Rolling release users had a variety of package updates this week to include updates of rpm, Plasma, rsyslog, webkit2gtk3, systemd, AppStream and more, which were updated throughout the week’s four openSUSE Tumbleweed snapshots.

The latest snapshot to be released, 20211027, updated eight packages. Mozilla Thunderbird 91.2.1 increased the memory required per threads for AArch64 to avoid an out of memory state and the email client also had Link Time Optimization enabled for Tumbleweed. The php7 7.4.25 update was a security release focusing on bug fixes like one that affected high memory usage during encoding detection and another fix addressed Common Vulnerabilities and Exposure–2021-21703. The 9.22 version of the real-time web framework perl-Mojolicious added a referer method and fixed the response status log message to use the trace log level instead of debug. A second release this week of mpg123 updated the package to version 1.29.2, which had a single fix for a non-live-decoder safeguard. AppStream, which is a cross-distribution package for standardizing software component metadata, updated to version 0.14.6; the new version updated documentation and added support for source locales. The package also added support for image and video screenshot handling and the changed states that it added Fedora to the continuous integration environment.

Snapshot 20211025 had an update of rpm 4.17.0. The update had many improvements, new translations and python generators and debuginfo extraction have been split into a separate upstream project. The rsyslog had two updates in Tumbleweed this week and this snapshot brought in version 8.2110.0, which fixes a couple of bugs affecting configurations. The 5.14.14 Linux Kernel had a whole bunch of fixes for Advanced Linux Sound Architecture and Btrfs. There were also several 4.2.20 library updates for libyui , which implemented the C++17 standard for package plugins. Another update in the snapshot was the update of the Free Remote Desktop package freerdp 2.4.1; the package update addressed two CVEs and one of those was an improper client input validation for gateway connections that would allow to overwrite memory.

Snapshot 20211024 provided the Plasma 5.23.1 update. This first minor update had a fix for its Discover app store to prevent a Flatpak crash when a source is disabled. KDE’s Plasma X Window Manager and Wayland Compositor KWin fixed the downloading software-rotated textures for PipeWire handling. Plasma Desktop fixed the “clear emoji history” action. The 6.1.28 version update of virtualbox fixed some audio issues and brought more administrative control over network ranges. The hypervisor also fixed a virtual machine black screen issue that happened on first resize after restoring from saved state. An update of webkit2gtk3 2.34.1 fixed a couple crashes affecting the WebKit rendering engine; one of the crashes would happen when loading videos on reddit. Several patches were removed from Ian Darwin’s open-source reimplementation of the file(1) command tool in version 5.41; the package added a new flag and requires that the match is a full word and not a partial word match. A version jump from libstorage-ng 4.4.44 to version 4.4.51 brought translations for Czech, Japanese and Slovak languages. The storage package also simplified parted flag handling. Other packages to update in the snapshot were acpica 20210930, java-11-openjdk 11.0.13.0, graphic visualization package graphviz 2.49.1 and more than a dozen other packages.

An updated 1.9.19 version of the audio package JACK was released in snapshot 20211021. The new version added an argument to wait for a soundcard to become available and fixed a collection of documentation. The systemd service manager update to version 249.5 dropped the list of valid net naming schemes and the update allows for extra net naming schemes to be defined during configuration. ImageMagick 7.1.0.10 improved the algorithm for automatic calculation of point size for captions and labels. The 4.7.0 version of iso-codes updated translations for Indonesian; the International Organization for Standardization package also added common names for South Korea and North Korea. The rsyslog package improved the error message output on Transport Layer Security failures in version 8.2108.0; the super-speedy logging system also added parameter ignoreolderthanoption and instructs the Text File Input Module not to ingest a file that has not been modified in the specified number of seconds. Audio player and decoder library mpg123 1.29.1 fixed the reporting of device property flags for buffer libmpg123. Several Python Package Index versions were updated in the snapshot; python-apipkg had a major update to 2.1.0: python-cachetools 4.2.4 added submodule shims for backward compatibility; and python-greenlet fixed a potential crash and a leak in version 1.1.2. Other pckages to update in the snapshot were libzypp 17.28.6, mc 4.8.27, thai-fonts 0.7.3, gnome-clocks 41.0 and more.

