Stop The Stink In Elmira
For those who are opposed to the location of the Proposed “Waste Disposal Facility” that Bio-En Inc. wants to build in Elmira, Ontario, Canada.
RT @lnxw48a1 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64986744 [www bbc co uk] #Turkiye leader Erdogan signals approval of #Finland joining #NATO ... still hesitant on #Sweden's application After the fall of the USSR, I was in favor of abolishing NATO. Frankly, I was too idealistic. I imagined Europe becoming a sort of demilitarized zone but without conflicting armies on each […]
bobjonkman favorited something by lnxw48a1: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64986744 [www bbc co uk] #Turkiye leader Erdogan signals approval of #Finland joining #NATO ... still hesitant on #Sweden's application After the fall of the USSR, I was in favor of abolishing NATO. Frankly, I was too idealistic. I imagined Europe becoming a sort of demilitarized zone but without conflicting […]
There's a natural spring just a short distance from here. Sometime about 30 years ago some kind of piping was added to it, so now the water comes out of a pipe a distance above the ground. People would fill their water cooler bottles there. About 10 years ago a sign was put up "This […]
RT @lnxw48a1 Behind this laundromat there is a pipe that continuaously spews water. People drive up and fill bottles, then leave. Trusting. I naturally assume that there is some contaminant and I therefore avoid drinking water from mystery pipes.
The only reason I have a Github account is to provide bug reports and feature requests to projects I want to support. I don't code much, but anything I want to be publicly available is on my own website. Although not in a code repository, which is probably a good idea.
RT @steve From https://t.co/Ljk2FwSC2I on Mastodon: In the spirit of deepening the open federated social web, this blog is now powered by ActivityPub, the open federated social standard. This is thanks to the WordPress plugin “activitypub”. You c... https://mastodon.cooleysekula.net/users/steve/statuses/110044125471741899/activity
bobjonkman favorited something by steve: From https://t.co/Ljk2FwSC2I on Mastodon: In the spirit of deepening the open federated social web, this blog is now powered by ActivityPub, the open federated social standard. This is thanks to the WordPress plugin “activitypub”. You c... https://mastodon.cooleysekula.net/users/steve/statuses/110044125471741899/activity
bobjonkman favorited something by clacke: Re: nu.federati.net/notice/3422215@LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864} A lot of people move to Fedi from Twitter, in Fedi numbers.Not a lot of people move to Fedi from Twitter in Twitter numbers.
It’s July again, and System Administrator Appreciation Day is always celebrated on the last Friday in July. Although the SysAdminDay website indicates that SysAdmins are the happy recipients of cake and ice cream, for the last few years SysAdmins in Kitchener-Waterloo have been celebrating SysAdminDay by taking themselves to dinner, along with spouses, friends, and co-workers.
This year we’re teaming up with the Kitchener-Waterloo VoIP Users Group. While KWVoIP meetings are usually scheduled for the fourth Thursday in July, this month we’re combining the KWVoIP meeting with SysAdminDay. There’s an overlap between the KWVoiP members and SysAdmins — VoIP systems need administration too! As a bonus, we’ll get a presentation from Brian Bentley about his roaming experiments in the U.S.
Tony, the Egg Roll King himself, is a versatile host. Not only are the egg rolls and spring rolls the best in KW, there are vegetarian meals available, and ERK has some of the best fried chicken, fish & chips, and poutine in town! Friday nights are busy at the Egg Roll King Restaurant, so leave a comment to let me know you’re coming and I can make a reservation.
KWVoIP Topic: Brian Bentley – Roaming Profile Experiments
Brian Bentley has returned from a short trip to the United States. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to present last month, so he’s catching up this month.
In order to stay in touch telephonically, Brian used Roam Mobility for Data services. He tested Fongo (Canadian number) and TextNow (US number) for VoIP services. While in the US he tried to sign up for a Google Voice number. What worked? What was cheapest? Was it worth the bother? Come to dinner to hear Brian’s answers.
