Debian Project News - August 31st, 2018

[Donald Norwood]

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The Debian Project https://www.debian.org/
Debian Project News debian-p...@lists.debian.org
August 31st, 2018 https://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2018/03/
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Welcome to this year's third 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 enjoy this edition of the DPN.

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

1: https://bits.debian.org

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

2: https://www.debian.org/security/2018/
3: 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
------------------------

Happy 25th Anniversary Debian!

This year's annual Debian birthday celebration, known as DebianDay [4],
was an even more special occasion as it marked a quarter century [5] of
excellence, development, contributions, translations, software creation,
advocacy, and all things Debian. Celebrations were held all over the
world and several Debian designers created some amazing artwork, logos,
posters, and images which we shared online.

4: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianDay
5: https://bits.debian.org/2018/08/debian-is-25.html

Debian 25 Years by Angelo Rosa [6]

6: https://micronews.debian.org/images/Debian25years-AngeloRosa.png

Anniversary Logo by Mark Billings [7]

7: https://micronews.debian.org/images/Debian25years-MarkBillings.png

Happy Birthday by Petrusko [8]

8: https://micronews.debian.org/images/Debian25years-Petrusko.png

Artwork by Daniel Lenharo [9]

9: https://micronews.debian.org/images/Debian25years-DanielLenharo.png

Posters by Valessio Brito [10]

10: https://micronews.debian.org/images/Debian25years-ValessioBrito.png

Thank you Debian Developers and Contributors for all that you do!
Updated Debian 9 and Debian 8: 9.5 and 8.11 released

The Debian project announced [11] the fifth update of its stable
distribution Debian 9 (codename "Stretch") on 14 July 2018 to point
release 9.5.

11: https://www.debian.org/News/2018/20180714

The Debian project also announced [12] the eleventh and final update of
its oldstable distribution Debian 8 (codename "Jessie") on 23 June 2018
to point release 8.11.

12: https://www.debian.org/News/2018/20180623

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


Alioth Migration to Salsa

Debian Developers and projects should have already migrated over to the
new system; additional information on the migration is available [13].

13: https://wiki.debian.org/Salsa/AliothMigration

Debian Data Protection Team announced

Chris Lamb announced [14] the creation and delegation of the Debian Data
Protection team. The team will serve as the centralized point for
queries regarding Debian's use and care of personal information across
the project and guidance on data protection principles.

14: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/06/msg00000.html

Latest team features of Debian Package Tracker

Raphael Hertzog shared [15] the latest team features of the Debian
Package Tracker. New to the tracker are helpful attributes for email
address team identification, discussion subscriptions, and automatic
maintainer and uploader fields along with many other features.

15: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/07/msg00001.html

vmdebootstrap to be removed September 2018

Lars Wirzenius encouraged [16] users of the vmdebootstrap package to
switch to other available tools prior to its removal from the archive
September 2018. The package, used for automatically building system
images, is somewhat difficult to modify and test due to its
architecture. As other tools are available users are advised to change
now.

16: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/07/msg00002.html

Debian Policy 4.2.0.0 released

Sean Whitton announced Debian Policy 4.2.0.0 being released and uploaded
to sid. The announcement details the changes from Policy 4.1.5. The
Debian Policy Manual [17] deals with the structure and contents of the
Debian archive, technical requirements each package must satisfy to be
included in the archive, and the package management system developers
have to be conversant with.

17: https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/

DebConf18 Videos are available

New and noteworthy packages

Among many other packages that were added to the unstable Debian
archive [18] in the past weeks, we can find:

* astroid (0.13-3) - Graphical notmuch email client [19]
* webext-debianbuttons (2.1-2) - Buttons for querying Debian-related
pages with Firefox [20]
* elpa-verbiste (0.1.45-4) - French and Italian conjugator - emacs
extension [21]

18: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/newpkg
19: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/astroid
20: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/webext-debianbuttons
21: https://packages.debian.org/unstable/main/elpa-verbiste


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

Upcoming events

Debian/Xen microsprint, Cambridge, 10 September

There will be a microsprint [22] held on 10 September in Cambridge, UK,
to work on Debian Xen packages for "Buster".

