Debian Weekly News - July 25th, 2006
Welcome to this year's 30th issue of DWN, the weekly newsletter for the Debian community. Christoph Berg implemented an overview page for tasks in the packages overview. He also announced that the repository has been moved to Subversion and that notifications are now handled by the Package Tracking System directly.
DzongkhaLinux launched. The Debian project announced the release of DzongkhaLinux, a GNU/Linux distribution based on Debian GNU/Linux 3.1 that has been localised into Bhutan's national language. The system consists of one CD which can be either installed or used as a live system. The Bhutan Department of Information Technology chose Debian for its high versatility and reliability as well as the guarantee to always remain 100 % Free Software.
Consolidating SSL Certificates. Jaldhar Vyas wondered if Debian should change all SSL certificate using packages to use the snake oil certificate from the ssl-cert package. Petter Reinholdtsen explained that Debian-Edu already configures several services with SSL certificates automatically and that such a change would simplify this.
Dealing with Documentation Issues in Stable. Osamu Aoki (青木 修)
asked
for an faq
tag for the bug tracking
system. In many cases, a bug report against stable is a frequently asked question and
the answer is hidden under an obscure location. Closing such bug reports or
tagging them wontfix
doesn't sound right.
Handling Assets for the Project. Manoj Srivastava proposed an amendment to the Debian constitution and sought seconds. This will bring the constitution in line with current needs and practices of handling assets globally, and allowing the project to add and remove partner organisations currently authorised to hold assets for Debian.
Package Tracking System Update. Raphaël Hertzog reported that the Package Tracking System can be used to relay information from derivative distributions as well. This allows interested people to receive regularly small patches instead of big monolithic ones. He is also seeking help for new features.
Release Status Update. Marc Brockschmidt commented on the etch release status. He clarified the meaning of the release goals and asked developers to work on lowering the number of critical issues affecting the release. Bug squashing parties will be organised around the world. The upcoming release will probably carry 4.0 as version number and may include Python 2.4, Linux 2.6.17 or newer, X.org and most of the architectures sarge was released for plus AMD64.
Finishing the /usr/doc Transition. Amaya Rodrigo Sastre asked
for a semi-automatic way to test the archive again to make sure there
are no more packages installing a symlink under /usr/doc
. Stefan Hühner
suggested the use of an existing lintian check. Joey Hess confirmed that this is the way he initially used to report bugs and
Luk Claes added that piuparts is also useful for such a check.
Beta 3 of the Debian Installer. Frans Pop announced the start of the third beta release of the debian-installer now that Linux 2.6.16 is available in etch. He explained that the installer consumes more memory because of crypto support which will be improved after the beta release and due to more supported languages.
Labelling enhanced CD/DVD Sets. Radu-Cristian Fotescu wondered how prominent a distributor of an enhanced sarge CD needs to mark that it's not an
official and original sarge CD. MJ Ray pointed
out that the official designation may only be used for official CDs and
that changed CDs are to be labelled
unofficial
.
Security Updates. You know the drill. Please make sure that you update your systems if you have any of these packages installed.
- DSA 1112: mysql-dfsg-4.1 — Denial of service.
- DSA 1113: zope2.7 — Information disclosure.
- DSA 1114: hashcash — Arbitrary code execution.
- DSA 1115: gnupg2 — Denial of service.
- DSA 1116: gimp — Arbitrary code execution.
- DSA 1117: libgd2 — Denial of service.
- DSA 1118: Mozilla — Several vulnerabilities.
- DSA 1119: hiki — Denial of service.
- DSA 1120: Mozilla Firefox — Several vulnerabilities.
- DSA 1121: postgrey — Denial of service.
- DSA 1122: libnet-server-perl — Denial of service.
- DSA 1123: libdumb — Arbitrary code execution.
- DSA 1124: fbi — Potential deletion of user data.
New or Noteworthy Packages. The following packages were added to the unstable Debian archive recently or contain important updates.
- awffull — Web server log analysis program.
- cdpr — Cisco Discovery Protocol Reporter.
- courieruserinfo — Retrieve courier user account information.
- dates — Calendar optimised for embedded devices.
- dwm — Dynamic window manager.
- fslint — Toolkit to fix various problems with filesystems' data.
- ggzd — GGZ Gaming Zone: main server.
- gnome-user-guide — GNOME user's guide.
- jpegoptim — Utility to optimise JPEG files.
- jwchat — Full featured, web-based Jabber chat client.
- jython — Python seamlessly integrated with Java.
- klamav — Graphical front-end for ClamAV.
- live-package — Debian Live framework.
- min12xxw — Printer driver for KonicaMinolta PagePro 1[234]xxW.
- pcf2bdf — Convert X11 font from PCF to BDF format.
- pootle — Web-based translation and translation management tool.
- pypar2 — Graphical frontend for the par2 utility.
- qemu-launcher — GTK+ front-end to QEMU computer emulator.
- ri-li — Toy simulator game.
- scim-thai — Thai Input Method Engine for SCIM.
- sudoku — Console based sudoku.
- trigger — Free 3D rally racing car game.
- unicode-data — Property data for the Unicode character set.
- yeahconsole — Drop-down X terminal emulator wrapper.
