Debian Project News - February 28th, 2018

[Laura Arjona Reina]

------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Debian Project https://www.debian.org/
Debian Project News debian-p...@lists.debian.org
February 28th, 2018 https://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2018/01/
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Welcome to this year's first issue of DPN, the newsletter for the Debian
community. Topics covered in this issue include:

* Welcome to the Debian Project News!
* Internal News/Happenings
* Events: Upcoming and Reports
* Reports
* Help needed
* More than just code
* Quick Links from Debian Social Media
* Want to continue reading DPN?


Welcome to the Debian Project News!
-----------------------------------

We hope that you are enjoying this format of the DPN.

For other news, please read the official Debian blog Bits from
Debian [1], and follow https://micronews.debian.org which RSS-feeds <the
@debian> profile in several social networks too.

1: https://bits.debian.org

Debian's Security Team releases current advisories on a daily basis
(Security Advisories 2017 [2] and Security Advisories 2018 [3]). Please
read them carefully and subscribe to the security mailing list [4].

2: https://www.debian.org/security/2017/
3: https://www.debian.org/security/2018/
4: https://lists.debian.org/debian-security-announce/

At the end of this Project News we've added a Quick Links section which
links to a selection of the posts made through our other media streams.


Internal News/Happenings
------------------------

Updated Debian 9 and Debian 8: 9.3 and 8.10 released

The Debian project announced [5] the third update of its stable
distribution Debian 9 (codename "Stretch") on 9 December 2017 to point
release 9.3.

5: https://www.debian.org/News/2017/2017120902

The Debian project also announced [6] the tenth update of its oldstable
distribution Debian 8 (codename "Jessie") on 9 December 2017 to point
release 8.10.

6: https://www.debian.org/News/2017/20171209

These point releases added corrections for security issues, along with a
few adjustments for serious problems. Security advisories have already
been published separately and are referenced where available. Upgrading
an existing installation to either revision can be achieved by pointing
the package management system at one of Debian's many HTTP mirrors. A
comprehensive list of mirrors is available at:
https://www.debian.org/mirror/list


FAI.me build service for installation images

Thomas Lange has announced [7] the FAI.me build service [8] for
customised installation images. On this web page, you can create
customised images with only a few clicks. It supports different Debian
distributions, all common desktop environments, several locales,
backported kernels, and the option of entering a list of packages. After
some time you can download your own ISO image which does a fully
automatic installation using FAI [9].

7:
https://lists.uni-koeln.de/pipermail/linux-fai/2017-November/011869.html
8: https://fai-project.org/FAIme
9: https://fai-project.org

Debsources now in sources.debian.org

The Debsources team is happy to announce [10] that Debsources [11],
which provides direct web access to the Debian operating system source
code, has been moved onto the official Debian infrastructure at
https://sources.debian.org. Debsources allows users to directly browse
available source packages and to peruse and highlight portions of the
source code files for every Debian release. It provides links via
HTML [12] and an API [13] for programmatic use.

10: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2017/12/msg00000.html
11: https://salsa.debian.org/qa/debsources/
12: https://sources.debian.org,
13: https://sources.debian.org/doc/api/

Debian participates in Outreachy and GSoC

Debian welcomes three Outreachy interns: Juliana Oliveira [14] who will
work on reproducible builds [15], Kira Obrezkova [16] who will work on
open-source mobile technologies [17], and Renata D'Avila [18] who will
work on a calendar database of social events and conferences for free
software developers [19].

14: https://medium.com/@jwnx
15:
https://wiki.debian.org/Outreachy/Round15/Projects#Outreachy.2FRound15.2FProjects.2FReproducibleBuildsOfDebian.Reproducible_builds_for_Debian_and_free_software
16: https://kira385881773.wordpress.com/
17:
https://wiki.debian.org/Outreachy/Round15/Projects#Outreachy.2FRound15.2FProjects.2FDebianOsmoCom.Debian_MobCom
18: https://rsip22.github.io/blog/
19:
https://wiki.debian.org/Outreachy/Round15/Projects#Outreachy.2FRound15.2FProjects.2FSocialEventAndConferenceCalendars.A_calendar_database_of_social_events_and_conferences

The Outreachy [20] program is available due to the efforts of Debian
Developers and Donors, providing a three month internship for groups
traditionally underrepresented in technology.

