easy spread of the pandemic. So it shouldn’t be too surprising that homeopaths started touting homeopathy, as an effective preventative or treatment for COVID-19 being touted by the Hahnemann society and a Swiss doctor named Jens Wurster. o **** Education **** # ** President-For-Life_Hopeful_Donald_Trump_Issues_Executive Order_Mandating_‘Patriotic’_Education_For_Kids ** When schools finally re-open to everyone and COVID is behind us (est. 2025), students will possibly have the chance to join their friends in some good old-fashioned American reeducation. God bless this autocracy. # ** Tax_the_Rich._School_the_Children._Pay_the_Teachers. ** o **** Health/Nutrition **** # ** ‘Taking_Sledgehammer’_to_Failed_US_Drug_War,_Oregon_Votes to_Decriminalize_Narcotics_as_Five_States_Legalize_Marijuana ** “Huge night against the War on Drugs.” # ** One_Thing_Very_Certain_After_Election_Day:_‘Coronavirus Spreading_Like_Wildfire’ ** The U.S. is “entering the most concerning and most deadly phase of this pandemic… leading to increasing mortality,” warned Dr. Deborah Birx earlier this week.  # ** The_Great_Barrington_Herd_Immunity_Hoax ** Trump’s current pandemic science adviser, Stanford University’s Hoover Institute Dr. Scott Atlas, last spring put his name to the so-called Great Barrington [Mass.] conference and its  declaration that calls for allowing COVID-19 to spread “naturally” in order to achieve “herd immunity” — the so-called point at which enough people have been infected, and allegedly then become immune, to effectively stall transmission of the pathogen in the general community. “Leading lights” from prestigious Harvard and Oxford Universities were conference participants presumably to lend “scientific legitimacy” to this auspicious gathering. The Great Barrington nationally-orchestrated spectacle was sponsored by the American Institute for Economic Research, a rightwing think tank that partners with the Charles Koch Institute, founded by the billionaire industrialist Koch brothers. Their proclamation claiming endorsements from some 40,000 “science and health specialists,” insists that everyone must be “free” to return to “normal life” with zero restrictions, that is, no masks, social distancing, testing, quarantines, etc. Among these endorsers, according to a skeptical UK source is one “Dr. Johnny Bananas.” We have yet to check out the others. None of the Great Barrington declaration’s “scientific” assertions have been peer reviewed. Yale Assistant Professor of Public Health Gregg Gonsalves stated, “They’re staking out a radical claim that has very little support in the scientific community, so it’s not as if there’s like a scientific debate. It’s sort of flat earth versus the world is round.” # ** In_Kashmir,_There_are_No_Migrants_to_Reap_the_Rice_Harvest ** He was working in the family’s small field – less than an acre – after 10 years. “I stopped working here myself because migrant labourers [mainly from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh] would do more work in less time, which saves me money,” he said. “But now, if ‘outside’ labourers don’t come,” added 62-year-old Rehman, a former government employee, “I might have to give up paddy farming.” In Central Kashmir’s paddy fields, migrant labourers are usually paid Rs. 1,000 for harvesting one kanal of paddy (8 kanals equal 1 acre), and 4- 5 labourers working as a team manage to harvest 4- 5 kanals in a day. Local labourers have been asking for higher rates – Rs. 800 per person as daily wages, and four labourers usually harvest 1 kanal a day (rarely 1.5 or 2). That’s a total of Rs. 3,200 per kanal. o **** Integrity/Availability **** # **** Proprietary **** # **** Pseudo-Open Source **** # **** Entrapment (Microsoft GitHub) **** # ** RIAA_Takedowns_Backfire_as_Pirated_MP3s Now_Surface_on_GitHub ** Two weeks ago the RIAA asked GitHub to remove the open-source stream-ripper software youtube- dl. This request wasn’t well- received by developers, many of whom retaliated by posting copies of the code. Yesterday, things went from bad to worse when a user with the name ‘F*** T** RIAA’ uploaded three MP3s of the songs the RIAA mentioned in its takedown notice # **** Security **** # ** Security_updates_for_Thursday ** Security updates have been issued by Debian (bouncycastle, gdm3, and libonig), Fedora (arpwatch, thunderbird, and trousers), openSUSE (chromium, gn), Red Hat (freetype, libX11, thunderbird, and xorg-x11- server), and SUSE (ImageMagick, java- 11-openjdk, salt, and wireshark). # **** Privacy/Surveillance **** # ** The_next_big_privacy_battles:_cross- border_data_flows_and_data_localization ** A couple of weeks ago, this blog looked at a rather unexpected consequence of the decision by the EU’s top court, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), to strike down the Privacy Shield framework that legalizes most flows of personal information from the EU to the US. In the wake of that decision, France’s national data protection authority, CNIL, not only said that key US companies like Microsoft should not be allowed to transfer personal data of EU citizens, but that an EU company ought to handle the data, not one based in the US. That’s an extreme data protection position that has rarely been raised before by a government agency. It may be an outlier, but there are increasing signs that the EU authorities are moving in a similar direction in their thinking. # ** Turkey_Doubles_Down_on_Violations_of Digital_Privacy_and_Free_Expression ** Turkey’s recent history is rife with human rights-stifling legislation and practices. The Internet Law, its amendments, and the recent decision of Turkey’s regulator (BTK) further cemented that trend. The Internet Law and amendments require large platforms to appoint a local representative, localize their data, and speed up the removal of content on-demand from the government. Turkey has also adopted a data protection law; however, it has failed to protect fundamental rights in practice. For instance, Turkey