Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2021 i Linux Magazine

Dear Reader, Today I’m remembering an episode that happened a few years ago. We are still a proud print publishing company, but, like most publishers, we deliver some of our copies in electronic form through content platforms available for personal computers and mobile devices. One of those platforms at the time was Apple Newsstand, a virtual newsstand for iPhone and iPad devices. The user interface for Apple Newsstand looked just like a magazine shelf at a bookstore, with a picture of a bunch of magazine shelves. Then, if you purchased a magazine, an icon with the cover of the magazine appeared on the virtual magazine shelf. The goal of Apple Newsstand was to be a perfect little replacement of a real neighborhood newsstand – you buy any magazine you want…

Linux Magazine www.linux-magazine.com ADMIN HPC http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/ mpi4py – High-Performance Distributed Python • Jeff Layton Python, I think it’s safe to say, is the most prevalent language for machine learning and deep learning and has become a popular language for technical computation, as well. Why Good Applications Don’t Scale • Jeff Layton You just bought a new system with lots and lots of cores (e.g., a desktop with 64 cores or a server with 128 cores). Now that you have all of these cores, why not take advantage of them by parallelizing your code? ADMIN Online http://www.admin-magazine.com/ Backup and Restore Disks • Erik Bärwaldt Not every backup tool is useful for backing up entire data media. Rescuezilla makes perfect bit-level copies of mass media in a matter of minutes, so you…

Author The Linux kernel mailing list comprises the core of Linux development activities. Traffic volumes are immense, often reaching 10,000 messages in a week, and keeping up to date with the entire scope of development is a virtually impossible task for one person. One of the few brave souls to take on this task is Zack Brown. Dealing with Older GCC Versions This past year, Linus Torvalds upped the supported version of GCC to version 4.9 or newer. The idea is that it’s good to support older as well as newer versions, because then people running on old systems can still compile the kernel. At the same time, if no one in the world is using a particular older compiler, you might be able to simplify some kernel code by…

Jon “maddog” Hall is an author, educator, computer scientist, and free software pioneer who has been a passionate advocate for Linux since 1994 when he first met Linus Torvalds and facilitated the port of Linux to a 64-bit system. He serves as president of Linux International®. Problems with Restrictions Recently there have been some discussions around free software that are focusing on nontechnical issues that might best be described as “moral” issues. For example, should people be allowed to charge for “free software” and should free software be used for purposes that are “immoral”? Should we build restrictions into our licensing that require “moral use”? I cannot speak for every piece of software out there or every person who writes it, but we did have these discussions over a quarter…

Sparkling gems and new releases from the world of Free and Open Source Software Spatial data environment QGIS GIS is an acronym for geographic information system, and those three letters are often applied to software that can sort, visualize, edit, analyze, and manage positional data, such as the data used to create maps. But it’s also a subject that can be as hugely complex and as unresolved as the surface of the Earth, Olympus Mons on Mars, or a tesseract in both three- and four-dimensional space. QGIS tries to help with this. It’s a Qt-based application that attempts to tame this complexity by making the software free and open source and keeping it as accessible and easy to use as possible. It accomplishes this while still providing enough functionality to…

Users, developers, and vendors meet at Linux events around the world. We at Linux Magazine are proud to sponsor the Featured Events shown here. For other events near you, check our extensive events calendar online at https://www.linux-magazine.com/events. If you know of another Linux event you would like us to add to our calendar, please send a message with all the details to events@linux-magazine.com. NOTICE Be sure to check the event website before booking any travel, as many events are being canceled or converted to virtual events due to the effects of COVID-19. FOSDEM '21 Date: February 6-7, 2021 Location: Virtual Event Website: https://fosdem.org/2021/ FOSDEM is a free event for software developers to meet, share ideas, and collaborate. Every year, thousands of developers of free and open source software from all over…

