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● 05.13.15

● Links 13/5/2015: GNU/Linux PCs in Russia, Fedora 22 Freeze

Posted in News Roundup at 6:03 pm by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxGNU/Linux

=> ↺ 10 Linux Dream Jobs – What’s Yours?

• What’s your Linux dream job? The Linux Foundation recently asked our Twitter followers to share their ideal Linux careers. Many responded that they’re already living the dream, working as sysadmins and developers (or by simply getting to use Linux in their everyday tasks.) While others imagine fulfilling careers not yet within their grasp. Here are 10 of our favorite responses, along with a few resources for learning more about each dream Linux career path.

=> ↺ New to Linux? 5 Apps You Didn’t Know You Were Missing

• When you moved to Linux, you went straight for the obvious browsers, cloud clients, music players, email clients, and perhaps image editors, right? As a result, you’ve missed several vital, productive tools. Here’s a roundup of five umissable Linux apps that you really need to install.

=> ↺ From Windows XP to Linux: Adding to the List

• Yesterday on Datamation, Matt Hartley wrote what could best be described as a reminder piece about the folks using Windows XP at home or in small businesses having options when it comes to replacing that particular operating system, and that the best option — go ahead and say it with me — is Linux.

=> ↺ Solar Sail Spacecraft Runs Linux and Uses SSH, Says Bill Nye

• The idea of solar sails was first introduced in popular culture by none other than Carl Sagan, more than 40 years ago. This particular technology was not a priority for scientists in the past decades, with very few exceptions, but The Planetary Society and Bill Nye want to change that by launching a small spacecraft called CubeSat that will be powered by light.

Desktop

=> ↺ HP Launch Ubuntu Laptops, PCs in Russia

• A slate of devices, which includes 15.6-inch notebooks and a 20-inch all-in-one desktop PC, will be sold through selected resellers and distributors across the country starting from mid-May, 2015.

=> ↺ HP to Sell Notebooks and All-in-One PCs with Ubuntu in Russia

• HP is one of the big companies that provide users with computers that came with Ubuntu pre-installed, and now those PCs are going to be sold in Russia as well.

=> ↺ Powerful Cirrus7 nimbini Mini PC Running Ubuntu Launches

• The Cirrus7 nimbini mini PC that is built with some great hardware and with a case from machined aluminum is now available for sale.

Server

=> ↺ Rackspace CEO Takes a Positive Spin from AWS for OpenStack Growth

• Rackspace reported its first quarter fiscal 2015 results on May 11, with company executives sounding very optimistic about the company’s future prospects.

• For the quarter, Rackspace reported net revenue of $480 million, for a 14.1 percent year-over-year gain. Net income for the first quarter was reported at $28.4 million, up from $25.4 million in the first quarter of 2014.

• [...]

• Rackspace’s cloud fortunes today are somewhat tied to the open-source OpenStack cloud platform, which it helped to create. Rhodes sees potential for OpenStack both in the public cloud space as well as the private.

Kernel Space

=> ↺ Kernel 4.1 RC3 Brings A Few Changes Only, But This Is Normal For An Early RC Version

=> ↺ Linux Kernel 3.19 Has Reached To End With Last Release Kernel 3.19.8, Install/Upgrade Kernel 3.19.8 In Ubuntu/Linux Mint

=> ↺ Linux Kernel 4.0.3 Is Now the Most Advanced and Stable Version Available

• A new version of the Linux kernel, 4.0.3, has been released by Greg Kroah-Hartman and is now ready for download. As it stands right now, this is the most advanced version available, and the same can be said about the branch.

Graphics Stack

=> ↺ Smooth Scrolling Implemented For XWayland

• One of the latest commits to the xorg-server that’s seen relatively few commits this development cycle is support for smooth scrolling with XWayland.

=> ↺ AMD Forms A Tiger Team For Catalyst Improvements, Including Linux

• I’ve found out from various people in the know that AMD has assembled a “tiger team” to tackle outstanding Catalyst driver issues. This tiger team isn’t Linux specific, but Linux driver issues will be fully evaluated and tackled by this new group of driver specialists.

=> ↺ AMD Releases Open-Source VCE 1.0 Support

• Last year AMD open-sourced their VCE video encode engine code for use by their open-source Linux graphics driver stack with the Radeon DRM kernel driver and RadeonSI Gallium3D and worked out a new OpenMAX state tracker. That open-source code drop only worked on the support for “VCE2″ hardware found with the AMD GCN hardware and newer (Sea Islands, Kabini, etc). AMD’s open-source Linux team has now gained permission for providing open-source VCE 1.0 support to offer video encode to older Radeon graphics processors.

=> ↺ New Linux Nvidia Stable Drivers Improve Texture Transfers

• Nvidia has just announced that a new Linux driver has been released in the Long-Lived branch, fixing just a few issues and bringing better texture transfers.

=> ↺ Intel Cherryview Now Supports OpenCL On Linux

• Intel’s been working on open-source Linux support for Cherryview for more than one year while finally one of the last pieces of the hardware enablement puzzle has landed: OpenCL support for Cherryview.

Applications

=> ↺ Music players on Linux: choice or confusion?

• Using Linux on the desktop on your computers will lead anyone to rely on a media or music player. A media player may not play movies (contrary to a movie player) but should be able to handle playlists, albums, and podcasts. What people quickly discover though is that the Linux platform has a many of these. A lot, actually. But it is difficult to know which one to choose, and depending on the distribution you may need to install additional codecs and other bits. Another aggravating factor is that while choice is good in these matters, no player really seems to stand out for each kind of platform. In my view, it has been already been several years that the choice of an actual media player for Linux is confusing. So confusing, sometimes, that I find myself wondering whether I shouldn’t turn directly to EMMS (yes, it’s that bad).

=> ↺ Multi-Platform BitTorrent Client qBittorrent Sees New Major Release

• qBittorrent 3.2.0 was released recently and it includes numerous changes such as support for Qt5, rewritten WebUI code, episode filtering for RSS, per tracker re-announce and much more.

