full circle ISSUE #27 - July 2009 PROGRAM IN PYTHON PART 1 full circle magazine #27 1 contents ^ full circle Program In Python - Pt1 p.07 Ubuntu Women p.24 Inkscape - Part 4 p.11 Ubuntu Games p.26 My Story p.17 MOTU Interview p.21 Scan To PDF/DJVU p.13 Command & Conquer p.05 Associate A File-Type p.16 Review p.19 Letters p.22 Top 5 p.30 The articles contained in this magazine are released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. This means you can adapt, copy, distribute and transmit the articles but only under the following conditions: You must attribute the work to the original author in some way (at least a name, email or URL) and to this magazine by name ('full circle magazine') and the URL www.fullcirclemagazine.org (but not attribute the article(s) in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you must distribute the resulting work under the same, similar or a compatible license. full circle magazine #27 2 contents ^ EDITORIAL This magazine was created using : Welcome to another issue of Full Circle magazine. nd welcome to another new series! ! Yes, last month I promised a new series on LAMP servers, but since so many people requested Python in our survey, I gave it priority. I don't like to have too many series' running at once, so maybe when the Inkscape series comes to Aan end, I'll start the LAMP series. In the feature this month, Ed discusses the latest shock news that (creators of the , and , games) have been bought over. What does this mean for Linux? See page 26. Ubuntu is a complete operating system that is perfect for This months is a bit unusual, it's one man's quest to create a low laptops, desktops and servers. power, near silent, server and (to put it lightly) it looks a touch different from what Whether at home, school or work you normally see in a PC/server case! Ubuntu contains all the applications you'll ever need including word processor, email In other news this month, has been released. What does that application and web browser. mean? I'll let Steve Langasek explain: Ubuntu is and always will be free of charge. You do not pay any licensing fees. You can download, use and share Ubuntu with your friends, family, school . or business for absolutely nothing. Enjoy the issue, and keep in touch! Once installed, your system is ready to use with a full set of productivity, internet, drawing and graphics applications, and Editor, Full Circle magazine games. [email protected] use the new 'contents' link to jump to the contents page from any other page! full circle magazine #27 3 contents ^ NEWS 2. The kernel failed to clear various Launchpad Now Kernel Vulnerabilities in personality flags when setuid processes were executed. Because Open Source Survey: Linux Ubuntu of this, other vulnerabilities could Released as GPL3, Launchpad's become exploitable if a local expertise in demand Canonical code is now open source. Note attacker mapped the NULL memory Market research firm Foote announced on that although it had been page. The issue was discovered by Partners has updated its survey July 28th the previously announced that two Julien Tinnes and Tavis Ormandy of the most sought-after IT availability of a components ( and and affects only Ubuntu 8.04 LTS, skills (non-certified) and ranked new Linux kernel 8.10 and 9.04 users. ) would be held back, a last Linux experience and skills as security update minute change now includes the second most sought after for the following 3. KVM failed to validate the page both. Ubuntu distributions: 6.06 LTS, table root. This could lead to a DoS by US and Canadian employers. The top position is held by Java 8.04 LTS, 8.10 and 9.04 (also attack and crash the affected • Launchpad-users mailing list: Enterprise Edition, Standard applies to Kubuntu, Edubuntu system. The issue was discovered https://lists.launchpad.net/launch by Matt T. Yourst and affects only Edition and Micro Edition. Other and Xubuntu). The update pad-users/msg05118.html Ubuntu 8.04 LTS, 8.10 and 9.04 open source skills included in patches 4 important security • Blog post at Canonical.com: users. the list include; Apache web issues (see below for details) http://blog.canonical.com/?p=192 server, MySQL and PHP. discovered in the Linux kernel • Press release: 4. eCryptfs failed to validate various Windows didn't make the list, packages by various hackers. http://www.ubuntu.com/news/can buffer sizes. Because of this, a local but demand for .NET skills Therefore, it is strongly onical-open-sources-launchpad/ attacker could crash the affected ranked 4th. recommended