Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter #81

Sun Mar 9 22:42:52 GMT 2008

Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, Issue 81 for the weeks March
2nd - March 8th, 2008. In this issue we cover the release of Hardy
Alpha 6, interesting Brainstorm stats, interview with Server developer
Mathias Gug, and, as always, much, much more!

== In This Issue ==

 * Hardy Alpha 6 Available
 * Brainstorm Stats
 * Interview with Mathias Gug, Server Developer
 * Full Circle Podcast - episode #01
 * In The Blogosphere
 * In Other News
 * Upcoming Meetings & Events
 * Updates & Security
 * Bug Stats & Translations

== General Community News ==

=== Hardy Alpha 6 Available ===

The Alpha 6 images are now available. Images are known to be
reasonably free of show stoppers, while representing a very recent
snapshot of Hardy. Alpha 6 includes a number of new features that are
ready for large-scale testing. Pre-releases of Hardy are "NOT"
encouraged for anyone needing a stable system or anyone who is not
comfortable running into occasional, even frequent breakage.
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-announce/2008-March/000396.html

=== Brainstorm Stats ===

Because everybody like stats, here are some numbers for you. These
stats represent the week of the Brainstorm launch (28th February - 5th
March):

 * 10796 users
 * 338319 votes cast! (that's around 31 votes per user)
    * 238043 were +1 votes
    * 100275 were -1 votes
 * 10446 comments posted on ideas!
 * 3145 ideas
    * 326 deleted (spam,…)
    * 578 marked as duplicate (out of 1125 duplicates report submitted by users)
    * 2567 remaining(Includes some categories added after the initial launch)

http://www.ndeschildre.net/2008/03/08/brainstorm-some-stats/

== Interview with Mathias Gug, Ubuntu Server Developer ==

UWN: Who are you? What do you at Canonical?

MG: My name is Mathias Gug - I was born and raised in France. I moved
to Montreal Canada 4 years ago. I've been working for Canonical as an
Ubuntu Server Developer since May 2007. With the help of the Server
Team I look after packages dealing with server technologies.

UWN: Is there (or is there a specific need for) an "enterprise"
community that is specifically geared towards Ubuntu Server? If so,
how is it different from the rest of the community? Do enterprise
users ever dive into IRC or mailing lists and ask for help?

MG: Members of the Server Team share a common interest in
server-related technologies, such as databases and network
authentication. These products are mainly used in corporate
environments.  So you're right in that we tend to have "entreprise"
members in the Server Team.

We're trying to reach for more users from the corporate world.
However we're facing the cultural problem that most of the companies
don't authorize or encourage their employees to have public activities
on mailing lists or IRC channels.

A related issue is how to get feedback from these users. The corporate
world is not used to dealing with the Ubuntu Development process. Our
process is opened and getting things done is much easier than with
other products. When someone complains that a feature is lacking, the
answer is not "we're not interested in supporting it" but rather
"nobody did it yet". So you can do it yourself (or pay someone to do
it for you) and get it included in the next release of Ubuntu.

One such example is SELinux: Tresys asked Kees Cook why SELinux wasn't
correctly supported in Ubuntu. The answer boiled down to "Because
nobody did it". Tresys came to the following Ubuntu Developer Summit
and wrote up a specification for integrating SELinux in Hardy with the
input of Ubuntu developers. They've then taken up the role of
implementing the specification, packaging new versions, submitting
patches to enable selinux in some packages all through the SponsorShip
process [1]. And by FeatureFreeze SELinux was implemented in Ubuntu !

I think this is a great example on the strength of our Development
process. But this is a rather radical changes for companies: rather
than hoping for a vendor to add a feature, there is the opportunity to
take a more active role. Our tools are available, our processes for
inclusion are opened and documented - it's up to you to get things
done.

[1]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SponsorshipProcess

UWN: How can individuals and LoCos get involved with the Server Team?
Are there any specific skills that would be helpful?

MG: Contributing to the server team can take many forms: support,
documentation, bug triaging, testing or packaging. Getting involved in
the Server Team is a great way towards Ubuntu membership. We have
loads of tasks to do which are recognized as contribution to the
Ubuntu project. The Getting Involved page [2] outlines the different
ways to contribute to Ubuntu via the Server Team.

[2]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/GettingInvolved

UWN: Are there specific MOTU mentoring programs geared for the Server
Team or a separate mentoring project?