- zimpl — Mathematical modelling language for optimisation problems.
Orphaned Packages. 40 packages were orphaned this week and
require a new maintainer. This makes a total of 355 orphaned packages. Many
thanks to the previous maintainers who contributed to the Free Software
community. Please see the WNPP pages for
the full list, and please add a note to the bug report and retitle it to ITA:
if you plan to take over a package. To find out which orphaned packages are
installed on your system the wnpp-alert
program from
devscripts
may be helpful.
- alicq — Flexible ICQ client in pure Tcl/Tk. (Bug#379599)
- apollon — KDE-based interface to the giFT file-sharing system. (Bug#379346)
- aptconf — Debconf infrastructure for setting up apt sources. (Bug#379037)
- atari800 — Atari emulator for X/curses/SDL. (Bug#379022)
- cbrowser — C/C++ source code indexing, querying and browsing tool. (Bug#378796)
- configlet — Alternative debconf configuration interface: core API. (Bug#379031)
- cscope — Interactively examine a C program source. (Bug#378802)
- cthugha — Oscilloscope on acid. (Bug#378946)
- discover — Hardware identification library. (Bug#379043)
- discover-data — Data lists for Discover hardware detection system. (Bug#379044)
- etherconf — Debconf interface to Ethernet device configuration. (Bug#379032)
- fbi — Linux frame buffer image viewer. (Bug#379250)
- gnome-tasksel — GNOME interface to Debian tasks. (Bug#379038)
- gtm — Multiple files transfer manager. (Bug#379000)
- htmlgen — Python library for the generation of HTML. (Bug#379679)
- ida — Image viewer & editor. (Bug#379257)
- kernel-patch-nfs-swap — Patch to Linux to enable swapping over NFS. (Bug#378928)
- krecord — KDE sound recorder. (Bug#379252)
- libapache-mod-python — Apache module that embeds Python 2.4 within the server. (Bug#379680)
- libooc-vo — VisualOberon GUI class library for Oberon-2. (Bug#379221)
- libooc-x11 — X11 specific modules for the oo2c compiler (devel). (Bug#379223)
- libooc-xml — XML parser for the oo2c Oberon-2 compiler (devel). (Bug#379222)
- libpcd — Library for reading PhotoCD images. (Bug#379254)
- libqt-perl — Perl bindings for the Qt library. (Bug#379681)
- localeconf — Debconf interface to locale configuration. (Bug#379033)
- mercury — New logic/functional programming language. (Bug#379682)
- motv — Motif TV application. (Bug#379256)
- mozilla-locale-zh-cn — Mozilla Simplified Chinese (China) language/region pack. (Bug#378751)
- mozilla-locale-zh-tw — Mozilla Traditional Chinese (Taiwan) language/region pack. (Bug#378752)
- oo2c — Optimising Oberon-2 to ANSI-C Compiler. (Bug#379224)
- openmotif — Open Motif. (Bug#379258)
- picax — Tool for creation of aptable media. (Bug#379039)
- python-adns — Python bindings to the asynchronous DNS resolver library. (Bug#379683)
- python-biggles — Scientific plotting package for Python [dummy package]. (Bug#379684)
- python-parted — Python bindings for GNU Parted. (Bug#379034)
- tcldom — DOM binding for Tcl. (Bug#379404)
- timezoneconf — Debconf interface to system timezone, date, and time. (Bug#379035)
- tv-fonts — X11 fonts for TV applications. (Bug#379255)
- wv — Programs for accessing Microsoft Word documents. (Bug#379466)
- xawtv — Collection of TV and radio applications. (Bug#379251)
Removed Packages. 10 packages have been removed from the Debian archive during the past week:
- kernel-latest-powerpc — Linux kernel headers on PowerPC
Bug#353717: Request of maintainer, outdated, unmaintained - kernel-image-2.4.27-alpha — Headers for building modules for Linux 2.4.27
Bug#367518: Request of maintainer, outdated, not used anymore, FTBFS - sfio — Enhanced library for managing I/O streams (development)
Bug#279812: Request of QA: rc-buggy, unmaintained, almost no users - doxymacs — E-lisp package for making doxygen usage easier under Emacs
Bug#321821: Request of QA: rc-buggy, unmaintained, no users - tcltk8.0-ja — Japanese localised version of Tcl 8.0
Bug#360500: Request of QA, uninstallable, obsolete version of Tcl/Tk - gnome-ruby — Ruby binding of libart
Bug#367680: Request of maintainer: obsolete - xmule — eMule client for the edonkey2000 network
Bug#370524: Request of maintainer, rc-buggy, unmaintained at the moment - barrendero — Deletes messages on the spool dir depending on their age
Bug#378485: Request of maintainer, old, unused, buggy - ipsc — IP Subnet Calculator for X
Bug#378772: Request of QA, rc-buggy (uninstallable), obsolete, dead upstream, maintainer MIA - ipfwadm — Linux 2.0.x firewalling tools
Bug#378548: Request of QA: unmaintained, very outdated, doesn't work anymore on more recent kernels
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This issue of Debian Weekly News was edited by Mohammed Adnène Trojette and Martin 'Joey' Schulze.