22: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/08/msg00005.html

Debian Bug Squashing Party, Chemnitz, Germany 28th-30th September

There will be a Bug Squashing Party [23] on 28–30 September 2018 in
Chemnitz, Germany.

23: https://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2018/09/de/Chemnitz

DebConf18 in Hsinshu

The annual Debian Project's Developer Conference, which includes
technical, social and policy talks and is known as DebConf [24], was
held this year in Hsinchu, Taiwan from 29 July through 5 August.
DebConf18 [25] was the very first Debian Conference held in Asia. We
welcomed over 306 attendees from around the world, and held 137 events,
100 talks, 25 Birds of a Feather discussion sessions, 5 workshops and
many other activities.

24: https://debconf.org/
25: https://debconf18.debconf.org/

The schedule [26] of events and talks [27] were continually updated and
shared on Debian micronews [28], and are still available.

26: https://debconf18.debconf.org/schedule/
27: https://debconf18.debconf.org/talks/
28: https://micronews.debian.org

DebConf19 in Curitiba

DebConf19 will be held in Curitiba, Brazil, from 21 to 28 July, 2019,
and will be the second DebConf held in Brazil.


Reports
-------

LTS Freexian Monthly Reports

Freexian issues monthly reports [29] about the work of paid contributors
to Debian Long Term Support.

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

Reproducible Builds status update

Follow the Reproducible Builds blog [30] to get the weekly reports on
their work in the "Buster" cycle.

30: https://reproducible-builds.org/blog/


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

Teams needing help

Packages needing help:

Currently [31] 1298 packages are orphaned [32] and 173 packages are up
for adoption [33]: please visit the complete list of packages which need
your help [34].

31: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2018/08/msg00369.html
32: https://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/orphaned
33: https://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/rfa
34: 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 currently 203 [35] bugs available tagged
"newcomer".

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


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

Jonathan McDowell shared [36] a write-up entitled "Hooking up Home
Assistant to Alexa and Google Assistant" which details how to set up
home automation and required authentication, with a few critical
security steps to avoid being another insecure device on the IoT.

36: https://www.earth.li/~noodles/blog/2018/06/alexa-assistant.html

Benjamin Mako Hill blogged [37] on "How markets coopted free software's
most powerful weapon" which highlights the methodology of current
business development models which use the same tools that enabled the
large scale development of free culture and free software. The talk was
also the keynote at LibrePlanet 2018.

37: https://mako.cc/copyrighteous/libreplanet-2018-keynote

Ana Guerrero Lopez introduced [38] us to debos [39], a versatile image
generator. The tool, used to build software images, makes the task easy
by using recipe files in YAML to create highly customized images.

38: https://ekaia.org/blog/2018/07/03/introducing-debos/
39: https://github.com/go-debos/debos

Contributors

1,484 people and 19 teams are currently listed on the Debian
Contributors [40] page for 2018.

40: https://contributors.debian.org/

Discussions

From the Debian-user mailing list serveral interesting questions were
asked:

HP Garcia asked about "Verifying Digital Signatures" [41]. Fellow Debian
users contributed to the discussion with pointers on how to check and
keep keys and signatures current.

41: https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2018/06/msg00239.html

Pierre Couderc asked "How to apt update from an USB key?" [42] Readers
can learn about other tried and proven methods to update sources and
packages for computer systems with limited access.

42: https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2018/07/msg00420.html

Martin Drecher asked about "use of su vs sudo?" [43] Always a hot topic
for administrators, this question introduces best practices and includes
some of a history of how/when passwords are used during the initial
Debian system installation and the effects on the system afterward.

43: https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2018/08/msg00226.html

Richard Owlett asked about "Installing package NOT in repository" [44].
This longer discussion talks about the installation of.deb files,
install pathname arguments, dependency checking, dpkg, apt, and cached
personal survival notes.

44: https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2018/08/msg00595.html

Tips and Tricks

Petter Reinholdtsen shared a tip on doing a Debian APT upgrade without
enough free space [45] on the disk. The blog post includes a script and
other methods for upgrades when storage space is limited.