MG: We've recently started a mentoring program within the Server Team.
It's aimed at users that want to get started contributing to Ubuntu
but don't really know how. The Contribute To Ubuntu page [3] has an
extensive list of ways to help which can be overwhelming for some
people.

The mentoring program of the Server Team tries to help them by giving
them a mentor from the Server`Team. Together, they'll discuss areas of
interest, define a simple task to accomplish and get the contribution
integrated in Ubuntu. This program is lightweight and short in time.

[3]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ContributeToUbuntu

UWN: With Hardy being a LTS release, what help does the Server Team
need and where can readers go to find out more?

MG: Now that we're in Feature Freeze, we've switched to bug fixing
mode. So the Server Team is looking for help in testing, both hardware
and software. For example if you have server hardware available for an
hour, you can try to install the latest version of the hardy-server
iso [4] and send a report to the ubuntu-server mailing list [5] if
your hardware is supported. The Server Team Roadmap [6] has list of
tasks we're currently working on.

[4]: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/hardy/alpha-5/ [[BR]]
[5]: https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-server [[BR]]
[6]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/Roadmap

UWN: There were two Server Team related sessions during Developer Week
and how did those go?

MG: Soren ran a session on Virtualization [7] - a lot of users turned
up in the IRC channel and asked for information about virtualization
support in hardy. This proves how important this new technology is in
the IT world.

I gave a presentation of the SeverTeam [8] the day before. I spent
most of the hour giving an overview of the team: who we are, what we
do and how you can get started contributing. I received a couple of
emails since then from users asking how to get involve in the
ServerTeam.

[7]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/devweek0802/Vitrualize [[BR]]
[8]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/devweek0802/SeverTeam

UWN: What are you working on for Hardy? Whats your favorite feature in
the LTS release?

MG: I kept an eye on AppArmor and helped with the creation of new
profiles for a couple of servers (mysql, named and slapd). I've also
tackled bugs in samba and mysql that have been opened for quit a long
time. Hardy being an LTS we've been focusing a lot on stability and
testing.

Virtualization is my favorite feature coming up in Hardy. Soren has
been doing an amazing job at integrating kvm and libvirt in Hardy. I
use it to do all of my work: being able to create vms with specific
roles or different releases make things simpler. I can reproduce
corporate environments (for example network authentication based on
ldap and kerberos) with five or six vms using only one physical
machine.

UWN: You worked on getting AppArmor into Ubuntu and SELinux will be
available in Hardy. How are they different?

MG: AppArmor takes a process oriented approach: you define which files
a process is allowed to access. SELinux uses a data view of the
system: you attach labels to bits of data and SElinux makes sure that
entities are allowed to access the data. AppArmor is easier to use for
users: the process-oriented concept is easier to grasp than the
data-labeling view. On the other hand, SELinux provides much finer
granularity which is required in some environments.

The good news is that both AppArmor and SElinux will be available in
Hardy: switching from one to another is just a matter of installing
some packages.

UWN: How long have you used Linux and what was your first distro? And
how long have you been using Ubuntu?

MG: The first time I saw linux was in 1997, Redhat 5 if I remember
correctly.  The first time I downloaded it was in September 1999,
Debian. But I gave up after a couple of weeks. I came back during
summer of 2000 with Mandrake Linux and the 2.4 kernel. I've never left
since then. I've been using Ubuntu since dapper.

UWN: Do you have any cool servers that you get to play on?

MG: I don't think so. I bought a new machine recently, based around an
Opteron processor with 4Gb of RAM and 320 Gb of disk space. But I
don't have a stack of exotic hardware - I'm not part of the kernel
team ;).

== In The Blogosphere ==

 * Ubuntu: next release will be the critical one - According to Sam
Varghese at itwire.com, "April 24 will be a red letter day for the
Ubuntu project. It will be three-and-a-half years since the experiment
began and the release that day of Hardy Heron, as version 8.04 is
known, will be a defining moment. This could well be the release that
either makes or breaks the project." Ubuntu was initially based on the
unstable release of Debian, but has now diverged to the extent that it
would be silly to pretend that it is anything other than a fork. The
release of Hardy Heron shows some interesting features. For once, the
plain brown desktop is gone and there is a graphic which gives it
character - fittingly of a heron. The main feature which marks this
out as the release on which Shuttleworth is probably betting the house
is Wubi, which allows one to install Ubuntu from within Windows.
Shuttleworth has been walking a very difficult path in trying to make
this project sustainable. Dealing with the FOSS community is not easy,
dealing with developers less so. He would like to see the Ubuntu
project succeed if only because some people in the non-Linux world
will then be able to eat cake, rather than stale bread.
http://www.itwire.com/content/view/17010/1090/

