Debian Project News - May 17th 2011
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The Debian Project http://www.debian.org/
Debian Project News debian-publicity@lists.debian.org
May 17th, 2011 http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2011/08/
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Welcome to this year's eighth issue of DPN, the newsletter for the
Debian community. Topics covered in this issue include:
* DebConf10 Final Report is out
* DNS security extensions now available for Debian's zone entries
* "Build it" event report
* Debian Identi.ca group reaches 10,000
* Removal ofalpha and hppa ports from ftp-master.debian.org
* Why attend DebConf
* Making "testing" user-oriented
* Further interviews
* Other news
* New Debian Contributors
* Important Debian Security Advisories
* New and noteworthy packages
* Work-needing packages
* Want to continue reading DPN?
DebConf10 Final Report is out
-----------------------------
The DebConf organization team released the final report of the 2010
Debian Conference, which was held in New York City, USA, at Columbia
University. According to the DebConf blog entry [1], "It's a 46-page
document which gives the reader an idea about the conference as a whole.
It includes descriptions of talks, DebCamp and Debian Day activities,
personal impressions, attendee and budgeting numbers, the work of
various teams, social events, funny pictures and so on." There are two
PDF versions of the final report available, which can be downloaded
fromthe DebConf Media website [2].
1 : http://blog.debconf.org/blog/debconf10/tbv_finalreport.dc
2 : http://media.debconf.org/dc10/report/
DNS security extensions now available for Debian's zone entries
---------------------------------------------------------------
The Debian Project's [3]debian.org and debian.net domains are now
secured by the DNS Security Extensions (DNSSEC). "This enables users
with security aware DNS resolvers to securely retrieve information from
the domain name system".
3 : http://www.debian.org/News/2011/20110512
"Build it" event report
-----------------------
Margarita Manterola sent a report [4] of the [5] "Build it" event
organized by the Debian Women project in collaboration with the Open
Hatch project and held on the #debian-women IRC channel on Saturday May
7. Both the sessions -scheduled at 11:00 UTC and 22:00 UTC to fit
different timezones - went very well with an audience of at least ten to
fifteen attendees. A log is available [6] for those who couldn't be
present at the event, as well as a Building Tutorial [7] based on the
log and already translated into Spanish - volunteers welcome for further
translations!
4 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-women/2011/05/msg00036.html
5 : http://www.debian.org/News/2011/20110502
6 : http://meetbot.debian.net/debian-women/2011/debian-women.2011-05-07-22.02.log.html
7 : http://wiki.debian.org/BuildingTutorial
Debian Identi.ca group reaches 10,000
-------------------------------------
As noted by Kipngetich Ibrahim Ngeno, the Debian group on Identi.ca [8]
has reached 10,000 members [9]. Beside the Debian group, founded on
January 2009, there is also an official Debian account [10] (from which
various news items and announcements are broadcast) and some accounts
[11] and groups [12] for specific teams.
8 : http://identi.ca/group/debian
9 : http://identi.ca/notice/72779036
10 : http://identi.ca/debian
11 : http://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Publicity/Identica#Identi.ca_.2BAC8_twitter_accounts_of_Debian_teams
12 : http://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Publicity/Identica#identi.ca_Groups
The latest official Identi.ca Debian team account is the Debian Women
account [13].
13 : http://identi.ca/debianwomen
Removal of alpha and hppa ports from ftp-master.debian.org
----------------------------------------------------------
Jörg Jaspert announced the removal of the [14]alpha and hppa ports from
ftp-master.debian.org. Users of either of these two architectures should
ensure that their sources.list entries point to the new location of
alpha [15] and hppa [16] ports, except for "Lenny" users, since these
architectures will still be officially supported until its End Of Life.
14 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2011/05/msg00005.html
15 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00011.html
16 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00012.html
Why attend DebConf
------------------
Stefano Zacchiroli wrote an interesting post about DebConf11 [17] that
explains why it is a truly FOSS event: there is no "event organizer"
company behind DebConf - all the work is done by volunteers (the DebConf
Team). Also, a major part of the value of DebConf itself derives from
the program which is created by all DebConf participants by submitting
proposals for talks, BoFs, contests, and so on. To quote Stefano: "Are
you going to DebConf and willing to attend a conference with a great
program? Great, then start submitting a great event yourself!".
17 : http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2011/05/debconf11_and_you/
In addition, this year the Debian Project is inviting newbies and
non-regular attendees to come to DebConf [18]. For these two categories
of participants an extra travel fund will be available. Any Debian
Developer or Maintainer who has never been to DebConf, or who last
participated in 2007 or before, can apply for this special funding. To
put forward your request, or to recommend other members of the Project,
send an email to the DebConf Newbies Team [19] before June 18, including
an estimate of travel costs, where you are leaving from, the amount you
will not be able to fund yourself, and the dates of arrival and leaving.
