The Software Libre project “Exterminate alle the brutes” in Malawi, Central Africa, goes into round four.
This time it’s less of a “Niggaz project” than a “Womanz project”! – Meow!
Stay tuned by subscribing to the projects website.
… the story continues. Am still trying to acquire a computer that is whether bound to a proprietary operation system, nor uses outdated hardware components.
Today I was writing to Lenovo Switzerland:
Guten Tag sehr geehrte Lenovo
Gerne würde ich mir eines Ihrer Produkte kaufen. So beispielsweise das ThinkPad X121e oder X220.
Da ich jedoch ausschliesslich das Betriebssystem GNU/Linux Debian benutze, möchte ich dieses ohne Lizenzkosten bei Lenovo oder einem Händler erwerben.Könnten Sie mir mitteilen, beziehungsweise einen Händler empfehlen, wo ich eines Ihrer Produkte kaufen kann ohne gezwungen zu werden, die Lizenzkosten über ein Produkt zu bezahlen, welches ich nicht benutze?
Besten Dank & freundliche Grüsse, A.A.
Lenovo writes back:
Sehr geehrter Herr A.A.,
vielen Dank für Ihre E-Mail.
Lenovo verfügt über ein Netzwerk kompetenter Händler, die Ihnen helfen, die am besten geeigneten Lösungen aus unserem Angebot auszuwählen.
Lenovo Business Partner sind auf den Vertrieb und den Support unserer Produkte spezialisiert und am Business Partner Logo zu erkennen (siehe Anhang).
Bei Fragen zu Preis, Verfügbarkeit sowie Bestellmöglichkeiten helfen Sie Ihnen gerne weiter.
Lenovo Vertriebspartner beraten Sie sowohl Online als auch vor Ort.
Kontaktdaten für Business Partner in Ihrer Nähe finden Sie unter:http://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/controller/e/chind/LenovoPortal/de_CH/special-offers.workflow:ShowPromo?LandingPage
Freundliche Grüsse / Cordialement / Cordiali saluti / Best regards
M.D.
… wobei meine Antwort sich wie folgt liest:
Guten Tag Herr D.
Besten Dank für Ihre Antwort auf meine Anfrage.
Wie von Ihnen vorgeschlagen habe ich mich umgehend dies bezüglich an einen “kompetenten Händler” ihres “Netzwerks” gewendet. Dieser verweist mich jedoch wieder zurück an den Hersteller, also Lenovo.
Es geht, bei meiner Anfrage um genauere Auskunft der Bestellmöglichkeit. Ins Besondere interessiert mich die Möglichkeit der Bestellung Ihrer wunderbaren Notebook Produkte ohne Betriebssystem, genauer ohne dass ich als Kunde die Kosten einer Lizenz eines Betriebssystems trage, welches ich gar nicht benutzen will. Schliesslich handelt es sich bei dem Betriebssytem-Produkt ja auch nicht um ein von Lenovo hergestelltes Produkt, sondern eines Dritten.
Um es anders zu sagen: Ich wünsche mir ein Gerät bei Ihnen, dem Hersteller, zu kaufen, ohne dass eine dritte Firma die Lizenzkosten eines Produktes erhält, welches ich weder erwerben, geschweige denn noch benutzen möchte.
Ich hoffe, im Sinne des freien Wettbewerbs und im Sinne internationaler Kartellrechte und Gesetze, dass dieses Produkt eines Dritten, in diesem Falle Microsoft, nicht an Ihre Produkte gebunden ist.Mit Neugier freue ich mich auf Ihre postivie Antwort, wünsche ein schönes Wochenende und verbleibe mit freundlichen Grüssen, A.A.
This is becoming a hassle again. The way the Apple operation system OS X evolves is not convenient to my personal needs and the way I want to use my computer. Apple managed to incorporate impure and illicit functionalities into their operation system, that locks the user into a product range, which they control. The users freedom of choice and control fades away, thus OS X Lion is based on BSD UNIX. The command line is the only application that is turning out to allow full straightforward and controlled accessibility to the system and information. After intensively having tested and deployed OS X Lion, I decided that my next computer has to be a complete GNU/Linux machine again. Steve is dead now anyways, so things won’t improve.