 * Ubuntu 8.04 Will The Hardy Heron Bear Fruit? - With the problems of
Vista, the end of the availability of XP, and Apple unable to see the
light and open up OS X to non-Apple hardware, much is expected of the
next release of the most popular consumer Linux distribution. If Heron
is indeed "Hardy," it could be the most important release of any
non-Microsoft operating system ever. Ubuntu has shown such progress
that many already use it occasionally, and it will only take a small
nudge to get them in the habit of constant use. Once a level of
comfort is established, the user base will grow beyond the
expectations of anyone. Hardy Heron is amazingly workable with little
to no knowledge of what lies beneath the pretty face. Ubuntu shows how
the open source community has concern for the average user with its
Long Term Support versions. Since Ubuntu is free, and not difficult to
obtain, giving Hardy Heron a try at the end of April might be one of
the best things you do for yourself this year.
http://www.lockergnome.com/theoracle/2008/03/08/ubuntu-804-will-the-hardy-heron-bear-fruit/

 * Starting a week with Ubuntu and Lenovo's X61 ThinkPad: First
impressions - Before switching to the Mac, Matt Asay was a hardcore
IBM ThinkPad devotee. This is his first experience with the post-IBM
ThinkPad, and it's an impressive piece of hardware. Equally important
for this review, it seems to work flawlessly with Ubuntu. Everything
on the keyboard works with Ubuntu, everything. Lenovo doesn't
officially support Ubuntu on this hardware but you wouldn't know it
from the experience. All of the specialty keys work and when Ubuntu
was told to put the X61 to sleep when the lid closed, it did so.
Ubuntu doesn't make a fetish of itself. It's just there, and it's
letting the applications do the talking without getting in the way.
http://blogs.cnet.com/8301-13505_1-9888465-16.html

== In Other News ==

=== Full Circle Podcast - episode #01 ===

Full Circle, the independent magazine for the Ubuntu Linux Community,
is proud to announce the release of it's first podcast! Featured in
this inaugural episode:
 * Driver-Free Car Runs Ubuntu
 * DARPA Grand Challenge
 * Ubuntu 8.04 Alpha 4
 * KDE 4.1 Feature Plan and Release Schedule
 * Torvalds pans Apple with 'utter crap' put down
 * And Much More!

Runtime is 1 hour and is available in MP3 or OGG formats.
http://fullcirclemagazine.org/2008/03/07/full-circle-podcast-1/

=== Document Freedom Day ===

The Document Freedom Day (DFD) is a global day for Document Liberation
with grassroots action for promotion of Free Document Formats and Open
Standards in general. The DFD was initiated and is supported by a
group of organisations and companies, including, but not limited to
the Free Software Foundation Europe, ODF Alliance, OpenForum Europe,
IBM, Red Hat and Sun Microsystems, Inc.

On 26 March 2008, the Document Freedom Day will provide a global
rallying point for Document Liberation and Open Standards.  Read more
at http://documentfreedom.org/News/20080220

=== LoCos and Politics ===
Along with three other LUGs, the Ubuntu-ni LoCo issued a public
statement promoting the need for a discussion and approval of
guidelines for a minimum level of accessibility for all Nicaraguan
government websites. The debate started on a mailing list to highlight
the inability to access some public websites using Firefox,
specifically the website of the General Comptroller of the Republic.

The issue was picked up by bloggers and various Internet sites, as
well as newspapers and television. Eventually the the General
Comptroller of the Republic site was made available for all Firefox
users. Read more at
http://leogg.wordpress.com/2008/03/03/web-standards-locos-and-politics-round-1/

== Upcoming Meetings and Events ==

=== Wednesday, March 12, 2008 ===

==== Server Team Meeting ====
 * Start: 21:00 UTC
 * End: 22:00 UTC
 * Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
 * Agenda: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/Meeting

== Updates and Security for 6.06, 6.10, 7.04, and 7.10 ==

=== Security Updates ===

 * [USN-583-1] Evolution vulnerability -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-security-announce/2008-March/000670.html
 * [USN-584-1] OpenLDAP vulnerabilities -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-security-announce/2008-March/000671.html
 * [USN-582-2] Thunderbird vulnerabilities -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-security-announce/2008-March/000672.html