implemented emergency surveillance decrees, after the 2016 coup, that granted the Turkish government unrestricted access to communications data without a court order—a carte blanche for government spying. Platforms should stand with their users and uphold international human rights law and standards that protect privacy and free expression. We fear that platforms instead might knuckle under pressure from the Turkish government. All these legal changes are happening in the midst of Turkey’s rule of law and democracy deficit, and lack of independence in the judiciary. Turkey has dismissed and forced the removal of more than 30 Turkish judges and prosecutors, which the European Commission explained has led to self- censorship in the judiciary, further undermining its independence and impartiality. The government has also jailed political opponents, which the European Court of Human Rights has recognized, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the extensions of detention of a political opposition leader had pursued the predominant ulterior purpose of stifling pluralism and limiting freedom of political debate, a core component of a democratic society. # ** Twitter_Adds_“Misleading”_Information Warning_to_Trump_Tweets ** Facebook affixed a label below a video clip from Trump’s early Wednesday speech, in which he falsely claimed victory. Twitter has added labels to two of President Donald Trump’s tweets about the presidential election as part of its effort to clamp down on misinformation on its platform. o **** Defence/Aggression **** # ** Media_Fail_to_Prepare_Public_for_Potential_Trump_Coup ** # ** Blue_dots_painted_in_front_of_Biden_supporters’_homes_in California ** The Roseville Police Department told The Hill that the dots were about 10-12 inches in size and painted on the street in front of houses with Biden yard signs. # ** Homeland_Security_Thinks_Everything_Looks_Like_Terrorism ** A concerned law enforcement source provided The Nation with this Department of Homeland Security intelligence report about alleged violent threats associated with this summer’s protests against police brutality and mass incarceration. Its use of counterterrorism terminology shows the DHS’s tendency to see terrorism threats where they may not exist. # ** Vienna_attack:_Austria_admits_failing_to_act_on_Slovak warning_on_gunman ** It has also emerged he was released early from a jail sentence last December for trying to join jihadists in Syria. # ** The_New_Humanitarian_|_The_humanitarian_fallout_of_the Nagorno-Karabakh_conflict ** Battle for control of Nagorno-Karabakh has frequently plunged the South Caucasus into turmoil, but the latest hostilities are threatening to cause a regional humanitarian crisis, with tens of thousands of civilians displaced amid resurgent COVID-19 outbreaks and at the onset of winter. Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan but populated by ethnic Armenians who reject Azerbaijani rule and run the territory as a de facto independent state. After the Soviet Union collapsed, a war broke out that ended in 1994 when Armenia forced out Azerbaijan’s troops and occupied several territories around the enclave, displacing hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijanis in the process. The conflict is currently on a disastrous trajectory: The previous war was fought over several years and claimed more than 30,000 lives, but nearly 150 civilians and at least 1,200 soldiers have been killed in the last six weeks alone. o **** Environment **** # ** The_CO2_and_Temperature_of_the PETM ** # ** As_US_Officially_Quits_Paris_Accord_Amid_Election Uncertainty,_Progressives_Say_‘Make_This_Disastrous_Decision Temporary’ ** “The U.S. exit from the Paris agreement is a shameful act and is especially cruel at a time when the world is reeling from devastating disasters worsened by climate change.” # ** U.S._Now_Officially_Out_of_the_Paris_Climate_Agreement ** The U.S. is now the only country to withdraw from the accord. # ** US_Now_Officially_Out_of_the_Paris_Climate_Agreement ** The U.S. has officially left the Paris climate agreement. # ** Paris_Agreement:_Don’t_Count_the_US_Out_Just_Yet ** The vast majority of people in the United States support the Paris Agreement. # ** Trump_Officially_Leaves_Paris_Agreement_After_Years_of Environmental_Wreckage ** On the day after a consequential presidential election, the U.S. has officially pulled out of the Paris climate agreement. Despite being the world’s second-largest emitter of carbon dioxide, the U.S. is now the only country in the world that has left the accord. # ** U.S._formally_exits_Paris_climate_change_pact_amid election_uncertainty ** Some 189 countries remain committed to the 2015 Paris accord, which aims to keep the increase in average temperatures worldwide “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), ideally no more than 1.5C (2.7 F), compared to pre- industrial levels. A further six countries have signed, but not ratified the pact. Scientists say that any rise beyond 2 degrees Celsius could have a devastating impact on large parts of the world, raising sea levels, stoking tropical storms and worsening droughts and floods. # **** Wildlife/Nature **** # ** Sawing_the_Sacred:_Felling_the_Djab_Wurrung Directions_Tree ** This elevation of mood provided ideal distraction for another ugly event. Early last week also saw the arrest of 60 people protesting the removal of a fiddleback tree deemed sacred to some members of the Djab Wurrung people. It was akin, one academic suggested, to seeing Notre Dame cathedral in Paris burn. The tree was the fruit of a practice involving the placing of a child’s placenta, with a seed, into the earth. This is not the only one: other birthing trees of even older vintage are threatened by the Western Highway upgrade. Over centuries, they have provided sanctuary for the safe delivery of generations of Djab Wurrung people. The removal of the 350 year old “directions tree” – a spiritual site for guidance – is