=> ↺ Pandora Client Pithos 1.1.0 And 1.0.2 Released

• Two new Pithos versions were released yesterday: 1.1.0 (for GTK 3.14+ only) and 1.0.2 and they include an important bug fix which caused the app to stop playing randomly.

Proprietary

=> ↺ ScudCloud: Unofficial Slack Client For Linux

• Slack is a team communication platform which features persistent chat rooms organized by topic, private groups and direct messaging, all searchable from one search box. Furthermore, the app integrates with Google Docs and Dropbox, GitHub and many others.

Instructionals/Technical

=> ↺ Monitor CPU temperature with Dizmo

=> ↺ Deploying Docker for OpenStack with Crowbar

=> ↺ How to Use GIMP Photo Editor

=> ↺ How to install Kloxo on CentOS 6, a free web hosting control panel for Linux

=> ↺ How to install Tonido private cloud server on Ubuntu Linux

=> ↺ Why Does Sysctl Not Write Under /sys

=> ↺ Practical Python programming for non-engineers

=> ↺ How to Manage Systemd Services on a Linux System

Wine or Emulation

=> ↺ The Wine Developers Are Discussing On Whether To Implement USB Support For Wine Or Not

Games

=> ↺ Hardcore Gravity Platformer ‘Blackhole’ Released For Linux

• The charming sci-fi platformer was released for Windows in February to very positive reviews from press and customers, and is now finally available for Linux.

=> ↺ Lovecraftian Precision Action Platformer ‘They Bleed Pixels’ Available In Linux Beta On Steam

• The popular action platformer has undergone a massive rewrite since last year to remove the dependency on XNA and to add a host of improvements. It is now nearing completion and has been made available in an open beta on Steam.

=> ↺ CO-OP : Decrypted 2.5D Puzzle-platformer Adds Linux Support, Some Thoughts

• CO-OP : Decrypted recently added in Linux support to the rather good looking 2.5D platformer, so it’s time for an overdue look at it with some initial thoughts.

Desktop Environments/WMs

K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt

=> ↺ Help the KDE eV write a privacy policy for Piwik

• We want to enable piwik to get meaningful statistics of kde.org visits, to be nice with privacy for that we have enabled the ip anonymizer plugin but we still need to provide a way for people to opt out.

=> ↺ May Update for KDE Applications 15.04

• This minor update includes a number of bugfixes, focusing especially on Kdenlive, Okular, Umbrello, and Marble. In addition to software bugs, issues with translations have also been addressed in this release.

=> ↺ DigiKam 4.10.0 Released With Bug Fixes, Install In Ubuntu/Linux Mint Or Other Derivative Systems

• digiKam is an Open-Source project Photos management software, specially for KDE but you can use it on Ubuntu or others distros too. In digiKam photos are organized in albums which can be sorted chronologically, by folder layout or by custom collections. Developers recently released digiKam 4.10.0 with 16 bug fixes. Developers main focus is on digiKam 5.0 release, as it is supposed to be a major release of digiKam.

=> ↺ digiKam 4.10.0 Released While digiKam 5.0 Is Still Being Ported to KDE Frameworks 5

• digiKam Software Collection 4.10.0 arrived on May 12 and included numerous bug fixes reported by users since the previous version of the program, digiKam 4.9.0, which was announced back in April 2015.

GNOME Desktop/GTK

=> ↺ GNOME Boxes 3.16.2 Now Supports Installations of Fedora 22

• As part of the soon-to-be-released GNOME 3.16.2 desktop environment, we are happy to announce today the immediate availability of the GNOME Boxes 3.16.2 open-source virtualization software and virtual machine manager.

Distributions

=> ↺ Goodbye Foresight Linux

• It’s with great sadness in our hearts that we write this article to you all, but it appears that in an email to the Foresight Linux’s mailinglist, Michael K. Johnson announces the retirement of the distribution.

=> ↺ Foresight Linux Announces The End Of Development

=> ↺ Material Design-Inspired Papyros Shows Great Progress

• It’s been a while since we heard about Papyros, the Linux distribution that used the Material Design concepts from Google, but developers have released a short video that illustrates the work they’ve done so far.

New Releases

=> ↺ ConnochaetOS 14.1

=> ↺ Clonezilla Live 2.4.1-19 Is Now Available for Download Based on Debian Sid

• On May 12, Steven Shiau announced the immediate availability for download and testing of a new development version of his famous Clonezilla Live distribution, version 2.4.1-19.

Slackware Family

=> ↺ May ’15 security updates for Adobe Flash

Red Hat Family

Fedora

=> ↺ End of Foresight and What Makes Fedora Different

• Foresight Linux officially called it quits yesterday due to a lack of developers. The project hasn’t seen a release in over two years, but it’s still sad when a distribution shuts down. Across town, Pete Travis posted a passionate open letter to Fedora on why it should remain true to its philosophy and Bruce Byfield pondered the age old mystery, “Why can’t Ubuntu play well with others?”

=> ↺ Fedora 22 Final Freeze

• Today is an important day on the Fedora 22 schedule[1], with a significant cut-offs.

=> ↺ Fedora 22 Linux Will Arrive on May 26, Final Freeze Now in Effect

• The Fedora Project is preparing to release their latest and greatest Linux kernel-based operating system, Fedora 22, which will arrive as expected later this month, on May 26, 2015.

=> ↺ Fedora 22 Is Now Under Its Final Freeze

• Today marks the final freeze for Fedora 22 with plans to officially release this Red Hat sponsored Linux distribution update later in May.