If you plan to participate in DebConf, don't forget to register via the
DebConf registration system [20].
18 : http://www.debian.org/News/2011/20110515
19 : mailto:newbies@debconf.org
20 : http://debconf11.debconf.org/register.xhtml
Making "testing" user-oriented
------------------------------
After the CUT proposal [21], a new word popped up in the discussion
aiming to make "testing" user-oriented: rolling [22]. Even though some
people objected [23] or even laughed [24] at first, others tried to
gather the main ideas [25] and began to propose serious mechanisms for
implementing them [26]. The various proposals are still up for
discussion. One of the main interesting goals would be to provide more
up to date software to our users, allowing them to provide earlier
feedback before "stable" is released; and one of the biggest perceived
risks is that developers may lose focus on the "stable" release itself.
There actually could be some solutions to provide "rolling" as a
pseudo-suite, avoiding disruption to the release process and allowing
developers to bypass the "testing" migration process to provide fixes in
"rolling" directly.
21 : http://cut.debian.net/
22 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-release/2011/04/msg00208.html
23 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00105.html
24 : http://loldebian.wordpress.com/2011/05/04/rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrolling/
25 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00111.html
26 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00275.html
Further interviews
------------------
Since the last issue of the Debian Project News, a new issue of the
[27] "This week in Debian" podcast has been published: with Phillip
Newborough [28], from the CrunchBang distribution.
27 : http://wiki.debian.org/ThisWeekInDebian
28 : http://frostbitemedia.libsyn.com/this-week-in-debian-episode-26
There has also been one further "People behind Debian" interview:
withSteve Langasek [29], release wizard and member of the technical
committee.
29 : http://raphaelhertzog.com/2011/05/06/people-behind-debian-steve-langasek-release-wizard/
Other news
----------
Ana Guerrero mentioned that Qt3 is looking for new maintainers [30].
You're invited to step up to adopt it [31] or help to figure out what to
do with packages depending on Qt3 [32].
30 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00056.html
31 : http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=625502
32 : http://wiki.debian.org/qt3-x11-freeRemoval
Fernando González de Requena Redondo, who has spent the last two years
carrying out an ethnographic survey of Debian [33], presented a master
thesis on the subject: "The spaces of community: a preliminary
ethnographic study on the Debian Project" . Hismore than 150-page report
[34] (in Spanish) is available from the institutional repository of the
UNED.
33 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00019.html
34 : http://e-spacio.uned.es/fez/view.php?pid=bibliuned:500405
Florian Weimer noted that people no longer use corporate accounts to
send mails to the Debian project mailing list [35], as they did in the
past, wondering if it results from corporate pressure or mailing list
policy. Russ Allbery replied that it is probably a matter of the ease of
getting a personal mailbox [36] and of the increased awareness -
compared to ten years ago - of on-line identity. Tony Travis added that
he prefers to use a private email address to have the freedom to express
opinions [37] which could be in conflict with "corporate" policy.
35 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00021.html
36 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00022.html
37 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00025.html
Martin Zobel-Helas wondered if Debian should implement RFC4941 as
default for the next stable release, [38] "Wheezy". RFC4941 [39]
describes an extension to IPv6 stateless address autoconfiguration for
interfaces whose interface identifier is derived from an IEEE
identifier; without this, IPv6 configured via router advertisement uses
the hardware address of the Ethernet card to determine the IPv6 address,
raising privacy issues as users could be tracked via their devices.
38 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2011/05/msg00462.html
39 : http://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc4941.txt
New Debian Contributors
-----------------------
7 applicants have been accepted [40] as Debian Maintainers and 11 people
have started to maintain packages [41] since the previous issue of the
Debian Project News. Please welcome Liang Guo, Nicolas Boulenguez,
Nicolas Lopez de Lerma Aymerich, Olivier Sallou, Sven Eckelmann, Thomas
Krennwallner, YunQiang Su, Alexander Holupirek, Vsevolod Velichko,
Emilien Klein, Ming-Ting Yao Wei, Tobias Hansen, Torquil Macdonald
Sørensen, Madhu Donepudi, Stephan Gerhard, Stefan Tomanek, Vladimir
Kotov and Tobias Winchen into our project!
40 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2011/05/msg00008.html
41 : http://udd.debian.org/cgi-bin/new-maintainers.cgi
Important Debian Security Advisories
------------------------------------
Debian's Security Team recently released advisories for these packages
(among others): otrs2 [42], exim4 [43], postfix [44], zodb [45], icedove
[46], exim4 [47], and apr [48]. Please read them carefully and take the
proper measures.