Con la caída de forosuse.org durante meses, la comunidad de openSUSE en español no tenía un foro donde preguntar y compartir… hasta ahora

Los foros quizás están de capa caída, pero creo de verdad que son el sitio ideal donde buscar ayuda y donde brindarla y donde esta puede ser más útil. No solo una vez si no muchas para quien viene a consultar algo similar a lo que una vez ya se solucionó.

Lo escrito en un foro queda para permanecer durante más tiempo que lo consultado en un canal de Matrix, Telegram u otro medio que tanto se han popularizado durante los últimos años.

Y ahora podemos por fin decir, que la comunidad en español de openSUSE vuelve a tener un foro donde consultar, ayudar y compartir sobre esta gran distribución de GNU/Linux.

A lo ya expuesto en las noticias oficiales, que podéis leer en el siguiente enlace, quiero aportar mi visión personal de este tema:

• https://news.opensuse.org/

Hago un pequeño resumen para poner al día el contexto sobre el nuevo foro en español para la comunidad de openSUSE.

Hasta ahora y desde hace muchos años, esa función la cumplía forosuse.org. Un foro que creció en base a la comunidad que la formaba, algo intrínseco en los foros, con el “boom” de los foros y en torno a una primigenia openSUSE, que por aquel entonces todavía era SuSE.

forosuse.org administrado por Riven, ha sido el sitio donde muchas personas hemos encontrado la solución a ciertos temas relacionados con esta distribución de GNU/Linux. Y donde hemos encontrado una pequeña comunidad con intereses similares.

Me registré en forosuse.org cuando instalé mi primer openSUSE 11.2 para consultar una duda y he seguido siendo parte del foro desde entonces aportando en lo que puedo.

Tanto fue así, que en unas “disputadas” elecciones me presenté a moderador y me dieron la confianza, para llegar así a convertirme en moderador, sustituyendo a Davmont y acompañando en las tareas a Diablo Rojo y Karlggest.

Parece que el resumen no está siendo tan breve. En definitiva, desde el mes de marzo (más o menos) de 2021, el foro estaba offline y no se podía acceder.

Riven nos comunicó por medio de DiabloRojo que el problema era la versión del software del propio blog (vBulletin), la versión de PHP del hosting y otros problemas del hosting.

Yo por mi parte poco podía hacer, porque no tengo los conocimientos suficientes, pero los moderadores le ofrecimos nuestra ayuda a Riven para poner en marcha de nuevo el foro.

El poner en marcha el foro de nuevo requiere invertir tiempo y esfuerzo (y supongo que dinero) y Riven debido a otras obligaciones de la vida real quizás no tiene ya tanto tiempo e ilusión.

No se lea esto como reproche, si no como legítima opción. Es lógico y normal que así sea. Por tanto MUCHAS GRACIAS por parte de los moderadores de forosuse.org a Riven por su tiempo y dedicación durante tantos años para mantener el sitio.

Los moderadores decidimos esperar y no meter más presión a Riven sobre el foro. Pasaban los meses y no había noticias de posibles avances o búsqueda de posibles decisiones.

Así que después de 6 meses esperando, los moderadores decidimos tomar una decisión. Las opciones eran montar un sitio paralelo o pedir un sitio dentro de la infraestructura oficial de los foros de openSUSE en inglés y otros idiomas ya existentes.

Decidimos tantear la segunda opción, nos parecía que era más viable a largo plazo y que resistiría mejor el paso del tiempo. No hacer del foro algo personal, si no algo comunitario.

Mandamos algún correo a los administradores de los foros contándoles la cuestión y la respuesta la verdad fue muy rápida y efectiva. Podrían habilitarnos un foro en español, dentro de la infraestructura propia de foros de openSUSE.

Desde el comienzo, por parte de los administradores de forums.o.o ha habido una buena disposición a hacer del nuevo sitio una realidad. Podiamos haber abierto el foro antes, pero quisimos primero tener una interfaz en español.

Los administradores, nos habilitaron las herramientas necesarias para traducir la interfaz de vBulletin al español, y a esa tarea nos pusimos Diablo Rojo, Karlggest y yo mismo. Traduciendo un montón de cadenas de texto de la mejor manera posible.