seen as cold and necessary business, part of a widening of a section of the Western Highway between Buangor and Ararat. It is also a stretch of highway connecting Melbourne and Adelaide, a bloody section of road known for fatalities and injuries. In the words of Premier Daniel Andrews, “If we waited around for an absolute consensus, then that deadly stretch of road would go unimproved, and we would see more people dying.” # ** Indigenous_Burning:_Myth_and_Realities ** Here are some representative of indigenous burning will save the forest articles. Fire tore through the Karuk tribe’s homeland. Many won’t be able to rebuild # ** Save_the_Whale,_Save_Ourselves ** In June 27, 2019, the writer Ed Yong published a story in The Atlantic with an anguishing statistic: Five North Atlantic right whales had been found dead in less than a month. Five dead represented more than 1 percent of a quickly vanishing population. Within hours of publication the story was updated to include a sixth dead whale, spotted on a surveillance flight earlier that day. Five days later, too late then to update the story, a seventh whale went missing. By the end of the summer, eight North Atlantic right whales were dead. The tragedy was outpacing the news cycle, our attention, and our appetite for grief. # ** Australian_forests’_smoke_climbed_20_miles_in_2019 ** Blazing Australian forests made their mark high in the stratosphere and cast a cloud that lingered for months. o **** Finance **** # ** Deep_Pockets:_Funding_the_Arts_During_the_Pandemic ** These hills provide the home for a group of cultural venues where music, theater, art, and dance take center state primarily during the summer months. Most venues have suffered financially during the Covid-19 pandemic either shutting down entirely, or operating with limited performances in limited settings. The same forces that drive the US economy also fund, to some extent, these venues. Ticket sales don’t pay the bills, so venues look to donors, some with enormous pockets. Such is the case in what will continue soon into the “winter of our discontent.” # ** COBOL_and_$2,020,202.02 ** If you ever see this you know it was (almost certainly) a programming mistake made in COBOL. Most COBOL programmers have made this bonehead mistake and I am no exception. The problem is caused by the way COBOL programmers typically initialize a record. Given this little program: [...] o **** AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics **** # ** Trump_Campaign_Demands_Recount,_Even_Though_He_Was_Against Recounts_in_2016 ** The race between President Donald Trump and Democratic candidate for president Joe Biden remains too close to make any definitive calls for either to be the clear victor quite yet, but if trends in a number of key areas keep holding true, it appears that Biden may defeat the incumbent president. # ** Election_Day_2020,_Early_in_the_Morning ** # ** Biden_Underperforms_and_Trump_Stokes_Chaos_by_Claiming False_Victory ** President Trump has prematurely declared victory and falsely accused Democrats of “major fraud,” even as millions of ballots continue to be counted across the United States amid an unprecedented wave of mail-in ballots widely believed to favor Democratic challenger Joe Biden. The two campaigns appear neck and neck in several battleground states key to winning the White House, but early results suggest Democrats performed worse than they had hoped, setting up a potential legal fight over uncounted ballots reminiscent of the 2000 election. We spend the hour discussing the results and what comes next, with Ben Jealous, president of People for the American Way and former head of the NAACP; Briahna Joy Gray, formerly the national press secretary for the 2020 Bernie Sanders campaign, and co-host of the “Bad Faith” podcast; and The Nation’s John Nichols in the battleground state of Wisconsin. “The tragedy of this election, regardless of what the outcome ends up being, is that it was ever this close at all,” says Gray. “The crime here is that the vote is this close.” # ** While_World_Awaits_Presidential_Result,_Progressive ‘Squad’_Expands_in_the_House ** The four congresswomen are joined by Jamaal Bowman and Mondaire Jones, both of New York, along with Missouri’s Cori Bush and Marie Newman in Illinois. # ** ‘We’re_Ready_to_Mobilize’:_As_Trump_Moves_to_Steal Election,_500+_Demonstrations_Planned_to_Protect_the_Results ** “We expected Trump and Republicans to try every trick in the book to cling to power. Join the movement to stop a constitutional crisis.” # ** America_Wakes_Up_to_a_Near_Worst-Case_Scenario ** Trump’s bogus victory claim, likelihood of a gridlocked D.C. reveal a still-broken nation. # ** We_Will_Be_There ** # ** Roaming_Charges:_The_Fuck_Up ** + I predicted in my column last Friday that the polls were underestimating Trump’s support (or voter indifference to Biden) by 3 percent. It looks more like 5 to 6 percent in many of the decisive states. In Wisconsin, for example, Biden was favored by 8 percent. At 2Am, he was leading by 0.3 percent. The elite consultants and pollsters may have fucked up more profoundly than the Democrats who relied upon their statistical sorcery. + In the midst of a killer pandemic and mass unemployment, the Democrats could have offered the nation a universal health care plan, a moratorium on evictions and a guaranteed basic income. Instead, they believed that the key to victory over Trump was to meld neoliberal economics with a neoconservative foreign policy. I don’t know where they got this idea. Probably, the same place Obama got his health insurance plan, the Heritage Foundation. # ** Trump’s_DOJ_Still_Pretending_Everything_Has_An ‘Interstate’_Nexus_To_Throw_Federal_Charges_At_Protester ** The Trump Administration’s desire to turn protests against police brutality into an antifa conspiracy have failed. But not for a lack of trying. Federal officers have been sent to major cities still experiencing unrest, but arrest data and DOJ press releases show