Looking around in the local stores, no vendor seems to offer a up-to-date notebook computer, which respects the users choice for freedom. Either I am offered a 1 years old computer, for which I would have to wait for 3 weeks, or I’d have to “bite into the sour apple” and buy a computer, which, – illicitly, – comes together with an operation system, for which I’d have to pay for, thus I’d never use it.
In my e-mail to Lenovo I get the answer:
“Dear Alex,
Thank you for contacting Lenovo.
We apologize. We do not support any other Operating System apart from Windows.
Sincerely,
Deboshree Mukherjee”
… whereas my answer follows like
“Dear Deboshree
That is very sad to read. Sounds like your company is bound to unfair
competition* and does not allow users freedom either.Do I at least have the possibility to acquire a computer, without
having to pay the license of an operation system, such as M$ Wind00ze,
which I wouldn’t use?Sorry to say that I won’t acquire a computer that forces me to use an
operating system that is unresistant to viruses and locks me into the
choice of the manufacturers formats and applications.
How comes that M$ is legally capable to establish such a contract with
your company that your products are bound to an operation system that
violates human rights?
Thus technology still evolves thanks to innovators, that are freely
sharing their ideas and creativity, based on the principles that
know-how and knowledge want to be free (as in freedom).Let me kindly remind you, that your company, that was former IBM, has
historically evolved based on this principles!As I am working in the field in technology research, I strongly have
to make sure, that I have complete control over my devices and
instruments. – This is only possible with software that is
non-proprietary, such as GNU/Linux & UNIX.Wishing you all the best & remaining with kindest regards, Alex
*(which in my country is a crime.)”
I need a hardware manufacturer and vendor who grants me my human rights and freedom, without violating international competition laws and rights.
[Update 4th of October 2011]
Lenovo, – surprisingly, – writes back.
“Dear Alex,
Thank you for your feed back and for your time and patience! We will surely forward this e-mail to the appropriate department to review for the betterment of the company. Thank you once again.
Sincerely,
Deboshree Mukherjee”
“Dear Deboshree
Thank you for your e-mail.
Would be great, if you could forward our correspondence to the respective department. I appreciate and, – honestly, – did not expect and answer.I am sure you understand my concern and hope that we can establish a fair business relationship. It would be disappointing to see that your great computer products couldn’t be used together with an operation systems that guarantees freedom.
Have a good weekend and looking forward to read you soon again, Alex”
This evening Richard Stallman was giving a talk at the ETHZ. It was nice to see how the lecture hall was filled with young ICT students and hackers. Richard started his talk by saying that if anybody wants to record the talk or take pictures should publish it only by using free formats, such as ogg. – Well he’s substantially right by saying this. I was just wondering why it has to be said, as I think it’s self-evident.
It appears that even one of the most respected education institutes, such as the ETHZ, does not take Freedom for granted. And there lies the socio-political deception: Governments and regulation authorities have pushed surveillance and media control as far as we’re accepting debates about freedom to be discussed in mediocre circles. People using GNU/Linux are seen as outcast, rebels and extremists. – Though freedom ought to be one of the most basic principles of humankind!
There’s a massive lack of intellectuals and authors, interfering into the public political and cultural debates, as it has become difficult to avoid the mass media and, – therefore, – disinformation. The economical thirst for growth managed to incorporate writers and readers to subordinate their belief for the sake of media-control. Academics and brains subordinated with self-absorbed researches, funded by lobbyists and obscure organisations, to abandon their principles of liberty and freedom.
At the shift from information society to knowledge society, it’s not enough to just present the four freedoms of Free Software to the tomorrows system administrators and technoly adepts. Richard might be substantially right in his exposure of the principles of free software, while “Big Brother“, – as he calls it, – has ever since found new means of control. (Which are implemented into the todays information technology structures, without letting users know. Whereafter a large part of society argues “I’ve nothing to hide”!)
Richard seems to have become “commensurable” to a large audience, without being contradicted, without disruptive moments and “Etat de Siege“, which are needed to shake the public. – Literally!
Humankind has to understand that the dialectic rapidly has to change and that we’re not willing to be instrumentalised by capitalism. Culture is defined by self-determination, innovation, transparency, freedom and human rights. Richard, the whole free software and civil liberty society have to take the step to the next level and start to take back, 0wn and rule this planet!