Una tarea ardua y poco entretenida, pero vital y muy importante para tener una experiencia óptima a la hora de utilizar el nuevo foro en español. Espero que sepáis perdonar si alguna traducción no es del todo acertada. Lo hicimos lo mejor que supimos en el menor tiempo posible para tener el foro preparado cuanto antes. Yo creo que ha quedado bastante bien.

Así que después de algunos correos con detalles de lo que queríamos los moderadores y los administradores del foro en inglés el proceso culminó en lo que ya conocéis. Un relevo a forosuse.org en forums.opensuse.org

Ahí tendréis a partir de ahora un sitio en español donde preguntar, compartir cuestiones sobre openSUSE. Espero que si ya teníais cuenta en forosuse.org os animéis a participar en esta nueva andadura y os registréis en el nuevo foro de openSUSE en español.

Empecemos a hacer comunidad en el foro, a consultar a crear guías que resulten útiles para consultar, a compartir trucos, a mostrar nuestros escritorios con capturas de pantalla, a compartir tal o cual aplicación de openSUSE…

En definitiva a hacer del nuevo foro en español de openSUSE un sitio de consulta y de reunión.

Así que a quienes me habéis preguntado en los comentarios del blog o por correo sobre el foro de openSUSE, ya tenéis la respuesta.

Es una pena tener que decir adiós a forosuse.org después de tanto tiempo, pero estas cosas pasan.

Los moderadores DiabloRojo, Karlggest y yo mismo esperamos volveros a encontrar en el nuevo foro:

• https://forums.opensuse.org/forumdisplay.php/957-Espa%C3%B1ol-(Spanish)

Usad los comentarios del blog si queréis más información al respecto, aunque poco más podría añadir a lo ya expuesto. ¡Nos leemos en el foro!

Tal y como estaba previsto en el calendario de lanzamiento de los desarrolladores, el martes 19 de octubre la Comunidad KDE ha comunicado que ha sido lanzada la octava actualización de Plasma 5.18 LTS. Una noticia que aunque es esperada y previsible es la demostración palpable del alto grado de implicación de la Comunidad en la mejora continua de este gran entorno de escritorio de Software Libre.

Lanzada la octava actualización de Plasma 5.18 LTS

No existe Software creado por la humanidad que no contenga errores. Es un hecho incontestable y cuya única solución son las actualizaciones. Es por ello que en el ciclo de desarrollo del software creado por la Comunidad KDE se incluye siempre las fechas de las actualizaciones.

De esta forma, el martes 19 de octubre, casi seis meses después de la séptima, se lanzó la octubre actualización de Plasma 5.18, la cual solo trae (que no es poco) soluciones a los bugs encontrados en este tiempo de existencia de vida del escritorio y mejoras en las traducciones.

Es por tanto, una actualización 100% recomendable que sigue la filosofía LTS, es decir, ofrecer un escritorio congelado en cuanto a novedades pero cada versión más robusto: ideal para los que ponen la estabilidad por encima de las nuevas funcionalidades.

Las novedades básicas de Plasma 5.18 LTS

Ya he hablado en varios artículos la lista de novedades, pero he aquí un breve resumen de las mismas.

• Nuevo selector de Emojis.
• Nuevo modo de edición global que sustituye el botón del cuadro de herramientas de escritorio y le permite personalizar fácilmente la disposición del escritorio.
•  Mejorado el uso del lanzador de aplicaciones Kickoff y de la edición de los widgets en dispositivos táctitles.
• Mejoras en las aplicaciones que utilicen las librerías visuales GTK.
• Múltiples mejoras en las notificaciones como la información del nivel de energía en dispositivos bluetooth vinculados.
• Posibilidad de activar una opción de comentarios de usuario (deshabilitado por omisión), que permite dar información detallada del sistema y estadísticas de la frecuencia con la que utilice las funcionalidades individuales del Plasma.
• Añadido un control deslizante para la velocidad de animación global.
• Diversas mejoras en Discover como la adición de comentarios anidados para los  complementos.

Más información: KDE

As you might have already noticed from my blogs, I am a music maniac. One of the factors influencing your music listening experience is what speakers you use. I was lucky right from the beginning, my parents are music maniacs as well. In this blog I introduce you to the speakers I listened while living at my parents, and three pairs of speakers I bought myself.