System Administrator Appreciation Day falls on the last Friday of July every year, and is allegedly celebrated by users gifting their SysAdmins chocolate cake and ice cream. Hands up, those of you who have actually experienced that? Hmmm? I thought so…
Nobody appreciates System Administrators more than other System Administrators, so for the last few years I’ve hosted a Systems Administrator Appreciation Day Dinner in Kitchener-Waterloo. Last year we went to LaiLai’s, and previously we’ve gone to Egg Roll King.
SysAdminDay is on Friday, 31 July 2015, just over two weeks away. Where would you like to go this year? Potential venues must offer vegetarian fare, and be physically accessible. Leave suggestions in the comments or send me e-mail, then next week we can vote. If there’s more than one candidate on the list we’ll rank choices from 3 points (most favoured) to 1 point (least favoured), and I’ll add them up, post the results here, and we’ll all meet for dinner.
SysAdminDay Dinner is open to everyone, whether you’re a System Administrator, a SysAdmin Student, or a former SysAdmin who’s been lured to the dark side. And also their friends, family, and end-users. OK, maybe not the end-users. Unless they’re friends or family.
Note to security policy admins: Be sure there are technical means to enforce the policies you set, because, like physics, people tend towards the lowest energy levels.
It’s amazing what a little search’n’replace will do.
Manager: We need to talk about your password.
Joanna: Really? I… I have fifteen characters. I, also…
Manager: Well, okay. Fifteen is the minimum, okay?
Joanna: Okay.
Manager: Now, you know it’s up to you whether or not you want to just do the bare minimum. Or… well, like Brian, for example, has thirty seven characters in his password, okay. And a terrific smile.
Joanna: Okay. So you… you want me to use more?
Manager: Look. Joanna.
Joanna: Yeah.
Manager: People can get a password anywhere, okay? They come to Chotchkie’s for the atmosphere and the security. Okay? That’s what the password’s about. It’s about security.
Joanna: Yeah. Okay. So more then, yeah?
Manager: Look, we want you to secure yourself, okay? Now if you feel that the bare minimum is enough, then okay. But some people choose to have more and we encourage that, okay? You do want to secure yourself, don’t you?
Joanna: Yeah, yeah.
Manager: Okay. Great. Great. That’s all I ask.
Later…
Manager: We need to talk.
Joanna: Yeah…
Manager: Do you know what this is about?
Joanna: My password?
Manager: Yeah. Or your, um, lack of password. ‘Cause I’m counting, and I see only fifteen characters. Let me ask you a question, Joanna. What do you think of a person who only does the bare minimum?
Joanna: What do I think? You know what, Stan, if you want me to have 37 characters in my password, like your pretty boy over there, Brian, why don’t you just make the minimum 37 characters?
Manager: Well, I thought I remembered you saying that you wanted to secure yourself.
Joanna: Yeah. You know what, yeah, I do. I do want to secure myself, okay. And I don’t need 37 characters in my password to do it!
On Wednesday, 14 January 2015 I registered for the Canadian Open Data Experience event called “Economic Potential of Open Data”. Speakers were to be Tony Clement, President of the Treasury Board; James Moore, Minister of Industry; and Ray Sharma, creator of the Canadian Open Data Experience (CODE).
Before the presentations started Tony Clement was off in a side office, unavailable for networking, and he left immediately after his presentation. James Moore was not present at all. For an Open Data event that promotes Open Government, it was a bit disappointing not to have access to the government ministers responsible for openness.
Here are some of the notes I took during the speakers’ presentations. My comments are indicated (like this).
Tony Clement, President of the Treasury Board:
Tony Clement referred to January 2014’s CODE event as the “first Open Data hackathon” in Canada (yet Open Data Waterloo Region has been holding Open Data Hackathons and CodeFest events since 2011)
CODE hackathon had 900 participants, with the spotlight on the business value of Open Data
“Electric Sheep” was the winner of the hackathon
Tony Clement and James Moore are making this road trip to announce 20 — 22 February 2015 as the CODE2015 Hackathon
There will be cash prizes for the top three apps created during the CODE hackathon
Tony Clement gave some words of praise to the Canadian government, saying that Open Data allows Canada to “compete with the world”.
