April 2015 - Talk - lists.gtalug.org

git questions
by Giles Orr 07 Apr '15

07 Apr '15

I've started using git fairly heavily (although not necessarily very well). I have several repos: a couple are code, also my ~/.vim/ folder and I'm thinking about adding ~/bin/ . If I remember to push from a particular machine before leaving it, I'll never have to deal with merging as I'm the only user. While most likely my discomfort with merging will be overcome by practice as I understand git does it well (I use SVN at work: merging is shudder-inducing), I'm guessing keeping everything up to date is still preferable. These questions are mostly about incorporating information about the repo into the Bash prompt: I was impressed recently by the way zsh appears to handle it, with a sequence of tiny icons in the lower right corner of the terminal indicating relative status. I didn't talk to the zsh user long, so I don't know if that's built-in, a plugin, or something he did himself. I'm starting from some code I got from nitrous.io, lovely in its conciseness: parse_git_branch () { git branch --no-color 2> /dev/null | sed -e '/^[^*]/d' -e "s/* $.*$/\1$(parse_git_dirty)/" } parse_git_dirty () { git diff --no-ext-diff --quiet --exit-code &>/dev/null || echo "!" } Put \$(parse_git_branch) into your prompt and it tells you what branch you're on, and if there are any unstaged changes (and goes away if you're not in a repo). I'd prefer it did uncommitted rather than unstaged, haven't tried to fix that yet. But I want to update it as it doesn't deal with origin at all. So, the questions: What is the easiest and most concise way to determine if your local is behind origin master? I've found that "git remote show origin" will show this information, but I'm not sure if it's the "best" way to find out, and I'm also concerned that running that every time your prompt comes up would slow things down as it makes a remote call(?) to get an answer - when you might not even have a network connection, or worse, a very slow connection. "git status" usually says "Your branch is up-to-date with 'origin/master'" (or "ahead"), but occasionally - even though origin is configured properly - this line doesn't appear. Is there a way to convince it to always show this line? Unfortunately, "git status" doesn't seem to ever notice if you're "behind" origin, thus the need for "git remote show origin". Any fix for that? The thought was to have output for the prompt that looked like this: (everything synced): "master-" (uncommitted local changes): "master!-" (behind origin): "master^" (ahead of origin): "masterv" (ahead and behind, with local changes): "master!^v" You get the general idea. I'm aware git is capable of immense complexity (branches, detached head, multiple remotes, different remotes for push and pull, etc.) that aren't addressed here. If I tried to tackle all of that at once (especially given I don't understand most of it) my head would explode and nothing would get done. So I'm sticking with my simple use case until I have to deal with the more complex stuff. Any thoughts welcome. -- Giles http://www.gilesorr.com/ gilesorr(a)gmail.com

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Where can I buy short ethernet and USB-to-microUSB cables?
by Walter Dnes 06 Apr '15

06 Apr '15

Two items I need to buy... 1) I have more devices than ports on my 4-port ST546 ADSL modem/router. I have a multi-port bridge sitting right next to it. A 6-foot ethernet cable connecting the 2 is a waste, and contributes to "crow's-nest". A 12 or 18 inch ethernet cable would do just fine. 2) Ditto for a short USB-to-microUSB adapter. A 6-footer is OK for my desktop. But when I'm travelling, and offloading smartphone photos to my laptop, a 6-foot cable is clumsy. -- Walter Dnes <waltdnes(a)waltdnes.org>

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Help; system date goes to GMT hour when I hibernate
by Walter Dnes 06 Apr '15

06 Apr '15

On Mon, Apr 06, 2015 at 11:01:47AM -0400, James Knott wrote > On 04/06/2015 02:31 PM, Walter Dnes wrote: > > > You may want to check your clock. You apparently sent this message > about 3.5 hours from now. Or perhaps you were just being proactive. > ;-) Actually, it was 4 hours. I have a bunch of spreadsheets, browser tabs, etc, open all the time, scattered over various work areas. Rather than re-open them every day, I simply hibernate, using suspend-to-disk. This way, things are where I left them. The past couple of months, when the machine comes up from hibernation, the clock is a few hours ahead. Now it's 4 hours ahead. It was 5 hours ahead before the switch to daylight savings time. This looks suspiciously like GMT. After reading your email, I dug deeper. Apparently, it's just the "kernel system time" that gets bumped forward when it comes up from hibernation. The BIOS clock is OK. As a heavy-handed hack, I've inserted the line... OnResume 01 hwclock --hctosys ...into my /etc/hibernate/hibernate.conf. This copies over the BIOS time to the kernel system date. It works, but I'd really like to know why it's necessary in the first place. -- Walter Dnes <waltdnes(a)waltdnes.org>