20: https://www.outreachy.org/

Google, through its Google Summer of Code [21] program, provides
students with a stipend to work over the summer months on open source
development. Debian is happy to announce [22] that we will be
participating as a mentoring organisation this year.

21: https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/
22: https://bits.debian.org/2018/01/gsoc-2018-mentors-and-co-mentors.html

We are looking for mentors and students that would like to participate.
Additional information is available on our Summer of Code 2018 wiki
page [23]; if you are able to mentor please contact the Debian Outreach
Team via mailing list [24] to join as a mentor.

23: https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2018
24: https://lists.debian.org/debian-outreach/

New IRC channel #debian-til

There is a new IRC channel #debian-til for sharing things that you
recently learned about Debian. Quoting the topic of the channel: "Share
something that you've learned today (or whenever) prefixed by
"TIL" (yes, even when YIL would be "correct"). Can be something
technical, social or anything else somewhat relevant to Debian -
Judgement-free zone! Post anything, however "obvious"!". More info about
the Debian IRC channels can be found in https://wiki.debian.org/IRC.


Misc Developer News

Paul Wise posted Misc Developer News #45 [25]. Highlights include
debhelper compat 11, KGB now supporting GitLab webhooks (for salsa), the
change of the mentors.debian.net FTP upload queue, a call to review your
debtags today, and Purism hardware discounts for Debian Developers.

25: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/02/msg00005.html

New and noteworthy packages

Among many other packages that were added to the unstable Debian
archive [26] in the last weeks, we can find:

* Gazebo 9 — new version of Gazebo, a multi-robot simulator for
outdoor environments. [27]
* Ganeti 2.16 — new version of Ganeti, a virtual server cluster
management tool. [28]
* R-cran-factominer — Multivariate Exploratory Data Analysis and Data
Mining. [29]
* Undertime — pick a meeting time using a table of world clocks. [30]

26: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/newpkg
27: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/gazebo9
28: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/ganeti-2.16
29: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/r-cran-factominer
30: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/undertime


Events: Upcoming and Reports
----------------------------

Upcoming events

Debian Bug Squashing Party in Tirana, Albania

There will be a Bug Squashing Party [31] on 3 and 4 March 2018, held in
Tirana, Albania, hosted by the Open Labs Hackerspace.

31: https://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2018/03/al/Tirana

MiniDebConf Curitiba 2018

Members of the Debian community in Curitiba met at Positivo University
to discuss [32] organising a 2018 Curitiba MiniDebConf [33] which will
take place April 11 to 14 at the central campus of the Federal
University of Technology - Paraná (UTFPR). Registration is free and
there will be a crowdfunding campaign to help finance the event.

32:
http://debianbrasil.org.br/blog/meeting-was-held-in-curitiba-to-organize-minidebconf-2018-and-bid-2019
33: https://minidebconf.curitiba.br/en

MiniDebConf Hamburg 2018

A miniDebConf will take place in Hamburg (Germany) from May 16 to 20,
with three days of Debcamp style hacking, followed by two days of talks,
workshops and more hacking. Read the announce [34] and visit the wiki
page of the event [35] where you can get all the details, register for
the event, and help in the organisation.

34: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/02/msg00003.html
35: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEvents/de/2018/MiniDebConfHamburg

Debian presence at events

There'll be a Debian booth at the Chemnitzer Linux-Tage 2018 [36] taking
place in the "Zentrales Hörsaal- und Seminar-Gebäude" of the Technical
University Chemnitz from Saturday 10 March to Sunday 11 March 2018. The
first CLT was held in 1999 and Debian has taken part in the event since
2002. If anyone is interested in helping with the booth, please have a
look at the wiki page:
https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEvents/de/2018/ChemnitzerLinuxTage

36: https://chemnitzer.linux-tage.de/2018/en

FOSSASIA Summit [37] will take place in Singapore 22–25 March 2018;
several Debian Developers and contributors will attend, and maybe
organise a Debian booth. Please get in touch via the debian-events-
apac [38] mailing list for details and help or coordination.