=> ↺ Fedora Workstation 22 Is Looking Great, Running Fantastic

• As the Fedora 22 release approaches, there will be more benchmarks coming along with other tests (e.g. the latest X11 vs. Wayland, Fedora 22 graphics performance, etc). For today’s article I just wanted to make a few remarks about Fedora Workstation 22. Fedora Workstation 22 feels like a nice evolutionary upgrade over Fedora 21. GNOME 3.16 and these upstream improvements represent a bulk of the user-visible changes in Fedora 22. Below the hood there’s the GCC 5.0 compiler, Mesa 10.5, Perl 5.20, Linux 4.0, and many other package updates. If GNOME isn’t your thing, Xfce 4.12 is present along with the premiere of the LXQt desktop environment. The latest KDE Plasma 5 / Frameworks 5 packages are also present in Fedora 22. Many of the other Fedora 22 workstation/desktop changes have already been detailed in numerous Phoronix articles.

Debian Family

=> ↺ systemd: Type=simple and avoiding forking considered harmful?

• I wonder if systemd shouldn’t do more to detect problems during services initialization, as the transition to proper notification using sd_notify will likely take some time. A possibility would be to wait 100 or 200ms after the start to ensure that the service doesn’t exit almost immediately. But that’s not really a solution for several obvious reasons. A more hackish, but still less dirty solution could be to poll the state of processes inside the cgroup, and assume that the service is started only when all processes are sleeping. Still, that wouldn’t be entirely satisfying…

=> ↺ Run Debian 8 Jessie with on Raspberry Pi 2 with RaspEX

• The creator of numerous GNU/Linux distributions are very excited to introduce us to RaspEX today, a distro based on the Debian GNU/Linux 8.0 (Jessie) and created to run on the Raspberry Pi 2 computer board.

Derivatives

=> ↺ Linux Top 3: Tails 1.4, 4MLinux 12 and TinyCore Linux 6.2

• Nearly a year after Tails 1.0, and the Tails 1.4 release is now available. Tails – short for The Amnesic Incognito Live System and is a privacy focussed Linux distribution.

=> ↺ Tails 1.4 is out

• Tails, The Amnesic Incognito Live System, version 1.4, is out.

• This release fixes numerous security issues and all users must upgrade as soon as possible.

=> ↺ Tails 1.4 Updates the Windows 8 Camouflage to Work with the I2P and Unsafe Browsers

• Tails 1.4 Updates the Windows 8 Camouflage to Work with the I2P and Unsafe Browsers

Canonical/Ubuntu

=> ↺ 2015 is shaping up to be the Year of Ubuntu

• Ubuntu has been making big promises since 2011 when they chose Unity to be at the center of their universe. And while they failed to deliver on Ubuntu TV or Ubuntu for Android, they’ve got other tricks up their sleeves.

=> ↺ Snappy Ubuntu Linux Now Used in Networking, Refrigerators

• With its number of uses growing, the Snappy Ubuntu Core Linux operating system is now coming to network switches and refrigerators. Canonical, the lead commercial sponsor behind the open-source Ubuntu Linux operating system, today announced an expansion of its push to embed Linux in everything from phones to refrigerators—and now network switches. The Snappy Ubuntu Core Linux operating system, a minimal version of Ubuntu Linux that provides an improved updating and security model, is designed for embedded devices and the Internet of things (IoT).

=> ↺ ICU Vulnerability Closed in Ubuntu 15.04

• Canonical has published details in a security notice about an ICU vulnerability that has been found and fixed in Ubuntu 15.04, Ubuntu 14.10, and Ubuntu 14.04 LTS.

=> ↺ Erle-Copter, Ubuntu Core Edition: the first drone with apps

• Although Ubuntu is best known for its desktop/server distro—which was recently updated to 15.04—the last few years have seen the project’s ambitions have grown considerably. For example, there’s the Ubuntu phone, which is beginning to win plaudits. In turn, solving the particular demands for a mobile platform led to new approaches and technologies that appeared again in Snappy Ubuntu, a “transactionally updated Ubuntu for clouds and devices.”

=> ↺ Erle Robotics’ Ubuntu Core Drone Is The First Drone With Support For Third Party Apps

=> ↺ The Latest OTA Update For Ubuntu Touch Brings A Huge List Of Changes

• As we had anticipated correctly last week, Canonical has released an OTA update for Ubuntu Touch (OTA 3.5), an update which brings fixes for over 15 bugs, some 3G enhancements, fixes for a bunch oc calendar sync problems, removed some crashes regarding ubuntu-keyboard and indicator-network, fixed the bug that drained the battery when the phone was used in airplane mode, patched some routing problems and the suspend problems have been removed.

=> ↺ New Ubuntu Touch Update Brings 3G and Location Services Improvements

• Today, May 12, we are happy to inform all Ubuntu Phone users that the Ubuntu Touch developers have just announced the release of the OTA 3.5 update for Canonical’s mobile operating system.

=> ↺ Why Can’t Ubuntu Play Well With Others?

• Last week, founder Mark Shuttleworth opened the Ubuntu Online Summit with a challenge to Linux desktop developers.

• “I’m issuing a call to people who participate in every desktop environment,” he said, “to set aside our differences, to recognize that the opportunity now is bigger than those differences, to create experiences that spans phones and tablets, and PCs, to bring all of our applications, none of which are on one desktop environment or another.”

• His words were rhetorically stirring — and provoked no major response whatsoever. Although some news sites reported his words without comment, probably most companies and projects have heard too many similar calls to action for this one to be effective.

=> ↺ Loli Papelk + Ultra Flat Icons, Install In Ubuntu

=> ↺ System76 Meerkat is a cute Intel Broadwell-powered Ubuntu Linux computer [Review]

• Imagine if every time you wanted a Windows computer, you had to buy a Mac, format the hard drive and install Microsoft’s operating system. That would suck, right? This is pretty much how it is for Linux users, sadly. If you are a user of a Linux distro such as Fedora or Ubuntu, for the most part — unless you are a system-builder — you have to buy a Windows machine, and install your preferred operating system.