there’s very little evidence that coordinated groups of anarchists are behind the violence and property destruction witnessed around the nation. Instead, it appears to be a loose assortment of white dudes who’ve spent too much time talking themselves up on social media. # ** With_McConnell-Led_GOP_Poised_to_Hold_Senate,_Progressives Fear_‘Disastrous’_Obstruction_as_Covid_Spreads_and_Planet Burns ** “Joe Biden could be elected president, but without the Senate, there’s a massive risk that he becomes a failed president unable to appoint any judges or enact any progressive policies.” # ** Biden_Campaign_Condemns_Trump_False_Victory_Claim_as ‘Naked_Effort_to_Take_Away_the_Democratic_Rights_of_American Citizens’ ** “If the president makes good on his threat to go to court to try to prevent the proper tabulation of votes, we have legal teams standing by ready to deploy to resist that effort. And they will prevail.” # ** “He_Doesn’t_Decide…_We_the_People_Do”:_Trump_Denounced_for False_Election_Night_Claim_of_Victory ** “We must count every vote, and prepare for what’s coming,” warned one progressive activist. “This is a crucial moment to defend democracy from fascism at home.” # ** The_Day_After ** As of last night, Nov. 3 late, it was exactly that, according to CNN. 44 to 248. This morning, Nov. 4, it’s come down to NV, AZ, WI, MI likely ending up for Biden once final votes are counted; and GA, NC likely for Trump. With Pennsylvania undetermined for days yet. And maybe weeks should Trump take legal action to stop the mail in vote count, which is likely. As I also predicted last week, Trump came before the TV cameras late last night Nov. 3 and declared the election was a fraud, that the vote counting of mail in ballots should halt in all the swing states only, and that he was going to the US Supreme Court. # ** Chile’s_Referendum_Vote_Should_Advance_Progressive Political_Changes ** Voters chose either yes or no on holding a constituent assembly that would create a new constitution. They also indicated their preference as to whether the constituent assembly would consist of 155 delegates all elected by the people, or would be “mixed,” with half the delegates being members of Chile’s Congress and other half elected by the people. Results showing 78.2% of the voters in favor of a constituent assembly and 79.2% of them choosing an entirely elected one had “force enough to be respected by the financial, civil, and military bastions of conservatism,” according to a report; 49% of those eligible did not vote. Delegates will be selected at a national election on April 11, 2021. The new Constitution will be submitted to a popular vote no later than August 2022. # ** Lincoln_Project_‘Epically_Failed,’_Say_Progressives_as Trump_Wins_Bigger_Share_of_Republican_Voters_Than_in_2016 ** “Turns out there were no ‘Biden Republicans.’” # ** Trump_Has_Not_Won,_No_Matter_What_He_Says ** It’s outright dangerous to have a leader who refuses to acknowledge a sound democratic process. # ** Everyone_Needs_to_Be_More_Furious_Right_Now ** Trump and gangster Republicans are now very openly trying to steal a presidential election. # ** ‘Every_Vote_Must_Be_Counted’:_Democracy_Defenders_Face_Off Against_Trump_Lies_About_Election_Results ** “Politicians do not get to decide whose votes will count and whose votes won’t count. We choose our politicians, they do not choose us.” # ** While_World_Awaits_Presidential_Result,_Progressive “Squad”_Expands_in_the_House ** With the world anxiously awaiting the results of a presidential race that some have called “a matter of life and death,” the four progressive congresswomen who burst onto the national political scene in 2018 and quickly became known collectively as “the Squad” expanded their informal team in the U.S. House on Tuesday by at least four. # ** As_Wisconsin_Called_for_Biden,_Trump_Campaign_Baselessly Cries_‘Irregularities’_and_Demands_Recount ** “While the counts are still continuing, our position remains the same: we feel good about what we are seeing,” said Biden’s campaign manager. # ** We_Now_Know_What_America_Is ** After four years of Trump, millions of Americans have still chosen to vote for him. # ** Gideon_Concession_to_Collins_Dashes_Democratic_Hopes_to Oust_Reviled_Maine_GOP_Senator ** The four-term Republican’s win follows her much- maligned vote to confirm Justice Brett Kavanaugh. # ** U.S._Democracy:_The_Four-Year_Rule? ** American democracy is in rough shape. It’s going to take more than this election to set it right. # ** The_UK’s_Report_on_Labour_Party_Antisemitism ** The EHRC concluded that the Labour party, then led by Jeremy Corbyn, could have tackled antisemitism more effectively if the leadership had chosen to do so. Despite the media frenzy in the Tory press (and the pro-Zionist Guardian), the report didn’t uphold the claim by the Jewish Labour Movement, which issued the first complaint, that Labour is “institutionally antisemitic”. # ** Third_Party_Now_for_2024 ** If Biden wins, the same pressure, in terms of mass protests and direct action, must be used against a Biden administration as it has been against a Trump administration, taking place even before Biden’s inauguration. A Biden administration won’t care about your progressive tweets, emails, or petitions, just as the Obama administration didn’t care – just ask the fossil fuel industry, the banks and the weapons manufacturers. That Biden offered nothing to progressive interests in this campaign, including leaking potential Republican cabinet members, but no potential progressive cabinet members, means the progressive vote is not just expected, but considered obligatory and not worthy of paying attention to by the DNC and the Biden/ Harris administration and future 2024 campaign. I do not think Trump will try to stay in office if he loses, despite his declarations. He’ll, of course, make a fuss and cry fraud and wrongdoing, but this will be to set up his MAGA TV venture with a ready-made narrative of the need for righteous and