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Debian Weekly News
http://www
.debian.org/News/weekly/2006/16/
Debian Weekly News - April 18th, 2006
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Welcome to this year's 16th issue of DWN, the weekly
newsletter for
the Debian community. We congratulate the new project leader
(DPL),
Anthony Towns. Holger Levsen [1]announced updated [2]videos
from the
last Skolelinux meeting as Ogg theoras. For the first time
the videos
themselves contain a copyright and author note.
1. http://layer-
acht.org/blog/debian/#1-14
2. http://meetings-archive.debian.n
et/pub/debian-meetings/2006/debian-edu-erkelenz/
Debian Project Leader Election. Manoj Srivastava
[3]announced Anthony
Towns as the winner of this year's project leader
[4]election whose
term started on April 17th. In total 421 developers have
casted a
ballot. Anthony [5]stated afterwards that the general
philosophy he
is aiming to follow is that there's very little you can do
as DPL that
you can't do as a regular developer.
3. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce
/2006/04/msg00004.html
4. http://www.d
ebian.org/vote/2006/vote_002
5. http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/04/msg00
152.html
Experimental Autobuilder. Wouter Verhelst [6]explained that
automatically building packages in the experimental
distribution is a
bit of a special case, which means that our experimental
autobuilders
act slightly differently compared to other distributions.
Only
properly versioned build-dependencies will be pulled in from
experimental and taken from unstable otherwise.
6. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce
/2006/04/msg00007.html
Debian Python Modules Team. Raphaël Hertzog [7]reported that
the
Debian Python Modules Team has been created to
collaboratively
maintain packages of Python modules. They have prepared a
[8]policy
already and invite all maintainers of Python modules to join
the team.
7. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce
/2006/04/msg00008.html
8. http://python-modules.alioth.debian.org/python
-modules-policy.html
X11 Release 7 Transition. Steve Langasek [9]reported that
X.Org 7.0
alias X11R7 has been uploaded into [10]unstable and that it
brought a
few bugs with it. As a result the X11R6 hierarchy is going
away and
new programs are installed in /usr/bin instead. Static
library
packages have also been dropped.
9. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce
/2006/04/msg00010.html
10. http://www.debian
.org/releases/sid/
Reforming the New Maintainer Process. Marc Brockschmidt
[11]summarised
his experiences of the current process. Some problems and
delays are
caused by the lack of interested people working as
application
managers. He proposed to raise the requirements before
applying and to
separate upload permissions, system accounts and voting
rights.
11. http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/04/msg00
163.html
On Generating Revenue. Annamalai Gurusami [12]wondered why
the Debian
project doesn't sell CDs and generate revenue. Don
Armstrong
[13]explained that the Debian project is a non-profit
organisation and
that other entities are more used to the complications of
taxes and
the economics of making and selling CDs and DVDs. Paul
Johnson
[14]added that it's better to donate to Debian directly
instead of
purchasing a product of which only a fraction of the prize
goes to the
project.
12. http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/04/msg00
221.html
13. http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/04/msg00
240.html
14. http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/04/msg00
244.html
Package Removal Problems. Lars Wirzenius [15]summarised the
top 10
problems he discovered in Debian packages using the
[16]piuparts
utility that performs automatic installation and
de-installation of
packages. Gustavo Franco [17]suggested to add checks to
[18]linda and
[19]lintian that could detect some of these problems
earlier.
15. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg00693.
html
16. http://packages.d
ebian.org/piuparts
17. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg00984.
html
18. http://packages.debi
an.org/linda
19. http://packages.de
bian.org/lintian
License Meta Information. Jari Aalto [20]proposed to add a
new field
to the control file that contains the abbreviation of the
used
license. Martin Würtele [21]pointed out that this
information is
already available on [22]packages.debian.org without the
need to
download the entire package. Jörg Jaspert [23]stated that
such a field
would not even ease NEW processing.
20. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg00766.
html
21. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg00769.
html
22. http://packages.debian.or
g/
23. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg00778.
html
Marking BTS SPAM. Shaun Jackman [24]wondered if it would be
possible
to mark spam sent via the [25]bug tracking system (BTS). Don
Armstrong
[26]pointed out that a button with a similar functionality
already
exists on the web pages for bug reports. Additionally,
Javier
Fernández-Sanguino Peña [27]provided a [28]Mutt
configuration snippet
for reporting list spam via mail.
24. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg00811.
html
25. http://www.debian.org/Bug
s/
26. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg00812.
html
27. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/02/msg01213.
html
28. http://packages.debia
n.org/mutt
Changes to the unofficial AMD64 Archive. Jörg Jaspert
[29]informed
about a functional change on [30]amd64.debian.net, which
maintains an
unofficial port of Debian for the [31]AMD64 platform. Since
the recent
inclusion of AMD64 as an officially supported platform there
is no
need for an unofficial AMD64 build daemon anymore. Users of
testing or
unstable should switch over to an official [32]mirror, users
of sarge,
the current stable release, are not affected by this change.
29. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce
/2006/04/msg00005.html
30. http://amd64.debian.net/
31. http://www.debian.
org/ports/amd64/
32. http://www.debian.
org/mirrors/list
Security Updates. You know the drill. Please make sure that
you update
your systems if you have any of these packages installed.
* DSA 1032: [33]zope-cmfplone packages -- Unprivileged data
manipulation.
* DSA 1033: [34]horde3 -- Several vulnerabilities.
* DSA 1034: [35]horde2 -- Several vulnerabilities.
* DSA 1035: [36]fcheck -- Insecure temporary file creation.
* DSA 1036: [37]bsdgames -- Local privilege escalation.
33. http://w
ww.debian.org/security/2006/dsa-1032
34. http://w
ww.debian.org/security/2006/dsa-1033
35. http://w
ww.debian.org/security/2006/dsa-1034
36. http://w
ww.debian.org/security/2006/dsa-1035
37. http://w
ww.debian.org/security/2006/dsa-1036
New or Noteworthy Packages. The following packages were
added to the
unstable Debian archive [38]recently or contain important
updates.
38. http:
//packages.debian.org/unstable/newpkg_main
* [39]briquolo -- Fast paced 3d breakout.
* [40]cfourcc -- Command line tool for changing FourCC in
Microsoft
RIFF AVI files.
* [41]cryptonit -- Client side PKI (X.509) cryptographic
tool.
* [42]dglog -- CGI log analyser for DansGuardian.
* [43]dodgindiamond2 -- Shoot-'em-up arcade game for one
or two
players.
* [44]germinate -- Expand dependencies in a list of seed
packages.
* [45]lsb-desktop -- Linux Standard Base 3.1 Desktop
support
package.
* [46]mesa-utils -- Miscellaneous Mesa GL utilities.
* [47]sparsehash -- Google's extremely memory-efficient
hash_map
implementation.
* [48]thoggen -- DVD backup utility based on GStreamer and
Gtk+.
* [49]tzdata -- Time Zone and Daylight Saving Time Data.
* [50]xorg -- X.Org X Window System.
* [51]zope2.9 -- Open Source Web Application Server.
39. ht
tp://packages.debian.org/unstable/games/briquolo
40.
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/graphics/cfourcc
41. htt
p://packages.debian.org/unstable/x11/cryptonit
42. http://
packages.debian.org/unstable/web/dglog
43. http://packages.debian.org/unstable/games/dodgindiamond2
44. h
ttp://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/germinate
45.
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/misc/lsb-desktop
46. ht
tp://packages.debian.org/unstable/x11/mesa-utils
47. http://packages.debian.org/unstable/libdevel/sparsehash
48.
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/graphics/thoggen
49. http:
//packages.debian.org/unstable/libs/tzdata
50. http://p
ackages.debian.org/unstable/x11/xorg
51. http:
//packages.debian.org/unstable/web/zope2.9
Orphaned Packages. 11 packages were orphaned this week and
require a
new maintainer. This makes a total of 292 orphaned packages.
Many
thanks to the previous maintainers who contributed to the
Free
Software community. Please see the [52]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.