I must admit that I never did a really thorough research about speakers and acoustics. I always listened to my ears, how much I like what I hear. This made my journey in listening to music a bit of a crisscross :-)

The early years: Acoustic Research AR 8 LS

While most people in the communist block had only a Sokol radio at home, I had the luxury of listening to a HiFi system imported from the West. Components were carefully chosen based on recommendations from the friends of my father. The speakers were made by Acoustic Research, a pair of AR 8 LS.

I did not know much about speakers at that time: there was no Internet yet, and no magazines about hifi yet (at least not in the remote part of Hungary, where I lived). The only thing I knew that I could not hear this level of sound quality anywhere else. I loved loud music, and even if these were bookshelf speakers, they could easily fill a 5m x 8m room. But when my parents were away and I had the time, I built a small triangle and listened to them just from a meter away.

Many years later I learned that the AR 8 LS was the smallest of a series of speakers. It was built for music enthusiasts, but this particular type was mostly used by professionals in studios as near field monitors. What a coincidence :-)

The university years: Altec Lansing 2.1 system

The AR speakers sounded fantastic, but as I started to listen to music elsewhere I suddenly realized that they did not have much bass. Or rather at that time I did not know yet, that others had too much bass. So, when I had a chance to buy something for myself, I ended up with an Altec Lansing self-powered 2.1 speaker system. Obviously, I did not have much budget, and these I could source at a relatively good price (even if this price was still 5x more than anyone around me would spend on speakers…). I do not remember the exact type any more, but it had a huge sub-woofer and the satellite speakers were two way.

Listening to Pink Floyd was fantastic on these speakers and the explosions in movies sounded terrifying. When we had a 5m x 5m room full with guests dancing, everyone wanted to buy similar speakers for home. However classical music or music with acoustic instruments did not sound nearly as good as on the AR 8 LS.

By that time I had a friend at university who brought me to various hifi events and I quickly became aware of the limitations. I fell in love with Linn and Heed Audio at that time, but as a university student they were out of reach for me.

My first larger salary: JVC EX-A5 wood cone system

When my Altec Lansing 2.1 system died with a bit of smoke I had to look for something new. I remembered reading about JVC wood cone systems earlier, so I visited a JVC show room to listen to one. I liked it, but it was expensive. A few months later, when I got my first relatively good salary for teaching SUSE Linux at a bank, finally I bought an EX-A5 mini system. It is a complete mini system: an amplifier built together with a radio and a CD/DVD player bundled together with a pair of two way wood cone speakers.

It did not have the extreme bass of the Altec Lansing 2.1 systems I had earlier, but for the rest it had a fantastic, well balanced natural sound. Suddenly I had to listen to my whole music collection again: all music had a lot more more detail. The speakers can fill a smaller room if necessary, but best listened to just as the AR speakers: as near field monitors. And many recording studios use them as such.

My dream speakers: Heed Enigma 5

Do you remember Heed from a few paragraphs earlier? For the last couple of years I am lucky enough to listen to a pair of Heed Enigma 5 speakers. I first listened to them during my university years at a factory visit. I did not know why, but no matter where I was in the room, I felt that instruments are all around me. It was a love at first sight, or rather at first listening. These are non-directional or omnidirectional speakers. The speakers are not directed at the listener, but slightly upwards. What it means that you do not have to sit in a traditional triangle setting to enjoy a perfect sense of spatial sounds.

With the Enigma 5 there are no compromises. Bass sounds perfectly just as everything else. Almost everything sounds much better than anywhere else. Even with speakers costing more than an average car I often had the problem that music came directly from the speaker, there was no sense of having a band in front of you. With ominidirectional speakers this problem is gone. However there are some recordings which do not sound that well on them: some persecution recordings sound strange, and the problems of some low quality recordings are over emphasized by this setup.

What is next?

Most likely nothing :-) Sometimes I think about connecting the wood cone speakers as an alternative to the current system. They sound a lot better with the current amplifier than with the bundled one. However, a switch between the speakers would most likely alter the sound of the system, and I would not want that. Luckily there are really just a very few recordings which do not play well with the Enigma 5. I can listen to them using headphones, and that hides away most of the recording problems as well.

You can read it in English

Hola Geekos.