redemptive justice. Such media, targeting potentially 60 million “robbed” voters, sets the Trump Empire up for billions in revenue and places his son, Don Jr., at the head of the GOP. Don Jr will run in 2024 and Trump will make more money all while continuing to lie, fantasize and play a pied piper to tens of millions of Americans who are looking for a leader due to the very real effects of economic disaster, societal change and demographic shift. # ** No_Country_for_Old_Democrats ** Even if Joe Biden is somehow put in the White House (all those combinations of winning Arizona and finding 700,000 spare ballots in Pennsylvania), he will still have lost this election. Come 2021, the Senate will remain under the thumb of the Dickensian Mitch McConnell; the Supreme Court will begin construing its original intent constitutional theories (a cross between the Torah, Ten Commandments, and sharia law); and House Republicans can begin their live feeds to the QAnon web site (free pizza with every subscription). # ** If_Trump_Tries_to_Sue_His_Way_to_Election_Victory,_Here’s What_Happens ** A hearing on Wednesday in an election case captured in miniature the challenge for the Trump campaign as it gears up for what could become an all-out legal assault on presidential election results in key swing states: It’s easy enough to file a lawsuit claiming improprieties — in this case, that Pennsylvania had violated the law by allowing voters whose mail-in ballots were defective to correct them — but a lot harder to provide evidence of wrongdoing or a convincing legal argument. “I don’t understand how the integrity of the election was affected,” said U.S. District Judge Timothy Savage, something he repeated several times during the hearing. (However the judge rules, the case is unlikely to have a significant effect; only 93 ballots are at issue, a county election official said.) “A lawsuit without provable facts showing a statutory or constitutional violation is just a tweet with a filing fee,” said Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. # ** Amid_Upheaval,_People_Vote_in_Record_Numbers_Across_the Region ** # ** What_It’s_Like_to_Vote_When_You_Have_COVID-19 ** # ** While_Social_Media_Was_Quick_To_Highlight_And_Limit_The Spread_Of_False_Claims_Of_Election_Victory,_Traditional_Media Just_Let_It_Flow ** For four years, all we’ve been hearing about is how social media was this terrible source of disinformation that had to be regulated because they were destroying democracy and all that. And so what happened last night/early this morning when Donald Trump falsely tried to claim he had won prior to all the votes being counted? Twitter and Facebook both reacted pretty quickly to flag the information, and highlight that it was misleading or false (and Twitter limited the ability to share it). # ** Election_Day_Mayhem_Began_Two_Years_Ago_With_Massive_Voter Purges ** You didn’t hear this in the cable TV chatter: In the two years leading up to this election, Georgia’s GOP secretary of state quietly wiped away the voter registrations of 198,351 voters — based on false information. # ** DeJoy_Will_Have_to_Testify_in_Court_After_USPS’s_Failed Mail-In_Ballot_“Sweep” ** A federal judge in Washington, D.C., said on Wednesday that the United States Postal Service’s (USPS) Postmaster General Louis DeJoy must testify in court or be deposed to account for a failure to “sweep” facilities for ballots, as the judge ordered on Tuesday. # ** For_the_Postal_Service,_a_Frantic_Election_Day_Turns_to Finger-Pointing_the_Day_After ** At a major regional U.S. Postal Service facility in Pennsylvania, Election Day passed in a frantic blur of identifying and processing ballots. “It’s crazy. It’s absolutely nuts,” a manager at the center said last night as she separated absentee ballots to be express mailed to meet deadlines. # ** Whether_the_GOP_Can_Stop_Voters_From_Legally_Fixing Rejected_Mail-In_Ballots_Could_Decide_the_Election ** Victoria Benedict, a stationery store owner in Atlanta who has been voting by mail for years, was surprised last month when she went to the Georgia secretary of state’s website and found her ballot had been rejected. A problem with her signature — the state said the one on her ballot did not match what it had on file — set her on a dayslong quest to make sure her vote would be counted. County staff told her that she would either have to show up at the local election office to sign her ballot or vote in person on Election Day. Either option would risk her health during a pandemic. Instead, on the advice of a friend who volunteers with the state’s Democratic Party, she filled out a form known as a ballot cure affidavit. This time, her vote was accepted. # ** Election_Day_2:_Live_Updates_About_the_2020_Ballot_Count ** # ** Trump_Campaign_Is_Suing_to_Stop_Michigan_and_Pennsylvania From_Counting_Votes ** President Donald Trump’s campaign manager announced that the Republican candidate for president would be suing the state of Michigan to stop counting votes from the presidential election that took place on Tuesday. # ** The_Simple_Reason_Polls_Failed_So_Hard_in_2020 ** In a word, proxies. Pollsters are about to start searching for ways to measure people’s opinions without asking them directly. Because yeah…that clearly doesn’t work. # ** American_Presidents ** I have hardly blogged on the US Presidential elections for two reasons. Firstly the debate is so polarised that many people are oblivious to rational argument that moves outwith the few favoured memes of each side, and I have more than enough abuse in my life already. Secondly, it is some years since I spent any substantial length of time in the USA, and it is a country I find that I understand less and less. I prefer to blog about things where I bring not just judgement, but an extra store of knowledge. # ** Election_Too_Close_to_Call:_Biden_Underperforms_&_Trump Stokes_Chaos,_Claiming_False_Victory ** President Trump has prematurely declared victory and falsely accused Democrats