Tech

  • Fresh LibreOffice 4.3 bug hunting session announced

    Steve WoodsOpen Source, Open Standards, Tech

    The Document Foundation (TDF), the organisation behind the free and open source LibreOffice productivity suite, has announced the dates for the second bug hunting session for the 4.3 version release of LibreOffice. This will run from 20th to 22nd June. The LibreOffice community has already made a huge collective effort to make LibreOffice 4.3 the best ever, based on automated stress tests and structured tests by Quality Assurance volunteers.

    LibreOffice banner

    Business and private LibreOffice users can now contribute to the quality of this free office suite by testing the 4.3 release candidate (RC) to identify any issues with their preferred configuration.

    Taking part in the bug hunting session Participating is easy. Details of the bug hunting session are on TDF wiki. The list of new features for LibreOffice 4.3 needing testing for bugs and regressions, is also on the wiki.

    Prospective participants will need to have a PC running either Linux, MacOs or Windows and a copy of LibreOffice 4.3 RC1 (which can be downloaded from http://www.libreoffice.org/pre-releases). Previous LibreOffice Quality Assurance experience is not mandatory.

    Experienced volunteers who will be available via the QA mailing list (libreoffice-qa@lists.freedesktop.org) and QA IRC channel (irc://irc.freenode.net/#libreoffice-qa) to assist newcomers in filing bugs.

  • Costa Rica’s UCR to launch advanced digital signature extension for LibreOffice

    Steve WoodsOpen Source, Open Standards, Tech

    The Computing Centre of the University of Costa Rica (UCR) will be launching an advanced digital signature extension for LibreOffice on 19th June, Costa Rica’s El Pais reports.

    LibreOffice banner

    The launch, which will take place in the auditorium of the Economic Science Faculty of UCR’s main Rodrigo Facio site, aims to explain and publicise the working of the extension added to the LibreOffice office suite.

    It will enable a document to be validated with a timestamp. This is the first time that such a free extension of this kind has been implemented in Costa Rica.

    It should be pointed out that UCR’s Computing Centre is the first organisation within Costa Rica to develop an open source digital signature component. It will enable Open Document files to be signed in the advanced XADES X-4 format.

    As Juan Carlos Romero, the extension’s developer, explained “open code libraries were used to develop this extension, along with the reuse of code from Belgium, a country which has a very robust free digital signature platform; based on this code we started to develop the 100% free software component for LibreOffice”.

    Finally, according to information provided by UCR’s Information Centre, which has spent more than 40 years developing and managing technology projects for education, it is presumed that the extension will be adapted within months to be compatible with all versions of LibreOffice.

  • Dorchester Crown Court: Crapita found in breach

    Steve WoodsLanguage, Politics, Social Media, Tech

    Earlier today barrister Charles MacLean Cochand tweeted the following from Dorchester Crown Court:

    It is understood that the replacement Portuguese interpreter booked via Crapita is travelling to Dorchester from Nottingham, a round trip of over 400 miles. This interpreter is due to arrive at 2.00 pm, according to Mr Cochand.

  • LibreOffice command line magic

    Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech

    One of the delights about using Linux is the command line interface (CLI), where the user issues program commands by typing in successive lines of text.

    ODF file iconEven programs which rely on a graphical user interface (GUI) can be controlled from the command line, including the LibreOffice office suite.

    One of the great features of LibreOffice is the integral PDF converter and this can even be controlled by command line using the command below without launching the program in a GUI.

    $ libreoffice --headless --convert-to pdf name_of_file.odt

    Just replace name_of_file.odt above with the actual file name you wish to convert, hit enter and the job’s done!

  • Environment Agency to release flood of open data

    Steve WoodsOpen Data, Tech

    The Environment Agency has announced that it is releasing a whole raft of information as open data.

    Environment Agency datasets that are already available as open data include:

    • Flood Alert Areas;
    • Flood Warning Areas;
    • Flood Warnings (Live Feed);
    • Real-time and Near Real-time River Levels (Live Feed);
    • Real-time and Near Real-time Air Temperature (Live feed);
    • 3 day Flood Forecast (Live Feed);
    • Water Framework Directive (WFD) River Waterbodies;
    • Water Framework Directive (WFD) Groundwater Classification Status and Objectives; and
    • Water Framework Directive (WFD) Measures.