42 : http://www.debian.org/security/2011/dsa-2231
43 : http://www.debian.org/security/2011/dsa-2232
44 : http://www.debian.org/security/2011/dsa-2233
45 : http://www.debian.org/security/2011/dsa-2234
46 : http://www.debian.org/security/2011/dsa-2235
47 : http://www.debian.org/security/2011/dsa-2236
48 : http://www.debian.org/security/2011/dsa-2237
Debian's Backports Team released advisories for these packages:
iceweasel [49] and exim4 [50] (twice [51]). Please read them carefully
and take the proper measures.
49 : http://lists.debian.org/20110503063614.GB4795@glandium.org
50 : http://lists.debian.org/20110510170109.GA3651@downhill.g.la
51 : http://lists.debian.org/20110514143158.GC1984@downhill.g.la
Debian's Stable Release Team released advisories for these packages:
clive [52] and pianobar [53]. Please read them carefully and take the
proper measures.
52 : http://lists.debian.org/1305055836.6748.570.camel@hathi.jungle.funky-badger.org
53 : http://lists.debian.org/1305055890.6748.577.camel@hathi.jungle.funky-badger.org
Please note that these are a selection of the more important security
advisories of the last weeks. If you need to be kept up to date about
security advisories released by the Debian Security Team, please
subscribe to the security mailing list [54] (and the separate backports
list [55], and stable updates list [56] or volatile list [57], for
"Lenny", the oldstable distribution) for announcements.
54 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-security-announce/
55 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-backports-announce/
56 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-stable-announce/
57 : http://lists.debian.org/debian-volatile-announce/
New and noteworthy packages
---------------------------
270 packages were added to the unstable Debian archive recently. Among
many others [58] are:
58 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/newpkg
* collabtive -- web-based project management software [59]
* crtmpserver -- high performance RTMP/RTSP streaming server [60]
* edisplay -- fast image manipulation programs (image viewer) [61]
* exabgp -- BGP route injector [62]
* fonts-horai-umefont -- Japanese TrueType font, Ume-font [63]
* fonts-pagul -- TrueType font for the Sourashtra language [64]
* fonts-yozvox-yozfont -- Japanese proportional handwriting OpenType font [65]
* fookebox -- web-based jukebox frontend to MPD [66]
* goldencheetah -- set of analysis tools for cycling performance [67]
* jsonbot -- framework for building bots for IRC, XMPP and the web [68]
* kate-syntax-go -- syntax files to highlight Go in Kate [69]
* mangler -- Ventrilo compatible client for Linux [70]
* nautilus-image-manipulator -- resize and send images from Nautilus [71]
* nwchem -- high-performance computational chemistry software [72]
* paprass -- manager of electronic documents [73]
* pcsxr -- Sony PlayStation emulator [74]
* vim-syntax-go -- syntax files to highlight Go in Vim [75]
* wavesurfer -- sound manipulation program [76]
* xnbd-client -- network block device client with support for live migration [77]
* xnbd-server -- network block device server with support for live migration [78]
59 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/collabtive
60 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/crtmpserver
61 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/edisplay
62 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/exabgp
63 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fonts-horai-umefont
64 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fonts-pagul
65 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fonts-yozvox-yozfont
66 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/fookebox
67 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/goldencheetah
68 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/jsonbot
69 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/kate-syntax-go
70 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/mangler
71 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/nautilus-image-manipulator
72 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/nwchem
73 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/paprass
74 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/pcsxr
75 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/vim-syntax-go
76 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/wavesurfer
77 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xnbd-client
78 : http://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/xnbd-server
Work-needing packages
---------------------
Currently 301 packages are orphaned [79] and 145 packages are up for
adoption [80]: please visit the complete list of packages which need
your help [81].
79 : http://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/orphaned
80 : http://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/rfa
81 : http://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/help_requested
Want to continue reading DPN?
-----------------------------
Please help us create this newsletter. We still need more volunteer
writers to watch the Debian community and report about what is going on.
Please see the contributing page [82] to find out how to help. We're
looking forward to receiving your mail at
debian-publicity@lists.debian.org [83].
82 : http://wiki.debian.org/ProjectNews/HowToContribute
83 : mailto:debian-publicity@lists.debian.org
This issue of Debian Project News was edited by Tiago Bortoletto Vaz,
Mark Caglienzi, Francesca Ciceri, Jeremiah C. Foster, David Prévot,
Alexander Reichle-Schmehl, Alexander Reshetov and Justin B. Rye [84].
84 : mailto:debian-publicity@lists.debian.org
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