Ubuntu 20.10 64-bit Codenamed Groovy Gorilla, Ubuntu 20.10 is the latest release in the popular desktop distribution. A short-term release, it will be supported for nine months until July 2021, with an easy upgrade path to the next release. The next Long Term Support (LTS) release is not scheduled until April 2021. Like all Ubuntu releases, Groovy Gorilla draws many of its packages from the Debian Unstable repository. In keeping with the tradition for short-term releases, it contains no major innovations. However, Groovy Gorilla does include one or two new features that might interest the curious. Chief among these are WiFi sharing through the use of QR codes. In addition, should you like what you see on the DVD, you might try Groovy Gorilla as a desktop on a 4MB…

Most users of Debian-based distributions are familiar with the single line Apt repository format that includes all of the information for a repository. With the new DEB822 format, those single lines are converted to multi-line entries, which allow more flexibility and extensibility over the standard for Debian software repositories. In fact, the single-line format standard is planned for depreciation, so most distributions will eventually convert over. For Pop!_OS users, that time is now. Pop!_OS is the Linux distribution created by System76 as both a developer and general usage desktop operating system. Up until 20.10, Pop!_OS defaulted to the single-line style of repository entries. Now, instead of the/etc/apt/sources.list file, you’ll find those repository entries in/etc/apt/sources.list.d/system.sources. As well, instead of a number of entries, (at least as of the initial release) you’ll…

Whether it’s decorative elements for a new case-modding project, custom trees to add a flourish to the Gloomhaven board game, or homemade gears for quirky gadgets, 3D printers make craft projects much easier – or so I thought. I had been struggling with my conscience for a long time about buying a 3D printer and weighing the arguments. Do I really need this? Isn’t there a lot of work involved? Could I maybe invest the money in a better way? Eventually, I gave in to my cravings when Chinese manufacturer Creality3D offered the Ender 5 Pro [1] for just EUR350 (~$414). Two weeks later, the package reached my home. After I unpacked, one of my first fears disappeared. I thought the DIY assembly would be complicated, but it was actually…

Writer Raymond Chandler called chess “as elaborate a waste of human intelligence as you can find outside an advertising agency.” But that doesn’t put us off, does it? In 1996, the media frenzy was huge when the Deep Blue chess computer developed by IBM beat the reigning world champion Garry Kasparov [1]. However, Deep Blue was also a veritable wall cabinet with power consumption to match. Today there are powerful open source chess engines for the home Linux desktop. One of the most powerful engines goes by the name of Stockfish [2]. It has been in development for more than 10 years and has now reached version 12. However, Stockfish only provides the artificial chess intelligence. You also need a user interface (i.e., a game board). As a chess aficionado,…

Home-built shooting game with Nerf targets and a Raspberry Pi Last Halloween, I was asked to put together a Nerf game for a local neighborhood party. Not wanting to do just the same old thing, I got together with a couple of local makers, and we built a set of electronic targets to create a real-life tower defense game! Although COVID put a damper on this year’s plans, we still managed to get most of the hardware together to expand the experience for a second round. The original game had three targets: an Arduino Uno [1] brain, an audio amplifier, and a loudspeaker. Each target was placed inside a wooden structure that we called a “tower” (Figure 1). The object of the game was to shoot at the targets with…

We are always looking for good articles on Linux and the tools of the Linux environment. Although we will consider any topic, the following themes are of special interest: • System administration• Useful tips and tools• Security, both news and techniques• Product reviews, especially from real-world experience• Community news and projects If you have an idea, send a proposal with an outline, an estimate of the length, a description of your background, and contact information to edit@linux-magazine.com. The technical level of the article should be consistent with what you normally read in Linux Magazine. Remember that Linux Magazine is read in many countries, and your article may be translated into one of our sister publications. Therefore, it is best to avoid using slang and idioms that might not be understood…