37: http://fossasia.com/
38:
https://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2018/01/debian-ev...@lists.debian.org

DebConf18 in Hsinshu

The organisation of DebConf18 (Hsinshu, Taiwan, 29 July–5 August 2018)
is going on. DebConf18 will be preceded by one week of DebCamp,
Saturday, July 21 through Friday, July 27. The Call for Proposals [39]
was published on 7 February 2018. You can now sign into the website [40]
and submit an event, or write to the content team at
<con...@debconf.org> [41] to suggest an invited speaker. Talk proposals
must be submitted by Sunday 17 June 2018 at the latest. Registration
will open soon and you can subscribe to debconf-announce [42] to be
notified when registration opens. Bursary applications will be available
together with registration and must be submitted by 13 April. As of now,
eleven companies or organisations have decided to support the event, and
DebConf18 is still accepting [43] sponsors; visit its website [44] for
more details.

39: https://bits.debian.org/2018/02/debconf18-cfp.html
40: https://debconf18.debconf.org/
41: con...@debconf.org
42: https://debconf18.debconf.org/about/registration/
43: https://bits.debian.org/tag/debconf18.html
44: https://debconf18.debconf.org

DebConf19 in Curitiba

DebConf19 will be hosted in Curitiba, Brazil. See the Debian Curitiba
bid [45] for details.

45: https://wiki.debconf.org/wiki/DebConf19/Bids/Curitiba

Event Reports

MiniDebConf Toulouse 2017

A miniDebConf took place in Toulouse, France, on 18–19 November 2017
organised by Debian France Association [46] together with the Capitole
du libre [47], the help of the Toulibre association [48], and the
support of Evolix [49]. The event was a real success with more than
twenty-five attendees at each session. Details of the event are on the
wiki page [50].

46: https://france.debian.net/posts/2017/mini-debconf_2017_retour/
47: https://2017.capitoledulibre.org
48: https://www.toulibre.org
49: http://evolix.com
50: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEvents/fr/2017/Toulouse

MiniDebConf Cambridge 2017

Another miniDebConf took place in Cambridge, UK, on 23–26 November 2017.
Details of the event, schedule, and photos are on their wiki page [51].
There were live video streams, and the recordings are already
available [52].

51: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEvents/gb/2017/MiniDebConfCambridge
52:
https://meetings-archive.debian.net/pub/debian-meetings/2017/mini-debconf-cambridge/

Debian presence at events

There was a Debian presence at the XIV Goiano Free Software Forum (FGSL)
in Goiânia (Brazil) last November (talks and booth [53]), at
LinuxDay [54] in Dornbirn (Austria) last December (Debian booth), at
Campus Party Brasil 2018 [55] in São Paulo (Brazil) and at FOSDEM 2018
in Brussels (Belgium) in February (Debian booth [56]).

53:
http://debianbrasil.org.br/blog/how-were-the-debian-activities-at-fgsl-2017-in-goiania
54: https://www.linuxday.at/
55:
http://debianbrasil.org.br/blog/how-were-the-debian-activities-at-cpbr11-in-sao-paulo
56: https://lists.debian.org/debian-events-eu/2018/02/msg00002.html


Reports
-------

LTS Freexian Monthly Reports

Freexian issues monthly reports [57] about the work of paid contributors
to Debian Long Term Support.

57: https://raphaelhertzog.com/tag/Freexian+LTS/

Reproducible Builds status update

Follow the reproducible builds blog [58] to get the weekly reports on
their work in the "Stretch" cycle.

58: https://reproducible.alioth.debian.org/blog/


Help needed
-----------

Packages needing help:

Currently [59] 1262 packages are orphaned [60] and 164 packages are up
for adoption [61]: please visit the complete list of packages which need
your help [62].