• What if you want to buy a computer with an operating system such as Ubuntu pre-installed? Enter System76. The company sells computers — both desktops and laptops — running the Linux-based Ubuntu operating system. Recently, the company began selling the Meerkat — a mini computer based on Intel’s NUC. I have been using the computer for a few weeks now, with both Ubuntu and Windows 10 and I am ready to share the experience with you.

=> ↺ Ubuntu 15.10 with Unity 8 and Linux Kernel 4.0 Runs on a Lenovo Tablet

• Now, we all know that you can use Ubuntu on a tablet device, so this may not come as news to you, but seeing the next-generation Ubuntu 15.10 Desktop Next on a Lenovo ThinkPad 8 Bay Trail tablet might interest you.

=> ↺ Ubuntu continues its push into IoT devices

• Today marks the start of IoT World in San Francisco, and TelecomTV is onsite to record a series of executive video interviews and product demos. As the telecoms sector shifts its focus from vertically-aligned M2M solutions towards more horizontal IoT platforms, we expected to see yet more jostling for position amongst platform providers and OS developers.

=> ↺ Ubuntu 15.10 (Wily Werewolf) Release Schedule

• Announced by Mark Shuttleworth on May 4, 2015, Ubuntu 15.10 (codename Wily Werewolf) will be released later this year on October 22, 2015, according to the preliminary release schedule that was made public today.

=> ↺ Ubuntu 15.10 (Wily Werewolf) to Use Linux Kernel 4.1, Most Likely

Flavours and Variants

=> ↺ A preview of the MintBox Mini

• CompuLab has a long history of working with the developers of Linux Mint. The MintBox 2 is a good example of their cooperation, and it has gotten very positive reviews on Amazon. Now there’s a new product called the MintBox Mini and one of the Linux Mint developers has a preview of it.

=> ↺ Windows Users Are Top Downloaders of elementary OS “Freya”

• A month after elementary OS “Freya” was released to the public, the developers have made public some details about the platforms that download it and the results are pretty surprising. From the looks of it, the Windows users are the main downloaders of this Linux OS.

=> ↺ It’s optional for now, but Linux Mint expects to switch to systemd next year

• Despite recent reports suggesting the contrary, Linux Mint isn’t committed to avoiding systemd, the controversial project taking Linux by storm. In fact, Clement Lefebvre, Linux Mint’s project leader, expects the next major releases of Linux Mint to use systemd by default.

• No, Linux Mint isn’t switching to systemd immediately. The Linux Mint 17.x series and Linux Mint Debian Edition 2 will continue to use Upstart and SysV init, with systemd available as an option you can choose yourself. Linux Mint is giving systemd some time to mature before switching, but—with upstream projects and the Linux ecosystem as a whole moving towards systemd—Mint realizes it doesn’t have an option in the long term.

Devices/Embedded

=> ↺ Imagination redesigns microcomputer for better Wi-Fi

=> ↺ £50 Creator CI20 Computer Gets Updated Software and New Board Design

=> ↺ Imagination Launches Upgraded ‘Creator Ci20′ Board With FlowCloud IoT Platform Support

=> ↺ Imagination Upgrades Creator CI20 Micro-Computer

=> ↺ MIPS Creator CI20 dev board gets a design refresh, wireless improvements

=> ↺ Updated Creator CI20: a beefier RPi B+ but MIPS

=> ↺ New Creator CI20 Development Board Unveiled By Imagination Technology

=> ↺ Imagination shrinks down its ‘Raspberry Pi on steroids’

=> ↺ Samsung taps Yocto for dual- and octa-core IoT modules

• Samsung unveiled a series of IoT-focused “Artik” SoCs and modules, including dual- and octa-core COMs that integrate wireless radios and run Yocto Linux.

Phones

Android

=> ↺ Moto X Android Lollipop Update Release Nears

• Back in April the Moto X Android 5.1 Lollipop update emerged for one small market in Brazil, but so far that’s it and the millions of owners in the United States are still waiting for the latest software upgrade. Last night Motorola made some key announcements regarding the original Moto X Android 5 Lollipop update, and when we can expect it to arrive.

=> ↺ 10 Enterprise-Friendly Android Wear Apps for Those New Wearables

• Android Wear, the wearable operating system developed by Google, has established itself as a credible option in the world of wearables. The mobile operating system platform allows for smartwatches and other wearables to take advantage of modified Android apps and gives Google a much-needed foothold in what is an increasingly important market. For enterprise customers, however, wearables are pretty much an unknown quantity. There are several studies that suggest wearables could find a suitable home in the enterprise, but for the most part, those devices have yet to show their value to corporate customers at this stage in the market’s development. To address that, Google has been courting third-party developers to build apps for Android Wear. Some of those apps can appeal to both consumers and enterprise customers. But the very fact that they can be used for the enterprise makes devices running Android Wear even more appealing. This slide show looks at some current Android Wear apps to see what might be useful for enterprise customers.

=> ↺ How to Fix Bad Nexus Android 5.1.1 Battery Life

• Google’s Android 5.1.1 update is finally pushing out in force to the Nexus 9, Nexus 7, and Nexus 10 bringing bug fixes for Lollipop problems. And while we haven’t seen widespread complaints just yet, the Android 5.1.1 update will almost certainly bring battery life problems to select Nexus users. With that in mind, we take a look at how you can go about fixing bad Nexus Android 5.1.1 battery life.

=> ↺ Android Wear 5.1.1: Taking the new update for a spin

• While we await Android Wear 5.1.1 to roll out on a wider scale, we had the opportunity to try the update out on the LG Watch Urbane. Google’s wearable platform has seen its fair share of incremental updates over the past several months, but this one is by far the biggest. You want Wi-Fi support? Done. An always-on screen? That’s here, too. Let’s take a look at what else is new.