Dell has completely embraced the Linux community. With one of the finest Linux-based laptops on the market (the XPS Developer Edition), Dell is definitely no stranger to open source and the needs of those who use it. Case in point, many Linux users are quite savvy in the realms of privacy and security. With most modern laptops equipped with webcams and microphones, which can be used (either by accident or via nefarious means) in less-than-desirable ways, it has become crucial for many users to have control over those features. To that end, Dell has offered up code to the Linux kernel for the Dell privacy drivers. What this feature will do is allow users (via keyboard shortcuts) to disable the built-in microphone and/or webcam on supported devices. The applicable shortcuts…

For any Linux admin who’s been looking to deploy single board computers for various purposes, there’s a new (while at the same time old) player in the Raspberry Pi mix – Ubuntu 20.10. Groovy Gorilla is the first official Ubuntu release to not only be optimized for the Raspberry Pi as a server distro, but as a full-blown desktop as well. To make this even more appealing, Ubuntu 20.10 will include the likes of LXD 4.6 and MicroK8s for the easy deployment of resilient micro clouds, small clusters of servers providing virtual machines, and Kubernetes on demand at the edge. Any Raspberry Pi 4 board with 4GB or 8GB of RAM can be deployed with Ubuntu Desktop or Server. And this isn’t a stripped-down version of the platform; it’s the…

POSIX has been around for a long time, but within the realm of enterprise computing, it has its issues which limit the scalability of compliant systems. This is especially true for systems that make use of deep learning, artificial intelligence, and other data-intensive use cases. That’s where object storage comes in. This particular model doesn’t require a hierarchical data structure. Instead, object storage makes use of flat pool data (where each piece of data is defined by its associated metadata). This type of storage has no scalability limitations, which could be a boon for large-scale applications. A group of engineers (including Henry Scott Newman, Chief Technology Officer at Seagate Government Solutions) created mmap_obj(), which makes it possible for object storage systems to process data within memory. The mmap_obj() protocol is…

Every 3D-printed project begins with an idea. Where does the idea come from? The simplest solution is to use a model that already exists. Several Internet platforms collect finished 3D models, including MyMiniFactory [1], Thingiverse [2], or even a special NASA [3] website. From these sites, you can download finished 3D models for printing, and in some cases, you can even publish your own 3D models for the community. Another way to create a 3D model is to scan or photograph real-world objects and then use software, such as a photogrammetry application, to generate a model. For instance, you could photograph an object from different perspectives and from all sides; when you have created 50 or more photos, you can then convert the photos into a 3D model using specialized…

Everyone is happier when things are tidy – even your computer. But most of us are not especially happy about the business of doing the tidying. If we could line up a smart vacuum or a robot feather duster to do the work, a great many of us would be very pleased to focus on other tasks. The inside of your computer doesn’t get cluttered like your garage or your medicine cabinet, but it does collect its own kind of clutter: logs, cached data, temporary files, crash reports. Part of clutter might be system services that still start up when you boot your computer even though you’ve forgotten why. In this month’s Linux Voice we look at Stacer, an easy-to-use tool that will help you tidy up your Linux system.…

#241/December 2020 Secure Your System Security often means sophisticated tools like firewalls and intrusion detection systems, but you can also do a lot with some common-sense configuration. This month we study some simple steps for securing your Linux. On the DVD: KDE neon 5.20.0 and elementary OS 5.2 #240/November 2020 It's Alive Build a whole operating system? Well maybe not a Linux, but if you're interested, you can implement the basic features of an experimental OS using resources available online. We can’t show you the whole process, but we'll help you get organized and take your first steps. On the DVD: Linux Magazine 20th Anniversary Archive DVD #239/October 2020 Build an IRC Bot IRC bots do the essential work of coordinating and forwarding chat messages on the Internet. This month…

The iNet wireless daemon (iwd) is poised to replace the familiar wpa_supplicant client used with many Linux systems. Next month we explore the secure and resource-friendly iwd Preview Newsletter The Linux Magazine Preview is a monthly email newsletter that gives you a sneak peek at the next issue, including links to articles posted online. Sign up at: https://bit.ly/Linux-Update Approximate UK / Europe Dec 31 USA / Canada Jan 29 Australia Mar 01 On Sale Date…