59: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2018/02/msg00287.html
60: https://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/orphaned
61: https://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/rfa
62: https://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/help_requested

Newcomer bugs

Debian has a "newcomer" bug tag, used to indicate bugs which are
suitable for new contributors to use as an entry point to working on
specific packages. There are 226 [63] bugs available tagged "newcomer".

63: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?tag=newcomer


More than just code
-------------------

Contributors

941 people and 16 teams are listed on the Debian Contributors [64] page
for 2018.

64: https://contributors.debian.org/

Discussions

On the Debian-user mailing list, Debian user Jason asked how to create a
PDF-Printer from the command line [65]. A large discussion covered many
questions asking: Is (La)TeX text or not, what exactly is a mimetype,
why not a2ps or lp, and file bloat for PDF creation. There are lots of
tips and tricks throughout the thread for those wondering about the same
question.

65: https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2018/01/msg00212.html

Debian user Richard Hector asked about the policy on the "wontfix" bug
tag used by maintainers [66]. The thread covered many topics and
discussions about the actual output from the date command, interactive
shells, the question of "what day is it really?", the fuzzy grammar of
the date string, parsers, mail LDOSUBSCRIBER, and the formail component
of procmail. A very interesting read!

66: https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2018/02/msg00073.html

Once upon a time in Debian:

* 2014-02-28 MiniDebConf in Phnom Penh, Cambodia 2014 [67]
* 2012-03-01 Derivatives patches service available [68]
* 2007-03-05 All Debian package installation prompts translated into
French [69]
* 2008-03-08 Debian Bug #470000 reported by <madc...@debian.org> [70]
* 1999-03-09 Debian GNU/Linux 2.1 'Slink' released [71]

67: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianCambodia/MiniDebConf2014
68: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2012/03/msg00000.html
69:
https://wayback.archive.org/web/20071104032015/http://times.debian.net:80/1084-debfr-debconf-100percent#1084
70: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=470000
71: https://lists.debian.org/debian-announce/1999/msg00005.html


Quick Links from Debian Social Media
------------------------------------

This is an extract from the micronews.debian.org [72] feed, in which we
have removed the topics already commented on in this DPN issue. You can
skip this section if you already follow micronews.debian.org or <the
@debian> profile in a social network (Pump.io, GNU Social, Mastodon or
Twitter). The items are given unformatted, and in descending order by
date (recent news at the top).

72: https://micronews.debian.org

February

* Debian won Linux Journal's Readers' Choice Award for Best Linux
Distribution!https://bits.debian.org/2018/02/debian-linuxjournal-readers-choice-award.html
* Debian loves Free Software, today and every day! Show your love
https://fsfe.org/campaigns/ilovefs/ #ILoveFS
* Vote for Debian in the Linux Journal's "Best Linux Distribution" of
2018!http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/best-linux-distribution-2018
* How were the Debian activities at #CPBR11 in São Paulo
http://debianbrasil.org.br/blog/how-were-the-debian-activities-at-cpbr11-in-sao-paulo


January

*< Meet @Debian> at @fosdem next week. We will be at building K level
1. https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEvents/be/2018/FOSDEM
* Spectre & Meltdown vulnerability/mitigation checker available in
stretch-backports
https://packages.debian.org/stretch-backports/spectre-meltdown-checker
* 2017 Freedombox progress report:
https://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2018-January/008242.html


December

* Videos of the recent MiniDebConf Cambridge are available, thanks
DebConf Video Team! See details and links at
https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEvents/gb/2017/MiniDebConfCambridge


November

* There will be a Debian booth at LinuxDay at Dornbirn (Austria) next
Dec 2nd https://www.linuxday.at
* This weekend is MiniDebConf Cambridge 2017! Get the info about
schedule and live streaming at
https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEvents/gb/2017/MiniDebConfCambridge
* How were the Debian activities at FGSL 2017 in Goiânia
http://debianbrasil.org.br/blog/how-were-the-debian-activities-at-fgsl-2017-in-goiania



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74: https://lists.debian.org/debian-news/


This issue of Debian Project News was edited by The Publicity Team with
contributions from Thomas Lange, Paulo Henrique de Lima Santana and and
Jean-Pierre Giraud.