    EA Open Data logo

    The Agency is now increasing its commitment and will soon public as much of its data as possible, including flood data, as open data. This means that over time more EA data will be made freely available to developers, technology companies and individuals.

    To assist the release of open data, the Agency is setting up a user group to advise it on which data it is most important to concentrate on making open.

    The group will be made up of external parties with an interest in EA data, its current data customers and people with an open data background; the group will also receive input from the Agency and Defra. Anyone interested in joining this group should email OpenData@environment-agency.gov.uk.

  • Ossmeter to reduce open source evaluation costs

    Steve WoodsOpen Source, Politics, Tech

    Q: what has the EU ever done for us?

    A: helped promote free and open source software!

    EU flagSeveral universities and companies are working collaboratively in the Ossmeter research project on a platform for evaluating and comparing open source software. The European Union is funding Ossmeter’s development to the tune of €2.6 mn. (out of total project costs of €3.4 mn. Ed.) and the software that is ultimately developed will be made available online as a free service and released as free software so it can also be deployed as an in-house quality management tool.

    The aim of the project is to reduce the costs of evaluating open source software. Collecting information from associated communication channels such as newsgroups, forums and mailing lists to identify whether user questions are answered in a timely and satisfactory manner, and to estimate the number of experts and users of the software are equally as important as the researchers’ objective, as is a comparison of several open source projects with regard to usage. The platform’s capability will be tested in three use cases.

    Ossmeter is being developed by nine European research and industry organisations:

    The Open Group is the over-all coordinator and the University of York provides the technical coordination.

    For more information on Ossmeter, read Joinup’s original post.

  • New version of Scribus open source DTP package released

    Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech

    Scribus logoThe developers of the Scribus open source DTP software have probably released the last version of the 1.4.x development branch with the release of version 1.4.4. From now on they want to concentrate solely on the next major release in the form of the 1.6.x series, whose first alpha version (1.5.0) should be made available for testing later in 2014.

    The Scribus version that has just been released contains a script to allow users to align images in frames and it is now possible to use page borders as guides for the snapping of objects. The autoquote script has been rewritten and has more available options. In addition, problems with the spellchecker that resulted in crashes have been resolved. A further new feature is and option for exporting work as PDF/X-1a.

    A new colour palette has been added for geographers, whilst Scribus now comprise a further CMYK colour palette created by the Newspaper Association of America (NAA) for newspaper advertisements.

    All the changes in the new version can be seen in the release notes.

    In addition to the release of the new version, the Scribus team has also announced a new industry partnership. By collaborating with Software Consulting Services (SCS), which was involved in the invention of Quark-XTensions, commercial support will now be available for migration to Scribus. Furthermore, SCS is willing to work on future Scribus development and already offers a plug-in for the import of Layout-8000 geometry files into Scribus.

    Scribus is available for the following platforms: Linux, BSD UNIX, Solaris, OpenIndiana, GNU/Hurd, Mac OS X, OS/2 Warp 4, eComStation and Windows.

  • New Alpha of 0 A.D. released

    Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Tech

    Wildfire Games has published a new version of its free real-time strategy game 0 A.D. The game comes with an open source licence and can be played on Linux, Windows and Mac OS X. New translations have made their way into 0 A.D. Alpha 16 “Patañjali” and the game can now be played in 13 different languages. Additional languages will follow. A Japanese translation is also ready; however, it has not been incorporated into the latest release due to the size of the script files. In addition, these make heavy demands on the hardware. The Japanese translation with its script files is therefore available as a separate download.

    A new AI called Petra should demand more of players and behave more aggressively during expansion and fighting. Just like human opponents, it builds defensive towers and fortifications. Petra will handle resources better than its predecessor (called Aegis) and also conduct trade with allies.

    The interface style introduced with the multi-player lobby in version Alpha 15 is now used throughout the game. Biolinum, a font from the Libertine Open Fonts Project is used as the game’s new font. In a multi-player game all players must now conform the game settings using “Ready” before it can start. A new version of the SpiderMonkey JavaScript engine, which provides new functions, has also been incorporated in 0 A.D. Alpha 16. Information about additional new features in 0 A.D. can be found in the release notes.

