Debian Weekly News - July 26th, 2000
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Debian Weekly News
http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/current/issue/
Debian Weekly News - July 26th, 2000
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Welcome to Debian Weekly News, a newsletter for the Debian community.
Test Cycle 3 has begun. Anthony Towns [1]writes that "it is hoped and
expected that we will not need to make any further changes to packages
between this test cycle and declaring potato stable." "This test cycle
will end in two weeks, roughly the 9th of August. At that point, any
additional problems will be added to the release notes, and potato
will be declared stable. The official announcement of this, and the
first non-virtual release party, is expected to take place at the
LinuxWorld Conference and Expo." Everyone seems confident we'll pull
it off this time.
Ben Collins [2]announced that Debian 2.2 will be dedicated to
developer Joel 'Espy' Klecker, who died unexpectedly at age 21. Almost
200 Debian developers have [3]signed the [4]dedication. We'll miss
you Joel.
Progeny, the Debian-based company founded by Ian Murdock, is in the
process of hiring several Debian developers. A quick look at their
[5]staff page turns up some familiar names, including John Goerzen
and Branden Robinson. Debian Weekly News has learned that other
developers may be joining them soon. Progeny's [6]jobs page states
that they are "seeking Debian developers to work on Debian GNU/Linux
and help develop a solid foundation for Linux NOW and our other
products and services.". The opportunity to work on Debian full-time
is a marvelous thing that benefits Debian as a whole, and it looks
like more and more developers will be in that position.
Constitutional, Parliamentary Issues. A proposal is in the works to
alter the Debian constitution so that the Social Contract and DFSG are
designated "Foundation Documents" that may only be changed by a 3:1
majority vote. Manoj Srivastava's [7]original draft has received
several seconds, and a [8]modified version has received 5 more. There
should be a vote eventually ... on the other hand, we have still not
voted on the non-free issue.
Debian security. [9]An article analyzing the performance of various
distributions with respect to security fixes unfortunately left Debian
out of their distribution lineup, stating we released too infrequently
to be included. Joey Hess (the editor of DWN) [10]posted a rebuttal,
in which he pointed out that with tools like apt, the security of a
distribution is not closely tied to release frequency, and also showed
that Debian releases new minor versions (such as 2.1r5) more
frequently than Red Hat. Read them both, and draw your own
conclusions. By the way, no security fixes have been announced for
Debian in the past week.
Packages newly added to unstable this week include the following and
[11]11 more:
* [12]ant: Java based build tool like make
* [13]antiword: Converts MS Word files to text and ps
* [14]auto-apt: on demand package installation tool
* [15]fancylogin: Themeable console login program
* [16]gtetrinet: multiplayer tetris-like game
* [17]libxerces-java: Validating XML parser for Java
* [18]tetradraw: ANSI drawing and viewing utility.
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References
1. http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/current/issue/mail#1
2. http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/current/issue/mail#2
3. ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/doc/dedication-2.2.sigs.tar.gz
4. ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/doc/dedication-2.2.txt
5. http://www.progenylinux.com/people/
6. http://www.progenylinux.com/jobs/
7. http://lists.debian.org/debian-project-0007/msg00061.html
8. http://lists.debian.org/debian-project-0007/msg00052.html
9. http://www.securityportal.com/cover/coverstory20000724.html
10. http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/current/issue/mail#3
11. http://auric.debian.org/~tausq/newpkgs-20000725.html
12. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/devel/ant.html
13. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/text/antiword.html
14. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/admin/auto-apt.html
15. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/admin/fancylogin.html
16. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/games/gtetrinet.html
17. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/libs/libxerces-java.html
18. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/editors/tetradraw.html
--
see shy jo
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