of “major fraud,” even as millions of ballots continue to be counted across the United States amid an unprecedented wave of mail-in ballots widely believed to favor Democratic challenger Joe Biden. The two campaigns appear neck and neck in several battleground states key to winning the White House, but early results suggest Democrats performed worse than they had hoped, setting up a potential legal fight over uncounted ballots reminiscent of the 2000 election. We spend the hour discussing the results and what comes next, with Ben Jealous, president of People for the American Way and former head of the NAACP; Briahna Joy Gray, formerly the national press secretary for the 2020 Bernie Sanders campaign, and co-host of the “Bad Faith” podcast; and The Nation’s John Nichols in the battleground state of Wisconsin. “The tragedy of this election, regardless of what the outcome ends up being, is that it was ever this close at all,” says Gray. “The crime here is that the vote is this close.” # ** Trumpism_Is_Alive_and_Well_—_and_It_Won’t_Go_Away_Even_If Trump_Does ** The final results of the 2020 presidential and congressional elections remain unresolved this morning. Even absent an outcome, there are many in the U.S. and around the world who will call Tuesday’s closer-than-expected election a disaster, an abject national humiliation, and a punch in the throat to every medical professional who waded into Donald Trump’s pandemic wearing trash bags and masks dipped in Lysol so they could help save lives. # ** Deutsche_Bank_May_Seize_Trump’s_Assets_If_He_Loses_and Fails_to_Repay_Debt ** Deutsche Bank is searching for a way to end its tumultuous relationship with President Donald Trump after the election following years of negative media coverage stemming from their relationship, a new report reveals. # ** Trump_Roundly_Ridiculed_by_Activists,_Artists,_and_Others After_Lying_About_Swing_State_Landslide ** Prominent Twitter users claimed everything from a full head of hair to “the Commonwealth of Bradley Cooper” in refuting the president’s latest lies.  # ** Standing_United_Against_Trump’s_Threat_to_Democracy, Protesters_From_Coast_to_Coast_Urge_Officials_to_‘Count_Every Vote’ ** “Right now, election officials are continuing to count millions of votes across the country, Biden is ahead in the Electoral College and the popular vote, and the outcome of this election will be decided by the voters, not Donald Trump.” # ** As_Michigan_Called_for_Biden,_Trump_Supporters_Condemned for_Chanting_‘Stop_the_Count!’_at_Detroit_Ballot_Center ** The president’s campaign filed lawsuits in Michigan and Pennsylvania to temporarily halt the tallying of votes in both battleground states. # ** ‘It’s_Just_a_Slaughter’:_Montana_Goes_From_Purple_to_Deep Red ** For years, Montanans have sneered at out-of-state pundits and journalists who characterized the state as “deep red,” ignoring its century-old purple hue due to a legacy of union activism and general ticket-splitting pragmatism. # ** A_Bumpy_Night_in_Berks_County,_Pennsylvania ** Reading, Pa.—If it all comes down to Pennsylvania—and at this point in the night, with Florida and Georgia looking doubtful, and dreams of a big blue wave fading fast, it looks like it might—let the record show that if Joe Biden wins here, he was carried to victory on the backs of the Latinx and immigrant activists in Make the Road, the young Green New Deal enthusiasts in the Sunrise Movement, and the self-organized collection of mostly Bernie Sanders alums who provide the muscle behind Pennsylvania Stands Up. When the polls opened at the Santander Arena here in downtown Reading—the largest polling place in Pennsylvania’s fifth-largest city—at 7 this morning there were about 80 people in line, and a half dozen volunteers to welcome them, hand out palm cards, and make sure everyone legally entitled to vote had the chance to actually do so. And when the polls finally closed in the 19th Ward, where some voters had to wait in line more than four hours, the volunteers were still there, providing food, water, hand warmers, and even live music to make sure nobody left the line. # ** By_Ignoring_Latino_Voters,_Biden_Has_Made_the_Election_Too Close ** As of Tuesday night, there was no clear winner in the 2020 presidential race. Nor is one likely to emerge until later in the week, when the votes are fully tabulated in slow-counting swing states like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Still, it is clear that the race will not be, as some had predicted, a blow-out for Joe Biden. Biden has already lost the crucial swing state of Florida. He has also underperformed in Georgia and North Carolina. It looks like if Biden wins, the path is through Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan, with possible help from Arizona and Nebraska’s 2nd district. # ** Joe_Biden_And_The_Democrats’_2020_Election_Catastrophe: Interview_With_Branko_Marcetic ** Jacobin writer Branko Marcetic joined Shadowproof managing editor Kevin Gosztola to analyze the outcome of the 2020 election for Joe Biden and the Democratic Party. While this conversation took place a little after 2 pm ET on November 4, it was evident Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden had a slim path toward eking out 270 electoral votes. He was likely to win by a razor-thin margin, despite polls and a media narrative that suggested he would handily defeat President Donald Trump. # ** Whatever_Happens,_It_Should_Not_Be_This_Close ** Former vice president Joe Biden was the overwhelming favorite, according to the best polls. And the best polls of polls. All the polls corrected their mistakes from 2016, they said. Biden was even given a decent chance to take Texas, Georgia, and North Carolina—three states that, demographically, are going blue, but have wallowed in red for too long. # ** Biden:_‘It_Ain’t_Over_Till_Every_Vote_Is_Counted,_Every Ballot_Is_Counted’ ** On a night of close contests and inconclusive results in the most bitterly contested presidential