=> ↺ Android 5.1 Lollipop Update And Release Date for Moto G, Moto X 1st and 2nd Gen and Moto E

• Android L, also known as Android 5.0 or Lollipop, has been very slow to roll out for newer versions of Android phones, and now a lot of users want version 5.1. This is especially true for Motorola phones including the Moto G (both 1st and 2nd generation), the Moto X (also 1st and 2nd generation), and the Moto E, as well as other Motorola Android phones.

=> ↺ Android 5.0 Lollipop update for Samsung Galaxy Note 2, Galaxy S4 Spark on Sprint rolls out

• Sprint is giving its Galaxy S4 Spark and Note 2 customers some Android 5.0 Lollipop loving after recently releasing the said update last May 8.

=> ↺ Android 5.1 update for Galaxy S6 and S6 edge expected to arrive in June

• Last month, it was revealed that Samsung was working on Android 5.1 for either device, with the update rumored to bring a Guest Mode feature, along with the ability to take images in RAW.

=> ↺ LG’s Urbane is the Android smart watch to watch

• Apple still hasn’t disclosed sales figures, but it appears Apple Watch is outselling all of the Android Wear watches pushed by Google and its partners.

• Never mind that those Google watches collectively hit the market long before Apple’s high-tech timepiece or that Apple is experiencing delays getting watches to buyers.

=> ↺ Android 5.1 Lollipop for the Galaxy S6 and S6 edge coming as early as next month

• According to Canadian carrier Rogers, the Samsung Galaxy S6 and the S6 edge should get their Android 5.1 Lollipop update as early as next month. The carrier’s official website mentions June as the estimated release date for the update, although the website also says that the dates are subject to change.

• Over this past month, we’ve heard that Samsung is already working on updating its latest flagships to Android 5.1 Lollipop, and we’ve also heard that the update should come with a new Guest Mode feature, as well as the ability to snap RAW photos. This is the first time we’re hearing about a potential release date for the update.

=> ↺ Android Wear 5.1 review: simple, useful and the best – for now

• Android Wear 5.1 has reduced Google’s emphasis on talking to your wrist, which is a good thing. The new menu system makes it easier to get to apps and settings, and the simple swipe-based interface is intuitive.

• The emoji-drawing support is excellent and being able to connect remotely to a smartphone using Wi-Fi is useful for when Bluetooth won’t stretch far enough.

• Android Wear’s notification-handling and quick, useful interactions powered by Google Now make it the best smartwatch platform currently available, but only if your life is plugged into Google services such as Gmail, calendar and Play Music.

Free Software/Open Source

=> ↺ Why tools like Docker, Vagrant, and Ansible are hotter than ever

• The complexity of application stacks keeps going up. Way, way up. Application stacks have always been complicated, but never like this. There are so many services, so many tools, so much more compute power available, so many new techniques to try, and always the desire, and the pressure, to solve problems in newer and cooler and more elegant ways. With so many toys to play with, and more coming every day, the toy chest struggles to contain them all.

=> ↺ 3 big lessons I learned from running an open source company

• It all sounds so straightforward: Put your code up on GitHub or start/join a project at the Apache Software Foundation (ASF), build a community of like-minded individuals, start a company, take in some funding, and then IPO. Or maybe not. One thing is certain: Running an open source company has unique challenges and opportunities. Although much has been written on the subject of open source and community building, I’d like to share three critical lessons learned in my travels as a co-founder and CTO of a venture-backed open source company.

=> ↺ Gaming Community Asks for Open Source GOG Galaxy Client

• GOG Galaxy is a new gaming client for the GOG distributions service, but for now it’s only available for the Windows platform. As a response, the GOG wish list now shows the open source GOG Galaxy client as the most requested item.

Events

=> ↺ GNOME.Asia summit 2015

• Every moment spent was mesmerizing in the summit. Day 0, 7th May 2015 Thursday was the workshop day in the auditorium of the Computer Science Department. Presentations by Andika Triwidada on “GNOME Indonesia Translation”, Akshai M for “MicroHOPE(Micro-controllers for Hobby Projects and Education)”, David King on “Writing your first GNOME application”, and Ekaterina Gerasimova, Alexandre Franke on the topic “How to make your first contribution” were out of the box informative.

=> ↺ LibrePlanet forever! Watch five sessions from 2015 online

• We’re happy to announce that recordings of five sessions from LibrePlanet 2015 are now online. Whether you couldn’t make it to the conference and are watching these for the first time, or attended and want to see them again, we hope you enjoy.

=> ↺ Last chance to register for the Randa Meetings 2015

• If you are interested in participating in this year’s Randa Meetings and want to have a chance to be financially supported to travel to Randa then the last 24 hours of the registration period just began.

Web Browsers

Mozilla

=> ↺ Firefox 38.0 Brings A New Tab-Based Preferences Menus

• Mozilla is proud to announced that it has released the Firefox 38.0 ESR (Extended Support Release) internet browser, which brings interesting features.

=> ↺ Mozilla Firefox 38 Gets a Baker’s Dozen Security Updates

• Five of the 13 security updates for Firefox 38 are considered critical. Mozilla also disabled the RC4 cipher suite for encrypted TLS data.

=> ↺ Firefox 38 arrives with DRM tech required to watch Netflix video, Ruby annotation, revamped look on Android

• Mozilla today launched Firefox 38 for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. Notable additions to the browser include digital rights management (DRM) tech for playing protected content in the HTML5 video tag on Windows, Ruby annotation support, and improved user interfaces on Android.

=> ↺ Update on Digital Rights Management and Firefox

• Because DRM is a ‘black-box’ technology that isn’t open source, we have designed a security sandbox that sits around the CDM. We can’t be sure how other browsers have handled the “black-box” issue but a sandbox provides a necessary layer of security. Additionally, we’ve also introduced the ability to remove the CDM from your copy of Firefox. We believe that these are important security and choice mechanisms that allow us to introduce this technology in a manner that lessens the negative impacts of integrating this type of black-box.