Los antiguos moderadores DiabloRojo, Karlggest y Victorhck de ForoSuSE, el foro en español de openSUSE, que actualmente no se encuentra disponible tiene el placer de anunciaros en latín:

Habemus Forum!

Forosuse ha sido el lugar de encuentro de la comunidad hispanohablante de usuarios y usuarias de openSUSE durante muchos años. El administrador Riven se encargó de mantener ese sitio en el que aprender, compartir y ser punto de reunión de quienes una de nuestras pasiones es openSUSE.

Creemos que se debe agradecer su labor, por el tiempo y recursos invertidos de manera altruista en mantener forosuse.org durante tanto tiempo. Pero las cosas cambian, en la vida surgen nuevos intereses, nuevos proyectos acaparan nuestro tiempo y es normal que así sea.

Por cuestiones técnicas nuestro querido forosuse ha sufrido contratiempos que lo han mantenido fuera de línea durante los últimos meses, debido a las actualizaciones del software propio del foro y otros problemas con el hosting. Después de muchos meses en los que no se resolvían esos problemas, los antiguos moderadores de forosuse tomamos una decisión.

Hemos decidido crear el nuevo foro dentro de la infraestructura oficial del proyecto openSUSE en lugar de crear un nuevo dominio, de este modo nos centralizamos para ofrecer nuestra ayuda a los usuarios del Geeko y dejamos fuera de nuestras manos el mantenimiento del foro, que será labor de gente más sabia que nosotros.

También cabe destacar y agradecer aquí el papel que han jugado los administradores del foro, que se han mostrado siempre con ganas de ayudarnos y nos han dado las herramientas y han realizado el trabajo relacionado con la administración de sistemas poniendo en marcha el foro y con la interfaz disponible en español.

Estamos emocionados con el nuevo foro y esperamos contar con vuestra ayuda para lograr una comunidad en nuestra lengua de nuestro querido Geeko. Nos tenéis disponibles en:

https://forums.opensuse.org/forumdisplay.php/957-Espa%C3%B1ol-(Spanish)

Dentro del foro propio en español. No dudéis en crearos una nueva cuenta. Este nuevo lugar quiere volver a reunir a la comunidad de openSUSE en español y seguir brindando apoyo mutuo y volver a compartir en torno a openSUSE.

Esperamos que el sitio poco a poco vaya creciendo y mejorando con vuestra ayuda. Sentiros libres para escribir en el nuevo foro, contar lo que te ocurre con el Geeko y sobre todo:

Diviértete un montón!

#English

Hello Geekos.

Former moderators DiabloRojo, Karlggest and Victorhck of ForoSuSE, openSUSE’s Spanish forum, which is currently unavailable, are pleased to announce to you in Latin:

Habemus Forum!

Forosuse has been the meeting place for the Spanish-speaking community of openSUSE users for many years. The administrator Riven was in charge of maintaining that place where we can learn, share and be a meeting point for those of us who one of our passions is openSUSE.

We believe that his work is to be appreciated, with the time and resources invested altruistically in maintaining forosuse.org for so long. But things change, new interests arise in life, new projects take up our time and it is normal that this is the case.

Due to technical issues, our beloved forosuse has suffered setbacks, due to updates to the forum’s own software and other problems with hosting. After many months of unresolved issues, we former forum moderators made a decision.

We have decided to create the new forum within the official infrastructure of the openSUSE project instead of creating a new domain, in this way we centralize ourselves to offer our help to Geeko users and leave the maintenance of the forum out of our hands, which will be work of people wiser than us.

It is also worth highlighting and thanking here the role played by the forum administrators, who have always been eager to help us and have given us the tools and have carried out the work related to the sys admin by launching the forum and with the interface available in Spanish.

We are excited about the new forum and we look forward to your help to build a community in our language for our beloved geeko. You have us available at:

https://forums.opensuse.org/forumdisplay.php/957-Espa%C3%B1ol-(Spanish)

Within the own forum in Spanish. Do not hesitate to create a new account. This new place wants to reunite the openSUSE community in Spanish and continue to provide mutual support and share around openSUSE again.

We hope that the site will gradually grow and improve with your help. Feel free to write in the new forum, tell what happens to you with the Geeko and above all:

Have a lot of fun!