45:
http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_APT_upgrade_without_enough_free_space_on_the_disk___.html

Arturo Borrero González highlights Things you can do with Debian,
Multimedia editing. [46] He covers many of the FLOSS software packages
and tools available in Debian for multimedia editing and production.

46: http://ral-arturo.org/2018/07/19/multimedia.html

Once upon a time in Debian:

* 2014-08-27 Two new architectures (arm64 and ppc64el) bootstrapping
in unstable [47]
* 2010-08-31 Debian Project mourns the loss of Frans Pop [48]
* 2007-09-02 packages.debian.org updated [49]
* 2005-09-03 bugs.d.o: usertags and user categories [50]
* 2009-09-04 grub package now based on GRUB2 [51]

47: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2014/08/msg00012.html
48: https://www.debian.org/News/2010/20100831
49: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2007/09/msg00001.html
50: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2005/09/msg00002.html
51: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2009/09/msg00002.html


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

This is an extract from the micronews.debian.org [52] 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 provided unformatted in descending order by date
(recent news at the top).

* Several Debian designers created artwork to celebrate #DebianDay
#Debian25years
* The original announcement from Ian Murdock can be found here:
https://deb.li/ikd3y #DebianDay #Debian25years
* 25 years and counting
https://bits.debian.org/2018/08/debian-is-25.html #DebianDay #Debian25years
* If you want Debian Buster released in early 2019 (or like short
Debian freezes in general...) help fix RC bugs today!
https://nthykier.wordpress.com/2018/08/06/buster-is-headed-for-a-long-hard-freeze/
* #DebConf18 closes in Hsinchu and #DebConf19 dates announced
https://bits.debian.org/2018/08/debconf18-closes.html
* #DebConf18 ended with the introduction of #DebConf19 in Curitiba and
the Closing Ceremony. See you next year in Brazil!

52: https://micronews.debian.org

* Debian joins KDE's Advisory Board
https://dot.kde.org/2018/07/12/debian-joins-kdes-advisory-board
* Report on Debian Edu sprint at MiniDebconf Hamburg, May 2018
https://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2018/07/msg00004.html
* "Report on the Debian Bug Squashing Party" (New York) by Elana
Hashman https://hashman.ca/nyc-bsp-report/
* "Introducing debos, a versatile images generator" by Ana Beatriz
Guerrero Lopez https://ekaia.org/blog/2018/07/03/introducing-debos/


June

* Bits from the Debian Project Leader (June 2018)
https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/06/msg00006.html
* MiniDebConf Curitiba 2018 - a brief report
http://debianbrasil.org.br/blog/minidebconf-curitiba-2018-a-brief-report
* Debian Perl Sprint 2018
https://bits.debian.org/2018/06/debian-perl-sprint-2018.html
* Report from the recent "cryptsetup" sprint
https://blog.freesources.org//posts/2018/06/debian_cryptsetup_sprint_report/
* Civil Infrastructure Platform Announces Collaboration with the
Debian LTS Initiative
https://www.cip-project.org/announcement/2018/06/19/civil-infrastructure-platform-announces-collaboration-with-the-debian-lts-initiative-and-welcomes-cybertrust-as-a-new-member
* Debian Installer Buster Alpha 3 release
https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/06/msg00005.html
* Share your plans for DebCamp18
https://lists.debian.org/debconf-announce/2018/06/msg00003.html
* Debian Artwork: Call for Proposals for Debian 10 (Buster)
https://bits.debian.org/2018/06/buster-artwork-cfp.html
* DebConf19 has a logo
http://debianbrasil.org.br/blog/debconf19-has-a-logo
* "Looking for a new Raspberry Pi image maintainer" by Michael
Stapelberg
https://people.debian.org/~stapelberg//2018/06/03/raspi3-looking-for-maintainer.html
* Come join the #Debian #buster bug squashing party in Brooklyn, NYC
on June 24th https://hashman.ca/nyc-bsp/


May

* Bits from the Debian Project Leader (May 2018)
https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2018/05/msg00006.html



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This issue of Debian Project News was edited by The Publicity Team with
contributions from Jean-Pierre Giraud, Chris Lamb and and Justin B Rye.