contest of the modern era, Joe Biden spoke to his supporters and counseled, “We’re gonna to have to be patient until the hard work of tallying votes is finished. It ain’t over till every vote is counted, every ballot is counted.” # ** Biden_Is_Piling_Up_a_Popular-Vote_Mandate_for_Ending Trumpism ** On Wednesday morning, Joe Biden swept past the 50 percent mark of total ballots counted thus far in the presidential election. By mid-afternoon on Wednesday, the Democratic candidate was leading Donald Trump by 3 million votes, and the margin expanded with each passing hour. In most countries, a popular-vote lead of that size would have put a candidate’s supporters’ minds at ease, but not in the United States. Even as Biden’s popular-vote lead was expanding, “battleground state”–obsessed television networks were still describing the contest as “too close to call,” and Trump was claiming—falsely, by every measure—that he had “won.” # ** YouTube_refuses_to_remove_video_that_appears_to_violate its_policies ** The video continues to make unsubstantiated claims of “rampant voter fraud” against Republican ballots while urging viewers to “take action” against Democrats. The video has more than 300,000 views. Google-owned YouTube’s policies say it will remove content “encouraging others to interfere with democratic processes, such as obstructing or interrupting voting procedures.” Last month, the company tightened its policies to include removing targeted conspiracy theory-driven videos that may result in real-life violence. After publication, YouTube spokesperson Andrea Faville explained that the company’s “Community Guidelines” refer to videos discouraging voting but not to videos that advocate interference after votes have been cast. # ** Postal_Service_refuses_judge’s_order_to_quickly_sweep facilities_for_ballots ** The U.S. Postal Service late Tuesday afternoon turned down a judge’s order to quickly sweep mail processing facilities in 15 states to ensure no ballots are delayed. b Earlier Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan ordered the sweep to occur between 12:30 p.m. and 3 p.m. EST in 12 postal districts that span 15 states. # ** Trump_campaign_says_it_is_suing_to_stop_Michigan_and Pennsylvania_ballot_counts ** As the actions were announced, Trump’s inner circle tried to prematurely and falsely claim victory for the president in Pennsylvania even as the count remained incomplete there. # ** Trump_Wants_to_Steal_the_2020_Election_by_Delegitimizing Votes_in_Pennsylvania_and_Michigan ** But none of that is the truth at this point. Whether or not Trump ultimately wins Pennsylvania, it’s too soon to assert he already has. So what is the Trump campaign up to? Well, it seems it’s intent on calling into question the legitimacy of the remaining uncounted votes, attempting to establish that Trump has won without any basis in fact. If Biden ultimately wins the state, what the Trump camp is saying now lays the groundwork for disputing those results in the court of public opinion. # ** Judge_orders_sweep_of_postal_facilities_for_mail-in ballots ** A federal judge on Tuesday ordered U.S. Postal Service inspectors to sweep locations in several states for left behind mail-in ballots and to send them to be counted immediately. The order comes after the Postal Service revealed more than 300,000 ballots were received but unable to be traced to their destination, according to data analyzed by the NAACP. The order, issued by U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, required Post Service inspectors and law enforcement to sweep facilities with low processing scores “to ensure that no ballots have been held up and that any identified ballots are immediately sent out for delivery.” The order affects facilities in six key battleground states, including Michigan, Georgia, Texas, Arizona and Florida. # ** Twitter,_Facebook_Slap_Warning_Labels_on_Trump’s_Tweet Charging_Democrats_With_Trying_to_‘Steal’_Election ** Twitter’s policy for political figures like Trump is to leave up tweets that would be violations for regular users if the company considers them to be in the “public interest,” but with warning labels. The social network adopted that policy in June 2019. Twitter first enforced the policy on Trump’s account over a May 29 tweet in which he said about the unrest in Minneapolis after George Floyd’s murder, “Any difficulty and we will assume control but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts. Thank you!” In that case, Twitter said the tweet violated its policy banning the glorification of violence. # ** Officials_warn_delayed_vote_count_could_lead_to_flood_of disinformation ** Facebook, however, took a different approach, with a spokesperson for the company telling Reuters that it would label posts, but would stop short of restricting the reach of those posts. Facebook also committed to only flagging posts claiming victory in the presidential race, not those at the state level. Social media keywords showed clear concerns from U.S. voters over the elections process on Tuesday. o **** Censorship/Free Speech **** # ** Content_Moderation_Case_Study:_Moderating_An_Anonymous Social_Network_(2015) ** Summary: Between around 2013 and 2015 there was a sudden popularity of so-called “anonymous” social networks. A few had existed before, but suddenly the market was full of them: Whisper, Secret and Yik Yak received the most attention. All of them argued that by allowing people to post content anonymously, they were helping people, allowing them to express their true thoughts rather than repress them. Whisper and Secret both worked by letting people anonymously post short text, which would be shown over an image in the background. o **** Freedom of Information/Freedom of the Press **** # ** The_Biggest_Story_of_Our_Time_Requires_an_Army_of Journalists_to_Tell ** The role of the free press in the world’s leading democracy is not to sit by and watch as authoritarianism takes root. o **** Civil Rights/Policing **** # ** A_Walk_in_the_Woods_During_a_Season_of_Uncertainty ** London, Halloween—Secretive, indifferent, they erupt from the shadow world beneath our feet. They whisper risk; promise delight, delirium, or death. Their names are magical: crowded parchment, club- like tuning fork, hairy curtain crust. Candlesnuff, fragrant funnel, collared parachute, coral spot. Destroying angel. Dead man’s fingers. There’s respect in the stretch for connection in those names, that effort to domesticate without denying mystery. # ** “They_Tried_to_Freeze_Me_to_Death:”_Torture_and_Resistance in_Israeli_Prisons ** Mohammad’s interrogation commenced as soon as he arrived at the Central Asqalan (Ashkelon) Prison in southern Israel, where he experienced physical and psychological torture for nearly two and a half months. He was handed his sentence by an Israeli military court on March 20, 2003. As soon as he was released from the Nafha Prison, 100 kilometers north of Bir Al-Saba’, he married Ghadeer, the beautiful and only daughter of his prison-mate, Majdi Hammad. Ghadeer and Mohammad have two children. # ** In_an_Uncertain_World,_EFF_Will_Always_Support_the_Users ** EFF turned thirty this year. In our three decades of work, we’ve seen huge shifts in the way technology and the Internet help, harm, and otherwise influence the lives of nearly everyone on the planet—and that includes its enormous influence on electoral politics. Our thirty-year view has allowed us the insight that regardless of who is in power, technology can be wielded in the service of justice and democracy, or it can be used as a cudgel to disempower and disenfranchise.  Right now, the results of the U.S. Congressional and Presidential elections are still being finalized, and votes are still being tallied. # ** Lawsuit_Says_NYPD_Is_Still_Engaging_In_Unconstitutional Stops_Of_New_York_Residents ** A federal judge shut down the NYPD’s “stop and frisk” program back in 2013, finding the suspicionless stops (mainly of minorities) were unconstitutional. Then-mayor Mike Bloomberg defended the program — often frothily — by claiming it was essential to maintaining order. Without stop and frisk, the streets would be awash in deadly criminals and their deadly weapons. An actual look at the data showed something else: barely any guns recovered, tons of minimal busts for marijuana possession, and about 90% of people released with no citations or arrests. # ** A_Billboard_Grows_in_Brooklyn ** # ** The_Enormous_Cost_Of_Digital_Inequality ** Both unintentionally and by design, we have reinforced a digital caste system that continues to divide communities into the “haves” and “have- nots.” What still remains unclear is not whether we can reverse engineer the disparate impact, but whether we, as a nation, believe that every resident in every community deserves equal access to a digital society. # ** Race_to_the_Bottom_Continues_for_Workers_as_Uber,_Lyft_Win Prop_22_Passage_After_Historic_Money_Dump ** One advocacy group called the measure’s passage “a huge win for companies whose whole business model is premised on decimating workers’ rights.” # ** Uber_and_Lyft_Stocks_Soar_as_California_Overturns Protections_for_Gig_Workers ** Californians handed a major loss to labor unions on Tuesday night in voting to pass Proposition 22, which allows companies like Uber and Lyft to continue classifying their drivers as independent contractors instead of employees. # ** Prop_22_passes_in_California,_exempting_Uber_and_Lyft_from classifying_drivers_as_employees ** Critics of Prop 22 have argued it undermines the spirit of AB-5, which is intended to ensure workers aren’t exploited by gig companies. Notably, for all its concessions, Prop 22 does not offer explicit protections such as workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance, family leave, or sick leave, or allow workers to unionize. “Billionaire [corporations] just hijacked the ballot measure system in CA by spending millions to mislead voters,” a coalition of gig workers opposing Prop 22 said on Twitter. “Uber, Lyft, & the other gig [companies] took a ballot measure system meant to give voice to ordinary Californians and made it benefit the richest [corporations] on the planet.” Terri Gerstein of the Harvard Labor and Worklife Program and Economic Policy Institute said in an email to CNN Business that the result will “leave thousands of California workers in a precarious and perilous position, without basic rights like workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance, or the right to a safe workplace.” # ** California_Chooses_Criminal_Justice_Reform ** On the surface, California’s Election Day was politics as usual in the state that Trump so frequently lambasts for its liberal tendencies. o **** Internet Policy/Net Neutrality **** # ** Comcast_Tells_Customers_They_May_Lose_Access_To_Comcast Channels_If_Comcast_Can’t_Agree_With_Comcast ** Comcast is informing the company’s 20+ million cable TV customers that they may lose access to Comcast TV channels next month if Comcast can’t come to some sort of agreement with… Comcast. o **** Monopolies **** # **** Copyrights **** # ** The_Linked_Commons_2.0:_What’s_New? ** The CC Catalog data visualization—the Linked Commons 2.0—is a web application which aims to showcase and establish a relationship between the millions of data points of CC- licensed content using graphs. In this blog, I’ll discuss the motivation for this visualization and explore the latest features of the newest edition of the Linked Commons. # ** MPA_Lawyers_Are_Trying_to_Shut_Down_Pirate_Anime Giant_Nyaa.si ** TorrentFreak understands that the MPA has delivered cease-and-desist letters to several individuals with alleged connections to massive anime torrent site Nyaa. Claiming that they are members of the so-called “Anime Cartel”, the notices make several demands including the total shutdown of the site plus cash settlements totaling tens of thousands of dollars. ╘══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╛