Confirmado para o esquenta do DevFest Brasil 2021. Esse evento será transmitido nessa quinta-feira (28/10) às 20h, no link https://lnkd.in/dkDsi3MZ. Lembrando que as inscrições do DevFest são gratuitas! Esperamos a sua inscrição através do link gdg.rocks/devfest2021

This article mainly discusses encountered issues and solutions when I installed VirtualBox Guest Additions for OpenEuler 20.03 SP1.

1. After installing openEuler 20.03 SP1, log in to openEuler (I login as root here, if you are a regular user, you may need to use sudo when executing commands below), and then click Device -> Insert Guest Additions CD image... to load the latest version of the Guest Additions CD into the system.
2. Mount the CD:

mkdir -p /run/media/openeuler/VBoxAdditions
mount /dev/sr0 /run/media/openeuler/VBoxAdditions
cd /run/media/openeuler/VBoxAdditions

3. If you choose to install directly as usual, it may prompt an error for extraction because the system lacks the tar extraction program in the case of minimal installation. So install it:

dnf update
dnf install tar

4. Run the installation:

./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run

You can see there exists an error. Let’s take a look at the details of the error:

cat /var/log/vboxadd-setup.log

It can be seen that it is a compilation error. According to Linux kernel documentation, the access_ok function has been changed from passing three parameters to passing two parameters after the Linux kernel version 5. VBoxAdditions judges whether to use three or two parameters by the Linux version number. However, the kernel version number used by openEuler 20.03 SP1 is 4, but the patches later than the Linux kernel version 5 for this have been applied. As a result, the access_ok function only needs two parameters in this case, so we only need to change the VBoxAdditions source code to let it call access_ok with two parameters.

5. Modify the source code of VBoxAdditions (note that the corresponding path is changed according to the version number of VBoxAdditions):

cd /opt/VBoxGuestAdditions-6.1.22/src/vboxguest-6.1.22/vboxguest/r0drv/linux
vi memuserkernel-r0drv-linux.c

Use i to edit, and change the following two places RTLNX_VER_MIN(5,0,0) to RTLNX_VER_MIN(4,0,0):

Then press the ESC key, :wq save and exit.

There is also a same issue in another file, so continue to execute the command:

cd ../../../vboxsf
vi regops.c

Then press the ESC key, :wq save and exit.

6. Finally continue the installation:

/sbin/rcvboxadd setup

Installation is complete!

Finally, the VirtualBox Guest Addition can be used after restarting the system!

Background

Ubuntu 21.10 can load on my computer through secure boot, and the shim version is 15.4. Then refer to the official tutorial, I installed rEFInd v0.13.2 (the latest version when I posted this blog) via PPA in Ubuntu 21.10. However, when I restart the system and load rEFInd, it always fails with the message Verification failed:(0x1A)Security Violation. I’m sure that both refind_local.cer and refind.cer under the EFI/refind/keys/ have been enrolled through MokManager (Although only refind_local.cer is needed through PPA installation).

Cause

From this post, I got that rEFInd currently (v0.13.2) lacks the .sbat section. For shim 15.3 and later versions, SBAT is mandatory, resulting in failure to start rEFInd.

The post also indicates that the author of rEFInd is currently studying how to solve the related problems. I hope the later versions can fix this issue.

Solution

To conclude, you need to use shim 15 to solve this problem. For this purpose, you can perform the following steps (applicable to amd64. Steps are also similar if you are on other architectures):

1. Obtain MokManager and the shim efi file signed by Microsoft from Ubuntu launchpad. To achieve this, download shim_15+1552672080.a4a1fbe-0ubuntu2_amd64.deb and shim-signed_1.45+15+1552672080-064ubuntub_bed64.deb.
2. Unpack the downloaded shim_15+1552672080.a4a1fbe-0ubuntu2_amd64.deb and take out the mmx64.efi file. (data.tar.xz-> . -> usr/lib/shim/mmx64.efi)
3. Unpack the download shim-signed_1.45+15+1552672080.a4a1fbe-0ubuntu2_amd64.deb, take out the shimx64.efi.dualsigned file. (data.tar.xz-> . -> usr/lib/shim/shimx64.efi.dualsigned) Rename it to shimx64.efi.
4. Go to download refind-bin-0.13.2.zip. Then create a new folder, and put the two files taken out together with the downloaded zip file into the new folder.
5. Open terminal in the fore-mentioned folder, then execute the following commands:

unzip refind-bin-0.13.2.zip
cd refind-bin-0.13.2
sudo ./refind-install --shim ../shimx64.efi

If you encounter any confirmation during the installation process, just enter y to confirm.