52. http://www.debian.o
rg/devel/wnpp/
* [53]alltraxclock -- Analog clock plugin for GKrellM.
([54]Bug#362929)
* [55]alltraxclock2 -- Analog clock plugin for GKrellM2.
([56]Bug#362930)
* [57]libticables3 -- Support library for Texas Instruments
link
cables. ([58]Bug#362163)
* [59]libticalcs4 -- Provides functions to communicate with
TI
calculators. ([60]Bug#362164)
* [61]libtifiles0 -- Texas Instruments calculators file
formats
library. ([62]Bug#362166)
* [63]skinedit -- Skin editor for TiEmu. ([64]Bug#362161)
* [65]thai-system -- Meta package for Thai environment
under X11.
([66]Bug#362490)
* [67]tidev-modules -- Sources for drivers for Texas
Instruments
calculators link cables. ([68]Bug#362162)
* [69]tiemu -- Texas Instruments calculators emulator.
([70]Bug#362159)
* [71]tilp -- TI calculator <-> PC communication
program for X.
([72]Bug#362157)
* [73]unalz -- Utility used for decompressing alzip format
file.
([74]Bug#362995)
53. http://packages.debian.org/unstable/x11/gkrellm-allt
raxclock
54. http://bugs.debian.org/
362929
55. http://packages.debian.org/unstable/x11/gkrellm-all
traxclock2
56. http://bugs.debian.org/
362930
57. http://packages.debian.org/unstable/libs/libticables3
58. http://bugs.debian.org/
362163
59.
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/libs/libticalcs4
60. http://bugs.debian.org/
362164
61.
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/libs/libtifiles0
62. http://bugs.debian.org/
362166
63. http://packages.debian.org/unstable/math/tiemu-skinedit
64. http://bugs.debian.org/
362161
65.
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/misc/thai-system
66. http://bugs.debian.org/
362490
67. http://packages.debian.org/unstable/misc/tidev-modu
les-source
68. http://bugs.debian.org/
362162
69. http:/
/packages.debian.org/unstable/math/tiemu
70. http://bugs.debian.org/
362159
71. http://
packages.debian.org/unstable/math/tilp
72. http://bugs.debian.org/
362157
73. http:
//packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/unalz
74. http://bugs.debian.org/
362995
Removed Packages. 8 packages have been [75]removed from the
Debian
archive during the past week:
75. http://ftp-
master.debian.org/removals.txt
* python2.1 -- IDE for Python (v2.1) using Tkinter
[76]Bug#362047: Request of QA, superseded by python 2.3
and 2.4
* decompyle2.2 -- Old version of the Python byte-code
decompiler
[77]Bug#361406: Request of maintainer, obsolete; replaced
by
decompyle; depends on to-be-removed python2.2
* zope-speedpack -- Speed optimisation for cmf-based
products
[78]Bug#361946: Request of maintainer, obsolete
* zope-filesystemsite -- Filesystem directory views from
cmf
[79]Bug#361947: Request of Maintainer, obsolete
* zope-testcase -- Unit testing framework and test case for
Zope
[80]Bug#361948: Request of maintainer, merged with zope
* zopeinterface -- Python library for API definitions
through
interfaces
[81]Bug#361950: Request of maintainer, superseded by
zope3
* zope-verbosesecurity -- Helps to explain the reason for
denied
access
[82]Bug#361949: Request of maintainer, merged with zope
76. http://bugs.debian.org/
362047
77. http://bugs.debian.org/
361406
78. http://bugs.debian.org/
361946
79. http://bugs.debian.org/
361947
80. http://bugs.debian.org/
361948
81. http://bugs.debian.org/
361950
82. http://bugs.debian.org/
361949
Want to continue reading DWN? Please help us create this
newsletter.
We still need more volunteer writers who watch the Debian
community
and report about what is going on. Please see the
[83]contributing
page to find out how to help. We're looking forward to
receiving your
mail at [84]dwn debian.org.
83. http:/
/www.debian.org/News/weekly/contributing
84. mailto:dwndebian.org
This issue of Debian Weekly News was edited by Sebastian
Feltel
and Martin 'Joey' Schulze.
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