[Update]
In the past week I practically bullied all my friends into reading the first post about the Linux experience and to my surprise, it did trigger a certain wonder in the non-nerd community that I know. The biggest curiosity had to do with its looks. I felt like trying to describe someone for a blind date… “Is not so boring! Seriously, it looks really good”, “No, I know you are not a computer person but I’m telling you, it changed its appearance completely and it looks amazing now”. This was actually the thing I was most surprised about when I first interacted with my Ubuntu interface, cause it’s really intuitive and friendly to the eye. Almost all of its software has a resemblance to one that we are familiar with already (Libre Office to Word, Banshee to iTunes, GIMP to Photoshop and so on). Most people think of Linux in the same way I did: is not for me cause I’m an “average” user, it’s the OS for programmers. That may have been the case some years ago, but now even a blond girl (hey that’s me!) can find her way around it without feeling hopeless or lost in an unfamiliar environment. However, the success of a blind date doesn’t have to do only with looks, because the important things usually transcend the limits of what’s visible to the eye. The open nature of this operating system makes all the difference in the world, and even if we are not familiar with the technicalities of it, even if we don’t understand how Linux is better than other OS because on the surface it “looks” the same and we are not particularly turned on by the cleanliness of the processes running in the back-end, we should try to be aware of the social and political implications of our daily choices and own those choices rather than let others decide for us.
It all started as a discussion on security. I’ve never considered this an issue of importance before, even as an avid computer user. But it was made clear to me that the world is changing and apparently not in the “right” direction. Eager to get out of my shell of microsoftian comfort, I decided to try GNU/Linux, when Lx kindly offered to install it for me. He guided me through the process like the patient “older brother” (note that I purposely didn’t use “big brother”) teaching the younger sister how to ride a bike. Which is why my old windows OS was kept intact in a different hard drive. Kind of giving me a “safety” feeling, like those little wheels on kid’s bikes. I needed the reassurance that my computer world as I knew it, was still going to be available for me, two clicks away. It wasn’t difficult to get on the road of open software this way. And the curious thing is that I haven’t accessed my “little wheels” (the windows hard drive) ever since I got the new one cause I don’t seem to need it. I can ride smoothly on the GNU/Linux and it has that “cool toy” aura to it. But it is important that I could do everything I needed to, and remarked that some things work even better now! (like video chatting and the general performance of my computer). So far, I don’t miss anything (beyond some unimportant shortcut and some spanish character) and I’m overall quite happy with the change. I had prejudices, like most people, because we tend to think that things are to be valued by their price, rather than by their nature. Like most people, I too thought that open software “can’t” offer enough because it’s free. As if there was an intrinsic correlation between high price and high quality. Reality dictates this is a fallacy that we choose to ignore.
That’s all for now. I’ll continue my quest of riding GNU/Linux and sharing my experiences with all of you who want to read about it.
Links:
GNU/Linux Ubuntu
GNU Project
Linux Newbie Guide
GNU/Linux Ubuntu Forum
On my Nagios Server I use twitter to send status alerts. It works nicely with Identica & Twitter.
The setup is easy. First install twidge with
root@host:~# apt-get install twidge
Then write a twidgerc file with the according twidge configuration
nagios@host:~# vi /etc/nagios3/twidgerc
[DEFAULT]
oauthaccesstoken: %(serverbase)s/oauth/access_token
oauthauthorize: %(serverbase)s/oauth/authorize
oauthdata: [("user_id","XXXXXX"),("screen_name","YOUR_SCREENNAME"),("oauth_verifier","XXXXXX"),("oauth_token","XXXXXX"),("oauth_token_secret","XXXXXX"),("oauth_callback_confirmed","true")]
oauthrequesttoken: %(serverbase)s/oauth/request_token
sendmail: /usr/sbin/sendmail
serverbase: https://api.twitter.com
shortenurls: yes
urlbase: %(serverbase)s/1
Make sure the file is readable by Nagios user. (!)
nagios@host:~# chown nagios /etc/nagios/twidgerc
Then add the following lines to /etc/nagios3/conf.d/contacts_nagios2.cfg (on GNU/Linux Debian).