Ray Sharma, creator of Canadian Open Data Experience:
Weather and GPS are commercially successful applications of Open Data
National competition had 930 participants
Ray Sharma talked of the “power of the crowd”, mentioning Litebox, WordPress, Kickstarter and Goldcorp
The economic potential of Open Data is like an iceberg — most of it is below the surface
There will be three hubs participating in the CODE2015 hackathon: Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal
The 2nd Generation of apps will use Open Data and Private Data, e.g. Zillo
Lan Nguyen, Deputy CIO for City of Toronto:
Toronto Open Data started in 2009 (although I remember Toronto setting up a blank Open Data web page after the Smart Cities conference in 2006)
Open Data is part of Toronto’s Open Government
There’s a long list of Open Datasets — Petabytes!
Unexpected benefits: silos of ownership; “See, Click, Fix” received 3,000 requests!
Commercialization of Toronto Open Data
Availability of budget and Council data
Transparent, engage citizens
Able to understand the outcome of Open Data
Liability, risk?
Open Data is available to everyone; it is Social Justice
Crowd sourcing: Encourage commercialization; partner with educational institutions
Next plan: Open Dashboard — reports from different stakeholders
Open Data is a powerful driver for Open Government
Devin Tu, founder of Map Your Property:
Idea for Map Your Property came from the fact that California has a single portal for geodata
MYP aggregates multiple datasets
Reports are made available in Microsoft .docx format and maps are exported as .pdf files (Oh great, Open Data in proprietary, non-consumable formats)
Benefits of Open Data: Entrepreneurs go to those places where there is Open Data
It is expensive to do business in places that don’t have Open Data!
Ryan Doherty, co-founder of IAmSick.ca:
Goal of IAmSick.ca: Reduce Emergency Room wait times
Integrated datasets? (speaking with Ryan Doherty after the presentation, I learned that much data was collected manually)
User tracking provides estimated wait times (are users aware their use of IAmSick.ca is being tracked? What information on users is retained? This could be a privacy leak nightmare waiting to happen. Speaking with Ryan Doherty afterwards, he assured me there was no medical information about users collected)
Improving business — efficiency in care delivery was apparent later
I found the focus on business interests and the competitive aspects of the CODE2015 hackathon a bit disconcerting. A cynic would say business is using $40,000 prize money in a competition as cheap bait to attract programmers to work for 24 hours straight. At 900 participants, that works out to paying only about $2.00/hour per programmer. And only four teams split the prize money, so most programmers go completely unpaid.
Still, CODE2015 only has three competitive hackathons on a weekend where the International Open Data Day holds hundreds of cooperative hackathons.
I hope OpenDataWR holds an event this year — the ones in 2013 and 2014 were fun, productive for some, and educational for all.
Hi Everybodeee! Every year, the last Friday in July is System Administrator Appreciation Day. A SysAdmin is the person who keeps your servers serving, your network working, and your backups, um, backed up. Most people only deal with their SysAdmin when things go wrong, but on the last Friday in July they shower their SysAdmins with gifts, chocolate cake and ice cream.
If you’re a SysAdmin, aspire to be one, are friends with or married to one, or just want to see what SysAdmins look like, come to this special Ubuntu Hour and celebrate with us.
Sysadminus Windowservus
Sysadminus Emailservus
Sysadminus Databasus
Sysadminus Linuxservus
What SysAdmins look like
Usually, we celebrate SysAdminDay in Kitchener-Waterloo with Egg Rolls and Guy Ding at the Egg Roll King Restaurant, but this year Tony and his family will be on vacation so we have to find another venue. I’ve received some good suggestions already; let me know of any others in the comments.