=> ↺ Mozilla Firefox 38.0 Lands in All Supported Ubuntu OSes with New Tab-Based Preferences

• Ubuntu has been making big promises since 2011 when they chose Unity to be at the center of their universe. And while they failed to deliver on Ubuntu TV or Ubuntu for Android, they’ve got other tricks up their sleeves.

SaaS/Big Data

=> ↺ Communication is the key to herding cats

• John Dickinson is Director of Technology at SwiftStack and Program Team Lead (PTL) of the OpenStack Swift project. Last year, he gave us an update on Swift’s progress with Storage policies: Coming to an OpenStack Swift cluster near you for Opensource.com. In this follow up interview, John offers tips for improving community collaboration on open source projects, and gives us a preview of his upcoming OpenStack Summit talk.

=> ↺ Mixed Quarterly Results for Hadoop-Focused Hortonworks

• The end of 2014 was a momentous time for Hortonworks, which focuses on the Hadoop Big Data platform. The company had a successful IPO, driving home how focused many enterprises are on yielding more useful insights from their troves of data than standard data mining tools can provide.

=> ↺ Q&A Sessions with Cloud and Big Data Thought Leaders

Project Releases

=> ↺ Wireshark 1.12.5 Officially Released, Still the World’s Most Popular Network Analyzer

• Wireshark, the world’s most popular open-source, cross-platform, and free network analyzer software, has been updated to version 1.12.5, a release that fixes numerous issues, patches important security vulnerabilities, and updates protocol support.

Openness/Sharing

Open Access/Content

=> ↺ Open-source texts would have wider use in state colleges

• Students facing eye-popping costs of college textbooks could save substantial amounts of money under a bill that would encourage the use of electronic texts.

• The House on Tuesday approved a pilot program and study of so-called open-source texts that faculty could assign instead of traditional books that can cost students as much as $1,200 a year. The bill, which passed 144-0, next heads to the Senate.

• It would establish a task force to develop plans for the best use of open-source texts through an existing program at Charter Oak State College.

Leftovers

Security

=> ↺ Google Moves Its Corporate Applications to the Internet

• Google Inc., taking a new approach to enterprise security, is moving its corporate applications to the Internet. In doing so, the Internet giant is flipping common corporate security practice on its head, shifting away from the idea of a trusted internal corporate network secured by perimeter devices such as firewalls, in favor of a model where corporate data can be accessed from anywhere with the right device and user credentials.

=> ↺ Tuesday’s security updates

=> ↺ Beware the ticking Internet of Things security time bomb

• IBM’s Andy Thurai didn’t quite put the words into former RSA CTO Deepak Taneja’s mouth, but did prompt him by asking at the start of a TIE Startup Con panel in Cambridge, Mass., earlier this month whether Internet of Things security is a “time bomb ready to explode.”

=> ↺ VENOM, don’t get bitten.

• CVE-2015-3456 (aka VENOM) is a security flaw in the QEMU’s Floppy Disk Controller (FDC) emulation. It can be exploited by a malicious guest user with access to the FDC I/O ports by issuing specially crafted FDC commands to the controller. It can result in guest controlled execution of arbitrary code in, and with privileges of, the corresponding QEMU process on the host. Worst case scenario this can be guest to host exit with the root privileges.

=> ↺ For Venom security flaw, the fix is in: Patch your VM today

• The QEMU fix itself is now available in source code. Red Hat has been working on the fix since last week.

=> ↺ VENOM Bug In QEMU Escapes VM Security

=> ↺ 11-Year-Old Bug in Virtual Floppy Drive Code Allows Escape from Virtual Machines

• Popular virtualization platforms relying on the virtual Floppy Disk Controller code from QEMU (Quick Emulator) are susceptible to a vulnerability that allows executing code outside the guest machine.

Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

=> ↺ U.S. Military Proposes Challenge to China Sea Claims

• The U.S. military is considering using aircraft and Navy ships to directly contest Chinese territorial claims to a chain of rapidly expanding artificial islands, U.S. officials said, in a move that would raise the stakes in a regional showdown over who controls disputed waters in the South China Sea.

=> ↺ It’s a Conspiracy! How to Discredit Seymour Hersh

• Max Fisher, now at Vox, learned well during his apprenticeship under Marty Peretz at The New Republic. This week, he was among the first to try to smear Seymour Hersh’s piece in the London Review of Books, which argued that pretty much everything we were told about the killing of Osama bin Laden was a lie. Most importantly, Hersh’s report questions the claim that Washington learned of OBL’s whereabouts thanks to torture—a claim popularized in the film Zero Dark Thirty.

• There’s a standard boiler plate now when it comes to going after Hersh, and all Fisher, in “The Many Problems with Seymour Hersh’s Osama bin Laden Conspiracy Theory,” did was fill out the form: establish Hersh’s “legendary” status (which Fisher does in the first sentence); invoke his reporting in My Lai and Abu Ghraib; then say that a number of Hersh’s recent stories—such as his 2012 New Yorker piece that the United States was training Iranian terrorists in Nevada—have been “unsubstantiated” (of course, other reporters never “substantiated” Hersh’s claim that Henry Kissinger was directly involved in organizing the cover-up of the fire-bombing of Cambodia for years—but that claim was true); question Hersh’s sources; and then, finally, suggest that Hersh has gone “off the rails” to embrace “conspiracy theories.”

=> ↺ Seymour Hersh Details Explosive Story on Bin Laden Killing & Responds to White House, Media Backlash

• Four years after U.S. forces assassinated Osama bin Laden, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Seymour Hersh has published an explosive piece claiming much of what the Obama administration said about the attack was wrong. Hersh claims at the time of the U.S. raid, bin Laden had been held as a prisoner by Pakistani intelligence since 2006. Top Pakistani military leaders knew about the operation and provided key assistance. Contrary to U.S. claims that it located bin Laden by tracking his courier, a former Pakistani intelligence officer identified bin Laden’s whereabouts in return for the bulk of a $25 million U.S. bounty. Questions are also raised about whether bin Laden was actually buried at sea, as the U.S. claimed. Hersh says instead the Navy SEALs threw parts of bin Laden’s body into the Hindu Kush mountains from their helicopter.