define contact{
contact_name twitter
alias Twitter
service_notification_period 24x7
host_notification_period 24x7
service_notification_options w,u,c,r
host_notification_options d,r
service_notification_commands notify-service-by-twitter
host_notification_commands notify-host-by-twitter
email twitteraccount_to_contact
}
… and add “twitter” to the members in the contactgroup (in the same file).
members root,nagiosadmin,twitter
Then add these lines to etc/nagios3/commands.cfg:
define command {
command_name notify-service-by-twitter
command_line echo "#Nagios $NOTIFICATIONTYPE$ $HOSTNAME$($SERVICEDESC$) is $SERVICESTATE$" | twidge -c /etc/nagios3/twidgerc update
}
define command {
command_name notify-host-by-twitter
command_line echo "#Nagios $HOSTSTATE$ alert for $HOSTNAME$" | twidge -c /etc/nagios3/twidgerc dmsend $CONTACTEMAIL$
}
Nagios will tweet the service notifications and send a directmessage to the according user with the host notification.
Here’s an example:
=^.^= Lx
Since I’ve discovered twidge I find Twitter very useful, as my Server tweets me it’s status.
Therefore I wrote the following simple shell-script:
#!/bin/bash #CC-BY-SA 11th of March 2011 by Lx time=`date +"%d/%b/%Y:%H:%M:%S %z"` if [ ! -e "~/log/$1_status.log" ]; then touch ~/log/$1_status.log; fi lastlog_on=`tail -n 1 ~/log/$1_status.log | grep ONLINE` lastlog_off=`tail -n 1 ~/log/$1_status.log | grep OFFLINE` control=`ping -c 3 -W 1 google.com | grep "[1-3][[:space:]]\(packets received\|received\)"` if [ -n $1 ]; then echo "Sending pings to "$1 pong=`ping -c 3 -W 1 $1 | grep "[1-3][[:space:]]\(packets received\|received\)"` echo "Ping result: "$pong if [ -n "$pong" ]; then echo "Host "$1" is online" if [ -z "$lastlog_on" ]; then echo $time" "$1" status ONLINE" >> ~/log/$1_status.log echo "Host "$1" is online" | twidge dmsend twitteraccount fi elf [ -n "$control" ]; then echo "Host "$1" is offline" if [ -z "$lastlog_off" ]; then echo $time" "$1" status OFFLINE" >> ~/log/$1_status.log echo "Host "$1" is offline" | twidge dmsend twitteraccount fi else echo "Network down" fi elif [ -z $1 ]; then echo "Usage: $arg0 hostname|ip" fi exit;
Then I use a cronjob accordingly:
*/5 * * * * sh ~/path/to/shellscript.sh foo.bar.baz > /dev/null 2>&1
You can easily also tweet the server uptime, load or whatever 
uptime | twidge update twitteraccount
Have phun!
I am very happy and proud, that Georg Greve, the former President of the Free Software Foundation Europe, was awarded with the German “Bundesverdienstkreuz” today.
My felicitation, Georg!
I recently tested some of the new “features” that the lately released “iLife ’09” software of Apple is offering to their users. The new iPhoto ’09 for example offers Geo-tagging of your images, so that one can see when and where photos have been taken. This further leads to the assumption, that some tracker could abuse this data. If it’s Google or any other “big brother” who is watching you, we have to admit, that we’re living in the age of George Orwells “1984″.
Kind of funny was though messing around with the “face recognition” feature. I assorted some of my images in iPhoto and tagged the recognized faces with names, when suddenly iPhoto offered me the following proposal: (see picture).
The picture shows Mark Shuttleworth (Ubuntu) and Georg Greve
(FSF Europe) at the Linux Tag in Wiesbaden 2006. iLife ’09 suggests to tag the detected face of Georg Greve as “Richard Stallman”, which is kind of funny. 
I think personally think, that a machine, based on a binary structure, will never achieve the possibility of suggesting truly diversified ambiguities because it only may answer “yes” or “no” such as “1″ and “0″. We’ll have to wait for Quantum-electronics that such things may happen…
(read more on “informative binarity and lifeworld-philosophical androgyny“)
[update: there is a youtube clip that shows the iPhoto feature.]