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Linux on Canon camera
by phiscock＠ee.ryerson.ca 06 Apr '15

06 Apr '15

---------------------------- Original Message ---------------------------- Subject: [Gphoto-user] Linux on Canon From: "daaawg" <cdaaawg(a)gmail.com> Date: Fri, April 3, 2015 7:48 am To: "gphoto-user" <gphoto-user(a)lists.sourceforge.net> -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thought this might be of some interest to Canon users: http://linux.softpedia.com/blog/Linux-Kernel-Ported-to-Canon-DSLRs-Thanks-t… ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Dive into the World of Parallel Programming The Go Parallel Website, sponsored by Intel and developed in partnership with Slashdot Media, is your hub for all things parallel software development, from weekly thought leadership blogs to news, videos, case studies, tutorials and more. Take a look and join the conversation now. http://goparallel.sourceforge.net/_________________________________________… Gphoto-user mailing list Gphoto-user(a)lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/gphoto-user -- Peter Hiscocks Syscomp Electronic Design Limited, Toronto http://www.syscompdesign.com USB Oscilloscope and Waveform Generator 647-839-0325

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A USB PID register for Open Source Software/Hardware Projects
by Myles Braithwaite 06 Apr '15

06 Apr '15

Saw this on HackerNews today <http://pid.codes/>.

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Lennart Poettering talk on new features of systemd at FOSDEM
by Alex Volkov 04 Apr '15

04 Apr '15

I thought it would be relevant to this list. Among the new features -- https://fosdem.org/2015/schedule/event/whats_new_in_systemd,_2015_edition/ Things recently added and being worked on: * systemd-nspawn -- docker-like containers * btrfs support * firewall support based on application id and not port numbers * moving kernel console into userspace, adding high DPI and proper Unicode support * resolving config file path with sysctl --edit / sysctl --cat * network management with networkd * auditing has indexing and is included in logging * support of stateless systems * resolvd -- vpn support, smart dns with support per-interface cache, support for LLMNR * rolling avahi into systemd is being worked on * journald remoting -- remote logging with http using pull and push model * logging stack traces without gdb * protect system/home/tmp/devices -- setup minimal namespace environments for services * timesyncd -- trivial sntp client with time saving for the devices with no rtc * autodiscovery of swap partitions with gptd * readahead support was dropped * merge gummiboot into systemd (UEFI secure boot support)

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[OT]: Two matched ATX towers looking for a home
by Scott Sullivan 03 Apr '15

03 Apr '15

I have two ATX towers that are looking for a good home. Contact me off list. Free to whomever that will do _pick up_ in North York. Their main feature is a lot of 3.5" and 5.25" bays for larger numbers of hard drives. http://revident.net/images/20150403-atx-towers-for-give-away/ Their in good condition, steel construction. -- Scott Sullivan

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[GTALUG-Announce] Meeting 14th April, 2015 at 7:30 pm
by Myles Braithwaite 02 Apr '15

02 Apr '15

<http://gtalug.org/meeting/2015-04/> # LessCSS with Myles Braithwaite and a Round Table Q&A Session *LessCSS* LessCSS extends the CSS language to make it actually useable by adding features like variables, mixins, functions, and a bunch of other techniques that allow you to make your stylesheets more maintainable, themeable, and extendible. *Round Table Q&A Session* A Round Table Q&A Session is where we take questions from the audience, and the audience discusses and attempts to answer those questions from their own knowledge. It's a great way to meet fellow members of our community and discover the skill sets we each bring to the table. ## Location George Vari Engineering and Computing Centre 245 Church Street, Room 203 Ryerson University <http://goo.gl/maps/16oJ2> <http://www.openstreetmap.org/way/23447525> ## Schedule * 6:00 pm - Before each meeting a group of GTALUGers dine at Kaiju (384 Yonge Street). * 7:30 pm - Meeting and presentation. * 9:00 pm - After each meeting a group of GTALUGers move to the The Imperial Pub (54 Dundas St East) for refreshments and more socializing. ## Code of Conduct We want a productive happy community that can welcome new ideas, improve every process every year, and foster collaboration between individuals with differing needs, interests and skills. We gain strength from diversity, and actively seek participation from those who enhance it. This code of conduct exists to ensure that diverse groups collaborate to mutual advantage and enjoyment. We will challenge prejudice that could jeopardize the participation of any person in the community. The Code of Conduct governs how we behave in public or in private whenever the Linux community will be judged by our actions. We expect it to be honored by everyone who represents the community officially or informally, claims affiliation, or participates directly. It applies to activities online or offline. We invite anybody to participate. Our community is open. Please read more about the GTALUG Code of Conduct here: <http://gtalug.org/about/code-of-conduct/>. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about the GTALUG Code of Conduct please contact one of the GTALUG Board Members. --- GTALUG Announce mailing list announce(a)gtalug.org http://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/announce