CrankyOldBugger writes:
I know of a perfect place in St. Jacobs (Harvest Moon), seating-wise, but
no wi-fi.
What about the Williams at University Plaza? I’m just tossing out names
here…
This might be a bit out of the ordinary, but maybe we could use my house in
St. Jacobs. If it’s nice out, we could have a pool party. The pizza joint
around the corner is makes good stuff. Just a thought….
Tim Laurence suggests:
If Chinese food is in order I am a big fan of Lia Lia.
Otherwise we could grab some space at the Rum Runner. Their rooms are just
perfect for groups.
Nathan Fish offers:
Kam Yin is an excellent Chinese restaurant, family-run I believe. They don’t have a party room, though. How many are we expecting?
I don’t know, Nathan… So, Everybodeee, please register for the SysAdminDay Ubuntu Hour in Kitchener-Waterloo event on the Ubuntu LoCo Team Portal, or let me know you’re coming in the comments.
In addition to the GNU/Linux Resources in Kitchener-Waterloo there are several other places to look online if you need support. Here’s a list of the GNU/Linux Resources I use.
Microsoft Windows XP finally reached its End Of Life on Tuesday, 8 April 2014. It was a good run, starting in 2001. And, WinXP is still being used by many people who can’t, won’t, or haven’t yet upgraded.
Of course, now that WinXP is EOL there will be no further updates. Any vulnerabilities discovered after 8 April will go unfixed, leaving WinXP computers vulnerable to attack. What can you to do minimize your risk?
First, and most important: If you haven’t already run the Microsoft Update, do so now. Click on Start, All Programs, Microsoft Update.
Select “Microsoft Upate”
On the Microsoft Update window select Express Update
Select “Express Update”
After that’s complete you’re on your own. But even if the WinXP operating system will no longer be updated, it’s still good to keep your applications updated. These software utilities will help keep your system up-to-date and tuned-up:
Never Eat That Green Food At The Back Of The Fridge
Never Trust Anyone Over Thirty
and
Never Sign A GnuPG/PGP Key That’s Older Than You Are
Looking for green food at the back of the fridge
OK, only one of those is true, and it’s not the last one. At the University of Waterloo Keysigning Party last fall, some of the people signing my key were younger than the key they were signing!
At the keysigning I was having a discussion with someone about key lengths. In particular, choosing 4096 bits instead of 2048. I was reading that GnuPG has a limit of 4096 bits, but that 4096 should be enough for all time to come.
I’ve read online that GnuPG does actually support larger key sizes but that there is a const in the source code limiting it to 4096. The reasons for doing so are supposedly speed, 4096 would be very slow to generate and use, and comparability with other implementations that may not support larger keys. Personally I think it’s an inevitability that this will be increased in time but we’re not there yet.
In 1996 when I started with PGP a 1024 bit key was considered adequate, by 1999 a 2048 bit key was still considered large.
Consider Moore’s Law: every 18 months computing capacity doubles and costs halve. I’m not sure if that means that over 18 months x flops increases to 2x flops at the same price, or that in 18 months the cost of x flops is half of today’s cost, or if it means that in 18 months the cost of 2x flops will be half the cost of x flops today. If the latter, then today’s x flops/$ is x/4 flops/$ in 18 months. That factor of four is an increase of two bits every 18 months, or four bits every 3 years.
So, the cost in 1996 to brute-force crack a 1024 bit key is the same as the cost in 1999 to crack a 1028 bit key. And in 2014, 18 years later, it’s the same cost as cracking a 1048 bit key (an additional 24 bits).
An increase in key size from 1024 bits to 2048 bits buys an additional 768 years of Moore’s Law. And going from 2048 bits to 4096 bits buys an additional 1536 years of Moore’s Law.
Is Moore’s Law overestimating the cost of cracking keys? Are there fundamental advances in math that have dropped the cost of cracking 1024 bit keys to near-zero? What’s the economic justification for crippling keysizes in GnuPG, anyway?
–Bob, who is not trolling but really wants to know.
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