=== Ubuntu 6.06 LTS Updates ===

 * gnatsweb 4.00-1ubuntu0.6.06 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/dapper-changes/2008-March/012636.html
 * evolution_2.6.1-0ubuntu7.2 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/dapper-changes/2008-March/012637.html
 * openldap2.2_2.2.26-5ubuntu2.6 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/dapper-changes/2008-March/012638.html
 * langpack-locales 2.3.18.9 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/dapper-changes/2008-March/012639.html
 * mozilla-thunderbird_1.5.0.13+1.5.0.15 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/dapper-changes/2008-March/012640.html
 * lighttpd 1.4.11-3ubuntu3.7 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/dapper-changes/2008-March/012641.html

=== Ubuntu 6.10 Updates ===

 * gnatsweb 4.00-1ubuntu0.6.10 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/edgy-changes/2008-March/008505.html
 * evolution_2.8.1-0ubuntu4.2 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/edgy-changes/2008-March/008506.html
 * openldap2.2_2.2.26-5ubuntu3.3 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/edgy-changes/2008-March/008507.html
 * tzdata 2007k-0ubuntu0.6.10.1 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/edgy-changes/2008-March/008508.html
 * mozilla-thunderbird_1.5.0.13+1.5.0.15 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/edgy-changes/2008-March/008509.html
 * lighttpd 1.4.13~r1370-1ubuntu1.5 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/edgy-changes/2008-March/008510.html

=== Ubuntu 7.04 Updates ===

 * gnatsweb 4.00-1ubuntu0.7.04 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/feisty-changes/2008-March/008860.html
 * evolution_2.10.1-0ubuntu2.1 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/feisty-changes/2008-March/008861.html
 * openldap2.3_2.3.30-2ubuntu0.2 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/feisty-changes/2008-March/008862.html
 * tzdata 2007k-0ubuntu0.7.04.1 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/feisty-changes/2008-March/008863.html
 * mozilla-thunderbird_1.5.0.13+1.5.0.15 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/feisty-changes/2008-March/008864.html
 * lighttpd 1.4.13-9ubuntu4.4 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/feisty-changes/2008-March/008865.html

=== Ubuntu 7.10 Updates ===

 * gthumb 3:2.10.6-0ubuntu1.1 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010151.html
 * ubuntu-docs 7.10.5 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010152.html
 * evolution_2.12.1-0ubuntu1.1 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010153.html
 * openldap2.3_2.3.35-1ubuntu0.2 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010154.html
 * phpmyadmin_2.10.3-1ubuntu0.2 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010155.html
 * tzdata 2007k-0ubuntu0.7.10.1 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010156.html
 * parallels 2.2.2226-1gutsy1 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010157.html
 * lighttpd 1.4.18-1ubuntu1.2 -
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gutsy-changes/2008-March/010158.html

== Bug Stats ==

 * Open (40262) +260 # over last week
 * Critical (23) +/-0 # over last week
 * Unconfirmed (19562) +6 # over last week
 * Unassigned (30819) +283 # over last week
 * All bugs ever reported (158157) +1990 # over last week

As always, the Bug Squad needs more help. If you want to get started,
please see  https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BugSquad

== Translation Stats Hardy ==

 * Spanish (13644)
 * English-UK (42367)
 * French (42530)
 * Swedish (51441)
 * Brazilian Portuguese (59173)

Remaining string to translate in Ubuntu 8.04 "Hardy Heron," see more
at: https://translations.launchpad.net/ubuntu/hardy/

== Archives and RSS Feed ==

You can always find older Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter issues at:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter

You can subscribe to the Ubuntu Weekly News via RSS at:
http://fridge.ubuntu.com/uwn/feed

== Additional Ubuntu News ==

As always you can find more news and announcements at:

 http://www.ubuntu.com/news

and

 http://fridge.ubuntu.com/

== Conclusion ==

Thank you for reading the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter.

See you next week!

== Credits ==

The Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter is brought to you by:

 * Nick Ali
 * John Crawford
 * Craig A. Eddy
 * And many others

== Feedback ==

If you would like to submit an idea or story you think is worth
appearing on the UWN, please send them to
ubuntu-marketing-submissions at lists.ubuntu.com.
This document is maintained by the Ubuntu Marketing Team. Please feel
free to contact us regarding any concerns or suggestions by either
sending an email to ubuntu-marketing at lists.ubuntu.com or by using any
of the other methods on the Ubuntu Marketing Team Contact Information
Page (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MarketingTeam). If you'd like to
contribute to a future issue of the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, please
feel free to edit the appropriate wiki page. If you have any technical
support questions, please send then ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com.