=> ↺ Sy Hersh’s bin Laden Story First Reported in 2011 — With Seemingly Different Sources

• R.J. Hillhouse, a former professor, Fulbright fellow and novelist whose writing on intelligence and military outsourcing has appeared in the Washington Post and New York Times, made the same main assertions in 2011 about the death of Osama bin Laden as Seymour Hersh’s new story in the London Review of Books — apparently based on different sources than those used by Hersh.

=> ↺ Smuggled Syrian documents enough to indict Bashar al-Assad, say investigators

• A three-year operation to smuggle official documents out of Syria has produced enough evidence to indict President Bashar al-Assad and 24 senior members of his regime, according to the findings of an international investigative commission.

• The prosecution cases against the Syrian leaders focus on their role in the suppression of the protests that triggered the conflict in 2011. Tens of thousands of suspected dissidents were detained, and many of them were tortured and killed in the Syrian prison system.

=> ↺ Fox News Defends Jeb Bush’s “Disastrous” Iraq War Answer

• Fox News defended Republican presidential hopeful Jeb Bush after he said he would still have authorized the invasion of Iraq “given what we know now,” claiming that Bush simply misunderstood the question.

Transparency Reporting

=> ↺ Prince Charles’s letters to ministers to be published

• They’ll be examined for evidence of any pressure brought to bear by a hereditary monarch-in-waiting on elected ministers, and for any evidence that government policy was changed following the prince’s intervention.

=> ↺ Prince Charles’s black spider memos to be published on Wednesday

• Prince Charles’ secret letters to British government ministers expressing frank views that the government has warned could undermine his political neutrality will finally be published on Wednesday.

=> ↺ Prince Charles Asked By Michael Crick About His Secret ‘Black Spider Memos’, It Didn’t Go Well

• Prince Charles clearly doesn’t want to talk about his ‘black spider’ memos to ministers, which are about to be released, after his aide was filmed body blocking a reporter who tried to ambush to ask about the secret letters.

• The memos, written to various government departments between 2004 and 2005, will be released at 4pm after a 10-year legal battle by The Guardian.

• They are understood to show Charles’ disagreeing with government policy.

• As Charles arrived at Marks and Spencer’s flagship store near Marble Arch on Oxford Street in London, Channel 4 News’ Michael Crick asked if he was “worried” about the letters and if he was still writing to ministers – and whether he thought he was behaving “unconstitutionally” in doing so.

=> ↺ A battle over these 27 bits of paper has cost you more than £275,000.

• Secret letters that Prince Charles wrote to Tony Blair’s ministers are finally being revealed after a fight lasting several years.

• It’s a battle that’s cost taxpayers more than £275,000 and needed a ruling by Britain’s highest court.

• So why has there been such a long wrangle over some bits of paper? Here are all your questions answered.

=> ↺ Release of Prince Charles’s letters shows the point of freedom of information

• The publication of letters Prince Charles sent to government ministers is a triumph – of sorts – for the Freedom of Information Act.

• The point of the act is to enable the public to understand better how those in authority are governing us. The release of the letters allows us a limited peek behind the curtains to see how the heir to the throne has been seeking to influence government policies.

• But boy, what a struggle. The government has fought very hard for a decade to prevent the disclosure of 27 pieces of correspondence between the prince and ministers in Tony Blair’s government.

=> ↺ UK Prince Charles’ letters to ministers finally made public

• Prince Charles said British troops were under-resourced during the war in Iraq, according to letters from him published on Wednesday which the government had tried to keep secret in case they cast doubt over the future king’s political neutrality.

• The comment about the armed forces came in a letter from the 66-year-old prince to former Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2004, one of 27 letters he wrote to former ministers in 2004 and 2005 which were released to the public after a decade of government attempts to block publication.

=> ↺ Queen’s restraint is exception to rule of meddling monarchs

• The determination of Queen Elizabeth II to avoid any action or utterance that might be deemed “political” has become the status quo. Little is known about her personal passions or politics. If she has any – and she surely has – she keeps them to herself.

• But monarchs and future monarchs, even since the end of executive monarchy, have always meddled. It is Elizabeth, not her son Charles, who is the exception rather than the rule.

=> ↺ Prince Charles ‘Black Spider’ letters released: Heir to the throne described opponents to badger cull as ‘intellectually dishonest’

• People opposing a cull of badgers to prevent the spread of tuberculosis in cattle were described by Charles as “intellectually dishonest” in a letter revealing that he has long been in favour of the controversial process.

• In a letter to the then Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2005, the Prince criticised what he described as the “badger lobby” for objecting to the killing of badgers while disregarding the slaughter of cattle which contract the disease.

=> ↺ Prince Charles’s ‘black spider memos’ show lobbying at highest political level

• A cache of secret memos between Prince Charles and senior government ministers has been released after a 10-year legal battle, offering the clearest picture yet of the breadth and depth of the heir to the throne’s lobbying at the highest level of politics.

• The 27 memos, sent in 2004 and 2005 and released only after the Guardian won its long freedom of information fight with the government, show the Prince of Wales making direct and persistent policy demands to the then prime minister Tony Blair and several key figures in his Labour government.

• From Blair, Charles demanded everything from urgent action to improve equipment for troops fighting in Iraq to the availability of alternative herbal medicines in the UK, a pet cause of the prince.

=> ↺ Prince Charles ‘black spider’ memos reveal lobbying of Tony Blair

• A cache of secret memos sent by Prince Charles to senior UK ministers has finally been published, following a 10-year freedom of information battle between the Guardian and the government. The letters reveal that Charles lobbied ministers, including the former prime minister Tony Blair, on a wide range of issues, including agriculture, the armed forces, architecture and homeopathy.

