March 2021 - Talk - lists.gtalug.org

war story: power failure makes CentOS system unbootable
by D. Hugh Redelmeier 30 Sep '22

30 Sep '22

tl;dr / spoiler: change fstab so that /boot/efi is not automatically mounted. See the recommendation at the end of this message. My gateway computer is a little PC running CentOS. It does not come back after a power failure. The reason (as best I can tell) is interesting and I think that I have a fix. My system is UEFI. It boots from a UEFI system partition, known as /boot/efi to Linux. If this gets corrupted, it won't boot. It is a VFAT partition. On my gateway (a Zotac Zbox RI321, a cute little box with two ethernet ports), the UEFI firmware apparently won't boot if the dirty bit is set in the system partition. CentOS normally runs with /boot/efi mounted. So when the system isn't shut down cleanly, the dirty bit will be on. Consequence: the system is not going to boot after a power failure. Odd observation 1: if I put a live Fedora 25 USB stick in the system and try to boot in this otherwise-unbootable state, CentOS boots from the main disk. So this really looks like a firmware bug/quirk. Odd observation 2: fsck doesn't seem to automatically fix the system partition. Once CentOS 7 booted, I dismounted /boot/efi and did an fsck on it. $ sudo fsck /dev/sda1 fsck from util-linux 2.23.2 fsck.fat 3.0.20 (12 Jun 2013) 0x25: Dirty bit is set. Fs was not properly unmounted and some data may be corrupt. 1) Remove dirty bit 2) No action ? 1 Leaving filesystem unchanged. /dev/sda1: 16 files, 2420/51145 clusters Googling got me to <https://www.centos.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=50917> In particular, this advice seemed quite good: ==== recommendation ==== Two other changes I recommend for UEFI systems, to each OS's /etc/fstab. - For the /boot/efi mountpoint, add the mount options x-systemd.automount,noauto - Change fs_passno (last column) to a 1 or 2; the canonical fstab instructions suggest 2, but systemd treats 1 and 2 as the same. The first change means the EFI System partition will not be automatically read-write mounted at boot time; it's a bad idea this is the default because it puts the ESP at risk especially if ther are crashes, FAT has no journal and will therefore always be marked dirty in such a case; no other UEFI OS mounts the ESP by default. Second, if anything tries to access /boot/efi (read or write), systemd will automatically mount it, and because of the fs_passno 1 or 2, it will fsck it first and that fixes and clears the dirty bit in case it's set. Right now without these changes, it's just a matter of having the right number and bad timing of crashes to render the EFI System partition corrupt.

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Re: [GTALUG] Has the graphics-card world gone mad?
by D. Hugh Redelmeier 08 Apr '21

08 Apr '21

| From: Evan Leibovitch via talk <talk(a)gtalug.org> | [GTALUG] Has the graphics-card world gone mad? Yes. For example, I've bought a couple ofAMD rx570-class video cards over the last two or three years. Each with 8G of RAM. $200 each, roughly. I recently saw a used one being offered for $500! These are obsolete! I ask the vendor if he was serious; he replied "yes, look at other folks prices." Insanity. The common wisdom (until the chip shortage became a meme) was that a lot of people in the US took their covid stimulus cheques and spent them on upgrading their rigs. I have no idea if this is a too-good-to-fact-check story or it is reality. There did seem to be a disruption in the shipping between Asia and North America, but video cards are so high price / mass ratio that that should not be a problem. Mining has gone crazy again. It's so crazy that apparently even less-than-optimal cards are being grabbed. But I don't actually know if this is just a myth. Perceived shortage brings on hoarding. That's going on for sure. Everyone building video cards wants to use TSMC's 7nm process. There's a bottleneck for sure. It should be possible to build mid-range GPUs with 10nm, 12nm or 14nm, I would think. | I made the mistake that I might want to upgrade my video card. I have a | Radeon RX 550 that is struggling to drive two 4K screens. It works, but | plenty of flickering under both Linux and Windows. Do you really mean flickering? Or to you mean laggy image updates. I would have thought that the card could do rock-solid 60Hz refresh but might have trouble updating the contents of the frame buffer in a timely fashion. My desktop use of a monitor has mostly static stuff so frame buffer updates need not be very quick. My use of a TV set to view streaming contents would get very annoying if the frame buffer updates were laggy. I use an AndroidTV box for streaming TV. Processor iGPUs are getting better. Perhaps a new processor's iGPU would be good enough and might not be bid up as much. Intel Xe seems really impressive (in 11th gen Core chips). AMD APUs might be good enough. It all depends on what you are really trying to do. You have the floor tomorrow. Perhaps a discussion on this would be interesting. | These don't strike me as cards powerful enough to do coin mining. Why are | they so rare and expensive? Is it the global chip shortage or something | else? And does anyone have an idea how long we'll have to wait this out ... | or how I can tune my card to support the screens? "Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent." -- John Maynard Keynes Nobody knows. I've often found panics have been used to set people's expectation of pricing. I.e. prices will stick higher. Perhaps not at peak prices, but higher than previous prices. --- Post to this mailing list talk(a)gtalug.org Unsubscribe from this mailing list https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk

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Has the graphics-card world gone mad?
by Evan Leibovitch 04 Apr '21

04 Apr '21

Hi all. I made the mistake that I might want to upgrade my video card. I have a Radeon RX 550 that is struggling to drive two 4K screens. It works, but plenty of flickering under both Linux and Windows. I looked at a few sources such as Tom's Hardware to get a good idea of what to buy, and it suggested a card in the $300-400 range. I wish. Canada Computers has the cards (GeForce GTX 1660 Super) listed in this price range but all are out of stock everywhere. Amazon and NewEgg have them listed for more than $1,100. These don't strike me as cards powerful enough to do coin mining. Why are they so rare and expensive? Is it the global chip shortage or something else? And does anyone have an idea how long we'll have to wait this out ... or how I can tune my card to support the screens? Thanks! Evan Leibovitch, Toronto Canada @evanleibovitch / @el56

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Canadian shares Turing award this year
by Russell Reiter 31 Mar '21

31 Mar '21

I thought this bit of news on the people involved in early compiler development might be of general interest. "Jeffrey Ullman and Alfred Aho developed many of the fundamental concepts that researchers use when they build new software." https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/31/technology/turing-award-aho-ullman.html -- Russell

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interesting article on FreeBSD kernel almost getty dangerous code
by D. Hugh Redelmeier 30 Mar '21

30 Mar '21

<https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/03/buffer-overruns-license-violations-…> Summary: a WireGuard port to FreeBSD was sponsored by Northgate (pfSense company). The port was of poor quality and dangerously so. Nobody caught it until after pfSense was released with it, and just before FreeBSD released it. The messenger was tortured, but not shot. Bonus: the guy who ported the code was a felon / bad landlord. Lesson: open source software does not get enough quality control. Especially code that might affect security. Some Linux distros attempt QC (e.g. RedHat) but I'm sure it is inadequate.

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Partitioning Question
by Jim Ruxton 29 Mar '21

29 Mar '21

I have a partitioning question I am hoping someone can help with. I have 2 hard drives in my laptop , a SSD and a standard hard drive. I dual boot Windows and Ubuntu. Here is an image of my partitions from gparted. The top is my SSD and the bottom is my other drive. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u7Rcn1_W95Z1PlV122IhPdR1VXJFxkAJ/view?usp=… <https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u7Rcn1_W95Z1PlV122IhPdR1VXJFxkAJ/view?usp=…> . My Linux system except for Home (which has it's own partition on the other drive) is on the SSD as well as Windows. I'm running out of room on the Windows partition on the SSD. I have other partitions on the other drive that has lots of space. Is there a way I can allocate some of that to Windows? For example as you can see in the image I have an ntfs data partition of 100 Gigs that is almost empty. Any way to take some of that and share it with the Windows SSD partition? Otherwise what would people recommend to give Windows more space based on what I have available. I should also probably move some of my Linux out of the SSD but not sure what? I assume if I do move stuff I would need to do it from gparted running on a USB stick? Thanks for your suggestions. Cheers, Jim

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Century font -- most LaTeX like font in Words
by William Park 29 Mar '21

29 Mar '21

FYI... I recently discovered "Century" font in Words, and I like it. It's similar to "Computer Modern" font that LaTeX uses. I can scan line without reading the words or, even worse, letters.