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Youtube hints
by Walter Dnes 02 Apr '15

02 Apr '15

Given that Flash is being minimally maintained for linux, it's nice that Youtube has gon over to HTML5, but there are still a few hiccups that I ran into. I'll detail how I got around them, and also mention random access to videos. For the purposes of this example, I'll use the "Ancient Aliens Debunked" video, because it's over 3 hours long, which allows for examples of time offset. Warning... some URL-tweaking follows. Item 1) Youtube is now "officially" viewable in html5 without Flash, but I do run into a few instances of... ======================= X This plugin is disabled Manage plugins... ======================= Here's a video that "doesn't play on HTML5". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&hd=1 Let's break it up into sections. For URLs, the first parameter is preceeded by "?", and additional parameters are preceeded by "&". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&hd=1 breaks up into https:// www.youtube.com domain /watch "watch" parameter ?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ video ID &hd=1 HD mode selection If you get rid of the "&hd1", the URL becomes... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ ...and it plays perfectly in HTML5, without Flash. Note that this is "the basic Youtube video URL". Item 2) OK, you've got a long video, and you want to jump a certain point in the video, without having to wait an hour plus to get to that point. This is done by appending a "&t=" parameter. It can contain "h", "m", and "s" subparameters. E.g. 1 hour, 20 minutes, and 15 seconds is signified by "&t=1h20m15s". You can include any or all of h/m/s. A few examples follow. "Pumapunku" (begins at 3 minutes 34 seconds into the video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=3m34s "The Pyramids" (begins at 22 minutes 40 seconds into the video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=22m40s "Easter Island" (begins at 1 hour 1 minute 35 seconds into the video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=1h1m35s "Pacal's Rocket" (begins at 1 hour 5 minutes 43 seconds into the video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=1h5m43s -- Walter Dnes <waltdnes(a)waltdnes.org>

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Booting Jessie from USB
by Giles Orr 01 Apr '15

01 Apr '15

I have an Acer C720 Chromebook with Bodhi Linux installed. I wanted to test Debian Jessie on the machine, so I physically removed the SSD and plugged in a 32GB USB stick (SanDisk Cruzer Ultra Fit, USB3). I installed Jessie on it (on an ext4 partition), and added a 5GB or so vfat partition on the end. When I attempt to boot from the USB stick, GRUB comes up and works fine, but things go sideways after that. Here are some of the errors that I've copied ("..." indicates dropped lines, mostly duplications): ----- usb 1-4: string descriptor 0 malformed (err = -61), defaulting to 0x0409 ... usb 2-1: device not accepting address 3, error -62 [repeated several times with different numbers] ... xhci_hcd 0000:00:14.0: Command completion event does not match command ... Gave up waiting for root device. Common problems: - Boot args (cat /proc/cmdline) - Check rootdelay= (did the system wait long enough?) - Check root= (did the system wait for the right device?) - Missing modules (cat /proc/modules; ls /dev) ALERT! /dev/disk/by-uuid/44621e45-2a15-4637-d0b8-282b63c8194b does not exist. Dropping to a shell! modprobe: module ehci-orion not found in modules.dep ... (initramfs) ----- I've got another laptop that runs permanently off a USB stick. Yes, I know it's a bad idea: the point is, it can be done - and in this instance it's meant as a temporary measure, a test of Jessie on this machine. I've checked the UUID of the partition in another machine, and it's set correctly. I tinkered with the GRUB kernel command line arguments: Debian had inserted a number of "hints" (sorry, haven't copied this part out) referring to which partition to boot from. I think they said "hd1,msdos1" and I changed them all (three?) to "hd0,msdos1" which caused the boot process to last longer and look more promising, but it again eventually failed out not being able to find itself. The Chromebook has two USB ports, one USB2 and one USB3: the failure is the same (or very similar) booting from both. My first reaction has been that something about the USB stick itself is too new - but Linux mounts it fine and installed to it okay. The "ehci-orion" doesn't make much sense: "Orion" seems to be an ARM chipset, and the Chromebook has an Intel Celeron 2955U in it. Any help appreciated. -- Giles http://www.gilesorr.com/ gilesorr(a)gmail.com

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