6. After restarting, if it prompts Verification failed, refer to step 9 of the official tutorial. Select Enroll key from disk, and then select the ESP disk where you installed rEFInd. Finally, choose the file of path EFI/refind/keys/refind.cer to import.
7. If you use a non-Ubuntu Linux system on your computer, you can continue to import the cer files corresponding to your distributions in EFI/refind/keys as above. Failure to do so may cause your Linux distribution to be unable to boot via rEFInd.

Here is an example to solve similar questions from the issue #43561

When I was trying to load the sequential model here using tf.keras.models.load_model in TF 2.3.1, an error is thrown at the following location:

~/.local/lib/python3.7/site-packages/tensorflow/python/keras/engine/functional.py in _should_skip_first_node(layer)
   1031   return (isinstance(layer, Functional) and
   1032           # Filter out Sequential models without an input shape.
-> 1033           isinstance(layer._layers[0], input_layer_module.InputLayer))
   1034 
   1035 
IndexError: list index out of range

The model is believed to be trained using keras and under TF1.9, and the model definition can be found here, and here’s the code for training.

Then I downgraded to TF 2.2 and 2.1 with the same code above, it threw the error just as #35934 Keras Model Errors on Loading – ‘list’ object has no attribute ‘items’

Then I downgraded to TF 2.0, the code was executing indefinitely. Finally I had to manually stop it:

/opt/conda/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/pywrap_tensorflow_internal.py in IsMapping(o)
   2569 
   2570     """
-> 2571     return _pywrap_tensorflow_internal.IsMapping(o)
   2572 
   2573 def IsMappingView(o):
KeyboardInterrupt: 

Then I have tried to use keras instead of tf.keras with TF 2.3.1 and Keras 2.3.1, first I encountered an error that can be solved in this way: https://github.com/tensorflow/tensorflow/issues/38589#issuecomment-665930503 . Then another error occurs:

~/.local/lib/python3.7/site-packages/tensorflow/python/keras/backend.py in function(inputs, outputs, updates, name, **kwargs)
   3931     if updates:
   3932       raise ValueError('`updates` argument is not supported during '
-> 3933                        'eager execution. You passed: %s' % (updates,))
   3934     from tensorflow.python.keras import models  # pylint: disable=g-import-not-at-top
   3935     from tensorflow.python.keras.utils import tf_utils  # pylint: disable=g-import-not-at-top

ValueError: `updates` argument is not supported during eager execution. You passed: [<tf.Variable 'UnreadVariable' shape=() dtype=int64, numpy=0>, <tf.Variable 'UnreadVariable' shape=(3, 3, 3, 32) dtype=float32, numpy=
array([[[[0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0.,
          0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0., 0.,
          0., 0.],
......

So this way fails.

Solutions

One way is to use TF 1.15.4 and Keras 2.3.1, and finally it worked out fine, inputs, outputs, summary etc. are all parsed correctly, as well as being able to run data through the model.

Another is to modify the TF 2.3.1 source code so that the model can be used in latest version using tensorflow keras. You have to redefining _should_skip_first_node in file tensorflow/python/keras/engine/functional.py:

def _should_skip_first_node(layer):
  """Returns True if the first layer node should not be saved or loaded."""
  # Networks that are constructed with an Input layer/shape start with a
  # pre-existing node linking their input to output. This node is excluded from
  # the network config.
  if layer._layers:
    return (isinstance(layer, Functional) and
          # Filter out Sequential models without an input shape.
          isinstance(layer._layers[0], input_layer_module.InputLayer))
  else:
    return isinstance(layer, Functional)

Afterwards

I have submitted a PR #43570 to tensorflow, and it get fixed in Tensorflow 2.5.0.