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my take on Richard Stallman's contributions
by D. Hugh Redelmeier 26 Mar '21

26 Mar '21

[This is nothing to do with the current topic of the propriety or wisdom of RMS rejoining FSF board.] “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” ― George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman I first saw this quotation pinned to Henry Spencer's side of the cubicle I shared with him at the University of Toronto. I think that this is very apt when discussing RMS. I'm not going to recite the history. It's available elsewhere and in more accurate form than my memories. >From my standpoint, RMS has been on the right side of many fights. Even when the prospects of success have been low or distant. The purity and simplicity of his messages (not to mention their repetitive nature) have made his ideas understandable. They have a logical clarity. He has taken a hard line that has often been or seemed impractical, especially annoying pragmatists. All wins for the side he champions have been provisional. For example, the GPL has not prevented Linux to be "enclosed"; GCC is in the process of being supplanted by LLVM. He/we can never rest. Many critics argue practicality against purity. Often convincingly: they often are not wrong. "Open Source" vs "Free/Libre Software" was an example. Evan has been our most assertive representative of this view. (I certainly let the pragmatic overrule the principled. For example, I used to use MythTV when I got an unencrypted TV signal. Then everything became encrypted (except OTA TV, which we cannot receive). Now I use proprietary devices and streams (Rogers, Netflix, ...).) Again, we depend on the unreasonable people to protect us. ================================ The reasonable person will use whatever works. This is exploited to steer the reasonable person towards enclosure. Off the top of my head, the most important things that Stallman did were: - crystallize a movement - create a defensive wall for Free Software (the GPL) - produce GCC and related tools - create cogent and clear analysis The GPL has proven important. It is inconvenient. But look at how Apple has co-opted BSD-licensed software. Initially I preferred "permissive" licenses for things I produce but no longer.

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[GTALUG-Announce] Meeting on Tuesday, April 13 at 07:30 PM
by hi＠gtalug.org 26 Mar '21

26 Mar '21

<https://gtalug.org/meeting/2021-04/> # Windows subsystem for linux with Evan Leibovitch After one too many times fighting with PulseAudio and video drivers and having printers and scanners that will NEVER work with Linux, I gave up my dual boot laptop and desktop and have loaded Win 10 on both. Turns out, things run faster too, even open source apps like Handbrake which take advantage of the GPU to do its video decoding while Linux can't do that. But the story is not done. I installed Windows Subsystem for Linux and now have a fully running Kubuntu as a VM when I want it. And there are some interesting tools such as Windows Terminal in which you can have a Linux terminal shell next to a tab with Windows PowerShell. # Lightning talks This is GTALUG's version of an un-conference, a loosely structured short talks emphasizing the informal exchange of information and ideas between participants, rather than following a conventionally structured GTALUG meetings. If you already have a topic in mind please send an email to speakers(a)gtalug.org to be added to the list of scheduled talks. ## Location Join Zoom Meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84001023881?pwd=Tk9DNnB0OXZibTJUT2hUR2taeGY2dz09 Meeting ID: 840 0102 3881 Passcode: 688539 Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kdNFVrX48s ## Schedule * 7:30 pm - Meeting and presentation. # 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 jeopardise 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 honoured 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: https://gtalug.org/about/code-of-conduct/. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about the GTALUG Code of Conduct please contact the GTALUG Board @ board(a)gtalug.org. --- GTALUG Announce mailing list announce(a)gtalug.org https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/announce

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The FOSS world's most famous incel is back...
by Evan Leibovitch 25 Mar '21

25 Mar '21

... hopefully, not for long. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/03/free-software-advocates-seek-re… I propose that GTALUG as an organization add its name to the petition, already signed by a healthy cross section of the FOSS world. https://rms-open-letter.github.io/ Evan Leibovitch, Toronto Canada @evanleibovitch / @el56

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