=> ↺ Prince Charles – Letters finally out – conspiracy theorists disappointed?

• There will be many disappointed people today I’d guess. Clarence House has released a statement that the publication of these letters will “only inhibit” the Princes ability to express concerns. Complete rubbish, if a member of the Royal Family is sending letters of a non-personal nature to those in our government, its of utmost importance that UK citizens are privy to their contents.

Environment/Energy/Wildlife

=> ↺ Energy and the US Dollar: May Issue of TerraJoule.us

• Imported energy as a share of total US energy consumption last year fell to just 11.16%, continuing a dramatic downtrend since 2005, when dependency stood at 30%. This is nothing short of a revolutionary trend-change, especially when you consider the gargantuan energy consumption of the US, which stands just shy of 100 quadrillion btu per year. Because US energy consumption overall has either bottomed, or is set to advance at least a little, the next dramatic move lower in the energy deficit will come in 2017, as LNG exports really get underway. TerraJoule.us believes global currency markets have not yet discounted these coming changes. Viewpoints overall about energy use, production, renewables, and global trade remains firmly anchored to an era that ended roughly a decade ago. Moreover, it’s astonishing that anyone who was watching markets a decade ago could possibly think the US Dollar is headed for trouble today. The US will become energy independent by 2019, according to the TerraJoule.us forecast. While the swings in fossil fuel trade are the driver for this change, the gains in renewables that will start hitting harder in the latter part of the decade will perfect and ensure this new era. Energy independence has typically been a subject for geo-political analysts. However, for our purposes, it’s the effects on the US Dollar and the impact on energy transition more broadly which are the main concerns for energy-focused investment, and the energy mix to 2020.

=> ↺ Nepal needs ‘sustainable aid’, says water charity

• In the aftermath of the 7.3-magnitude tremor in Nepal this week, Seattle-based NGO Splash has launched a campaign to raise $500,000 (£320,000) for its water projects in Kathmandu.

Finance

=> ↺ The Future of Jobs and Wages: A Conversation with Economist Richard Wolff

• WTO, TPP, NAFTA, CAFTA, and a host of trade agreements are causing America to hemorrhage jobs and the resultant downward pressure on wages. Add the productivity gains realized from automation and technology and the future of jobs in America looks pretty bleak. The government is cutting back on social programs and privatized welfare systems dependent upon the whims of the wealthy didn’t work for Louis the XVI or any other aristocracy throughout history. How will American workers support their families and keep our economy vibrant? There is a way but it will take courage. However, the long-term benefits are sustainable and fair. Professor Wolff talks to Tim Danahey and tells us how.

=> ↺ European Union VAT and my bookstore

• I really, really dislike this, but EU law leaves me no choice. I’m not comfortable blatantly ignoring tax law. I don’t think the EU could really do anything to me, but I wouldn’t be shocked if a future EU-US treaty were to suddenly make me responsible for years of back VAT. And I would like the option of visiting the EU in the future, rather than risk trouble because I’m evading taxes.

PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

=> ↺ Groups Add to Evidence in “Whistleblower” Tax Fraud Claim Against ALEC

• Common Cause and the Center for Media and Democracy sent federal authorities new evidence today that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is falsely passing itself off as a tax-exempt charity and effectively using taxpayer dollars to subsidize its lobbying on behalf of private interests.

• Common Cause filed a supplement to its three-year-old tax whistleblower complaint against ALEC, and the two groups sent a joint letter to Internal Revenue Service Commissioner John Koskinen demanding an investigation, collection of fines and back taxes, and the revocation of ALEC’s status as a tax-exempt charity. Supporting evidence available here.

Censorship

=> ↺ Greatest Threat to Free Speech Comes Not From Terrorism, But From Those Claiming to Fight it

• We learned recently from Paris that the western world is deeply and passionately committed to free expression and ready to march and fight against attempts to suppress it. That’s a really good thing, since there are all sorts of severe suppression efforts underway in the west – perpetrated not by The Terrorists but by the western politicians claiming to fight them.

Privacy

=> ↺ Welcome to the ad business, Verizon

• AOL’s fastest-growing business is advertising technology, which few people understand, like, or value.

• In its acquisition announcement this morning, Verizon Wireless declared its $4.4 billion acquisition of AOL, the Internet stalwart, to be a driver of its “over the top,” or Internet-delivered, content strategy.

=> ↺ Feds drop case in which cops nailed webcam to utility pole to spy on house

• The Justice Department on Tuesday withdrew its appeal of a lower court’s December ruling that said it was illegal for police to attach a webcam to a utility pole and spy on a suspected drug dealer’s house in rural Washington state for six weeks.

• The government did not comment on its decision to drop the appeal in a brief filing to the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals.

• The video camera operated 24 hours a day. Footage was synced to the computer of a Kennewick Police Department detective who could operate the camera from afar via its pan-and-zoom capabilities.

Civil Rights

=> ↺ Update: Striking Hypocrisy

• In fact the first focus of the Tory government is on removing rights that protect ordinary people from their betters, be they human rights or employment rights.

=> ↺ Fox Host: “If You Don’t Want To Be Poor,” Get A Job

=> ↺ MOVE Bombing at 30: “Barbaric” 1985 Philadelphia Police Attack Killed 11 & Burned a Neighborhood

• Today marks the 30th anniversary of a massive police operation in Philadelphia that culminated in the helicopter bombing of the headquarters of a radical group known as MOVE. The fire from the attack incinerated six adults and five children, and destroyed 65 homes. Despite two grand jury investigations and a commission finding that top officials were grossly negligent, no one from city government was criminally charged. MOVE was a Philadelphia-based radical movement dedicated to black liberation and a back-to-nature lifestyle. It was founded by John Africa, and all its members took on the surname Africa.

=> ↺ Don’t worry, Theresa May. Twitter has defined British values for you

• David Cameron will introduce a counter-extremism bill later in May…

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