I love conferences. Now, that most conferences are either virtual or hybrid (both virtual and on-premises), people often say that it must be heaven for me. I can visit many more conferences and give many more talks. Well, it is not just this simple. Virtual conferences are a love-hate relationship for me. Of course, there are some advantages, but also disadvantages.

Giving virtual talks

Yes, I could give more talks. Even overlapping conferences are not a problem any more: I can give a talk at a European conference in the morning, and give another talk at a US conference in the evening. Most of the time I give talks about sudo and syslog-ng, and there are relevant conferences almost every other day.

Does it make sense to give a talk this often? No. Repeating the same talk all over again is boring both for me and for the audience, especially that talks are often recorded and published. Both sudo and syslog-ng are complex but small utilities, covering only a limited number of use cases. Creating a brand new talk for each event would be a lot of effort and not even possible due to the limited number of topics.

Also, from the speaker point of view, giving a talk virtually is not the same, as being there in person. I love teaching and spreading knowledge. However giving the actual talk, transferring knowledge, is just a third of the value. The hallway track, talking to (potential) users and collecting feedback is at least as important from a product management point of view. And learning the latest technology trends first hand from fellow speakers at dinners and other events is also a huge bonus. None of these are possible at virtual events, or so far not that effective.

See my opensource.com article about being an open source evangelist for a few ideas how to make virtual events better for speakers: https://opensource.com/article/21/1/open-source-evangelist

Giving virtual talks does not work really well for me. I am used to being able to see my audience and not just to a screen with a mic and sometimes a camera. All I need is occasional eye contact and being able to check how my audience reacts. Ten or a thousand people is no different. After giving a few talks where the technical content was fantastic according to feedback, but the presentation boring and monotonous, I found a workaround. My talks are given or pre-recorded in the office in a meeting room with one or two colleagues listening. From the talk quality point of view, this setting is almost as good as a real conference audience.

Of course, there are also cases where being virtual is the only way I can present at a conference. When I give a talk on sudo or syslog-ng, I travel on company budget. However I am happy talk about other topics as well. Last year I could give a talk at the OpenPOWER North America Summit about POWER and open source this way. I am a POWER enthusiast, but it is not part of my job. Traveling there on my own would have been a bit too expensive for me, but being virtual allowed me to participate and give a talk.

Participating at events

There is an open source and / or an IT security focused conference almost every day. I am happy to participate in Arm and POWER related events too. However participating each and every relevant event simply does not make sense. While I try not to repeat the exact same talk over and over again, many speakers do. And of course participation takes a lot of time too.

I often hear that I should just watch the recordings. That way I can watch them at my own convenience, when it does not clash with meetings or hiking plans. It does not work. One of the values of attending virtual conferences live is that you can ask questions. When you watch a recording, you cannot ask questions. And the Q&A part of sessions is often not part of the recordings. With overwhelming amount of recordings available and in my “to watch” list, my experience is that I either consider a talk important enough to watch live or it will be long irrelevant by the time I get to the recording.

Virtual conferences are great when I do not have the time or resources to be at the event in person. This is how I can participate OpenPOWER events, or All Things Open this year with the travel restrictions still in place. However in-person events are better in many ways. Physical presence helps in focusing, your whole mind is there. Not to mention conference t-shirts and stickers :-) You can talk to like minded people. Chat cannot fully replace that.

In-person conferences are a fantastic place to finally meet people you have worked with over the Internet for many years. I met various FreeBSD developers, ARM guys, syslog-ng users while at FOSDEM, All Things Open or SCALE. Talking to someone in person, even just for a few minutes, make these work collaborations even closer. Talking to engineers at the exhibition booths is also different. They are a lot more open and happy to talk about topics not available in official communication, like how syslog-ng is integrated in their product, what they consider our main strengths and weaknesses. At one conference an AMD engineer explained me how they are still working on ARM CPUs, even if nothing is seen from the outside. None of these are available in a chat window.

What’s next?

I know that it is more difficult from the organizers point of view, but I hope that most events will go hybrid. As a speaker I definitely want to present in person, whenever possible. It is a lot more value from the speaker’s point of view. But hybrid gives the possibility to talk or participate even if I cannot be there for financial or scheduling reasons. So, as much as I hate the word “hybrid” thanks to cloud-related marketing materials, I’d love to see hybrid conferences in the long term! :)