to update your system or gain elevated privileges. • The development wiki: system as soon as possible! The issue was discovered by Ramon https://dev.launchpad.net/ Red Hat Certified Engineer and de Carvalho Valle and affects only • Instructions for getting code: Linux Professional Institute The following Linux kernel Ubuntu 8.04 LTS, 8.10 and 9.04 https://dev.launchpad.net/Getting vulnerabilities were discovered: users. Certification failed to make the "Hot List" for IT certifications. The Canonical Launchpad The information obtained by 1. The RTL8169 network driver The above Linux kernel developers will be on IRC in failed to validate buffer sizes. the market researchers comes vulnerabilities can be fixed if you channel #launchpad-dev on Because of this, a remote attacker from almost 2,000 public and update your system now. irc.freenode.net. That’s the place on the LAN (Local Area Network) private sector organizations to go for real time development could crash the affected system or and over 85,000 IT workers in discussion and questions. For gain elevated privileges. The issue the US and Canada. was discovered by Michael Tokarev usage issues, #launchpad is still and affects all the aforementioned the place, as before. Ubuntu systems. softpedia.com : h-online.com : Ubuntu Weekly News full circle magazine #27 4 contents ^ COMMAND & CONQUER or this month's on you could edit, but there are Command & Conquer %D%{$fg[red]%}]%{$reset_color some cases where it won't do df %}%{$reset_color%}"$'\n'"%{$f article, I'll cover a few g[blue]%}&#9492;&#9472;>%{$re anything at all (I can't say I things that are set_color%} " know all possible uses of it, so which displays filesystem Fsometimes mentioned online you will have to try for usage (I usually use it with the with instructions, or things that which looks like the image yourself). “-h” argument, so that it aren't enough for an entire below. displays in Gigabytes). article on their own, but should Another useful thing to still be mentioned. I hope that You have two ways to do know is that you can use while watch this information is useful for this: loops and the like in the actual those readers who want to do 1) you can open a new terminal shell too. For example, if you which runs a command once more with their shell, or who and view the shell (which, if wanted to list all the files in a ever 2 seconds (by default, but want to customize it, yet you're running in a tty session, directory and insert it into a can also be changed with “-n occasionally run across a term or are doing too much at once, different line of code, you could <num>” argument). that they don't know. or hate changing shells before do this: scrot you're finished, isn't a great I'll begin with prompt option) or ls|while read line; do `cat ${line}`; done which is essentially a customization. Say you've 2) you can “source” it. I prefer command-line based spent a long time finding a option #2 since it takes Of course, you will get an screenshot tool, but with a lot prompt for your terminal that's immediate effect in the original error message if you run into a of options and possibilities (see to your liking, and you've terminal, and is fairly simple to directory, but that can be the manpage for more info, finally gotten all the escape do. It is done by using the solved with a simple check there are too many options to characters set and you're command “source” followed by (using an if statement). This, cover here). ready to try it out. This is my the path (or name, if it's in however, I will leave to you. And, of course, the other .zshrc PS1: your current working directory) commands I've covered in the to the configuration file A couple of other useful past months are also export (.bashrc in this case). PS1="%{$fg[blue]%}&#9484;&#94 commands that I find myself frequently used, but the 3 above haven't been mentioned 72;[%{$fg[green]%}%n%{$fg[cya source .bashrc using a lot are: n]%}@%{$fg[green]%}%m%{$fg[bl ue]%}:%{$fg[magenta]%}%~%{$fg [blue]%}]- This command works with %{$fg[red]%}[%{$fg[cyan]%}%* most configuration files that full circle magazine #27 5 contents ^ COMMAND & CONQUER before, and are useful. One last on top or always below, but can thing I want to cover in this be both (Xmonad seems to is an open-source, Web-based, professional, article is what a tiling window offer only one or the other out groupware application that manager is, since quite a few of the box, and I couldn't find a facilitates the organization of all coders I know prefer them over work around).