    Download 0 A.D. Alpha 16 Patañjali.

  • Introducing Novena open source computer hardware

    Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Open Standards, Tech

    German IT news website Heise reports that Andrew “bunnie” Huang has successfully financed his open source Novena Computer hardware, although the crowdfunding campaign is still running until the end of this week.

    Novena is an open source hardware of software platform for hackers who appreciate a development platform that’s as open as possible. Huang originally wanted to fulfil his own wish for a laptop specifically for hackers; due to heavy demand the hardware can be ordered via the crowdfunding project until the end of the week.

    The motherboard is on its third revision although the essential performance characteristics have not changed. Freescale i.MX6 is used as the CPU; this has four Cortex-A9-cores with a frequency of 1.2 GHz. The Vivante GC2000 GPU is used for the graphics. The connections and specifications for the laptop are comparable with other netbooks and are on average as follows: up to 4 GB of RAM (1 SODIMM, DDR3-1066), SATA II interface, USB 2.0 interfaces, HDMI output and Mini-PCI Express. A dual channel LVDS LCD connector can supply a screen resolution of 2048 × 1536 pixels at 60 Hz. The exclusivity of such a “handmade” product is clearly reflected in the price. Huang has stated in the past that this is not a cheap PC system.

    The Novena platform is available in 4 variants. The motherboard on its own costs US $500. The desktop version is available for US $1,195 and the laptop variant for US $1,995. In addition, the Heirloom version is a designer variant for lovers of handmade cases. The work of designer Kurt Mottweiler costs a hefty US $5,000 and this Novena variant comes with a hand-crafted wood and aluminium housing.

    As far as the operating system is concerned, Huang is using Debian GNU/Linux.

  • Another variant on the HMRC fake email

    Steve WoodsLanguage, Oddities, Tech

    This morning I discovered the fake HMRC email below in one of my inboxes.

    I’m disappointed to note that the senders of this one are only offering me a refund of £830.99; the previous bunch of scammers were offering £1,400.

    TAX RETURN FOR THE YEAR 2014
    RECALCULATION OF YOUR TAX REFUND
    HMRC 2010-2011
    LOCAL OFFICE No. 3819
    TAX CREDIT OFFICER: Jarrett Horn
    TAX REFUND ID NUMBER: 9896077
    REFUND AMOUNT: 830.99 GBP

    Dear Applicant,

    The contents of this email and any attachments are confidential and as applicable, copyright in these is reserved to HM Revenue & Customs.

    Unless expressly authorised by us, any further dissemination or distribution of this email or its attachments is prohibited.

    If you are not the intended recipient of this email, please reply to inform us that you have received this email in error and then delete it without retaining any copy.

    I am sending this email to announce: After the last annual calculation of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund of 830.99 GBP

    You have attached the tax return form with the TAX REFUND NUMBER ID: 9896077, complete the tax return form attached to this message.

    After completing the form, please submit the form by clicking the SUBMIT button on form and allow us 5-9 business days in order to process it.

    Our head office address can be found on our web site at HM Revenue & Customs: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk

    Sincerely,

    Jarrett Horn
    HMRC Tax Credit Office
    Preston<br /.
    TAX REFUND ID: UK9896077-HMRC

    This email was delivered from a Korea Telecom server and came with an attachment -Refund-Form-ID_9896077.zip (the number in the zip file varies).

    Some of the language used – e.g. ‘fiscal activity‘ – is also a clue to its bogus nature. HMRC is supposed to use simpler English than that. Furthermore, note that the title seems to suggest the tax return concerned is for 2014, but the refund relates to 2011-2012. Not even HMRC is that slow in refunding money.

    If you’re on a Windows machine, opening that zip file is fraught with danger as the archive contains a Trojan which, when run, attempts to drop cryptolocker, ransomware and loads of other malware on your computer.

    As stated in an earlier post, HMRC never sends notifications of a tax rebate by email or asks taxpayers to disclose personal or payment information by email.

    As before, if you receive one of these emails, you are advised to forward it to phishing@hmrc.gsi.gov.uk and then delete it.

    Once again, consult HMRC’s website for comprehensive advice on phishing and bogus emails.

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