Firstname Lastname dilemma

I've been quite annoyed with the naming system Malaysian Malay use..

In our culture, normally, people doesnt use "FirstName LastName" system, but "GivenName FatherName" instead. Ok, for local use, its not much a problem as people here understand the system. But when it come to dealing with international softwares/people, it got tricky, and sometimes, frustating.

For quite a number of people, "GivenName FatherName" system doesn't hurt them much because their parent only give them 1 word name, and the father only have 1 word name. So they just assume GivenName as FirstName and FatherName as LastName. But, the system also allows the use of very long names that make it hard to differentiate which is which, and I am one of those with such names.

"Mohd Izhar Firdaus Ismail" - heh, try finding which name to call me from that name (I'm assuming you are not Malaysian) - I'm pretty sure most will just call me "Mohd".

I personally adopt "Izhar Firdaus" when dealing with international stuff. However, sometimes, on certain automated system, I got really annoyed and confused. (eg: gramps)

Linpus Linux == Fedora, but poorly done

http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/columns/acers_linpus_linux_lite_ultra_portable_laptop

The hardware is based on the Intel Atom Processor which will be used in the Asus EeePC 1000. If you navigate to /etc/system-release you will discover that Linpus is based on a fork of Fedora 8 (Werewolf). That’s better. Much better. Fedora has managed to avoid shabby deals with Microsoft and playing fast and loose with Kernel source code and the GPL. At last, a version of GNU/Linux on an ultra portable you can use with a clear conscience. Being a stripped-down version of Fedora it lacks both make and gcc (and probably ncurses too, though the binaries may be included in the distro but just excluded from the default installation). That will not bother novices or newbies much but it will hack off advanced users—no pun intended. On the plus side though, Linpus comes bundled with MP3, WMV and Flash support and plugins. Package management is courtesy of Synaptic but as Linpus is really Fedora, packages are RPM and presumably Yum could be used on the command line.

Despite all the caveats, Acer has joined Asus, Dell and others in something which may have a profound effect on the future of free software; and, above all, at last a pre-installed version of GNU/Linux that will sit well with a free software conscience. No source code ambiguities or GPL violations or any funny business playing fast and loose with the principles of free software. Just a hacked version of Fedora.

I have known Acer been shipping Linpus Linux for quite some time (Acer been shipping machines with Linpus in Malaysia since 2006 IIRC), but I didn't know Linpus is based on Fedora. I've tried using Linpus before, but its quality is nowhere near its parent. Also, while the Acer machine (the one I tried) ships with Linux, getting the machine to actually runs Linux is a pain. Nvidia gfx card, Nvidia chipset and Atheros/Broadcom Wireless, proves fatal when want to keep up with latest and greatest of the FOSS world.

Acer should test their machine hardwares with Linux without proprietary drivers before actually shipping it with Linux. Shipping Linux with the machine while the machine itself is resisting the OS is not a good approach. They should be tested to work well together - this is one place Acer (and other Linux laptop/desktop vendors) should learn from Apple Mac.

I am not sure how stuff goes nowadays after the Acer announcement that they will supporting Linux officially (as the bad experience I had was quite some time ago), I hope the bad experience I had with Linpus have changed.

P/S: /me patiently waits for a company that can be Apple of the Linux world. The ThinkPad series are near, but still missing at some points.

UTP Network Representation

MPPUTP posted a post at their news blog about the DirectConnect file transfer is the one that affecting the Internet connection of UTP. And they showed this diagram



Dear MPP, obviously you are taking this image blindly without checking at how the UTP network functions. Its either you are being tricked about the design, or the real UTP network design is really that severely flawed.

Here, let me show you the map of the UTP network, from the the IP number point of view. I draw this map based on my experience analyzing the network structure of UTP to get around certain things to link up the UTPchat servers. How villages are separated, how stuff are being laid out. However, note that this map is mainly based on IP data and base routing only. I couldn't map VLANs and others lower level networking architecture because of the limitation of the access I have.

Let begin with the overall layout, [Image 1]




Opps ... like a web? .. oh yes it is... however, weblike doesnt mean bad. More redundant link will help reduce bottlenecks the core. The Internet have a lot of redundant links, just in case one link is down or overload, the other will take over. UTP have some redundant links, but theres something looks fishy with it. I'll explain later in this post.

Next up .. the per-village network~. I'll only show 1 village here, with 3 blocks (getting everything to be put here, is too much). [Image 2]



Now now now, this is where you file transfers are causing the perception of slow Internet connection. As you can see there, for block A traffic to get to block B, it will need to go through Block A's router then Block B's router. What makes it slow is .. 1 block, theres at least 250 IP available for use, imagine 250 computers, trying to transfer files across different blocks through one gateway. Theres only one phrase to describe that, HEAVY BOTTLENECK!. Transfer for people on the same block will need to go through the switch of the block. When too many traffic going through one gateway, the gateway became overloaded, collisions start happening, etc.

DirectConnect servers mostly handles clients on the same-village, any transfer between block of the same , by rights, won't be affecting the upstream internet connection. Unless ... somebody set the routing rules sooooo crazy, that it forces everything to meet at one point before passing it to the other blocks. The diagram you MPP show us, if that really is the real UTP network, than something really need to be done. When you make everything meet at one point, obviously, that one point become the single point of failure. Network routers and switches have maximum capacity, you cant simply direct all those 4000 100mbps LAN traffic through the central network. If you do, obviously ,when those 4000 users start transfering, for example, 1mbps (128KBps) traffic between them (not through the Internet), you'll end up with your central network had to handle all those 4000mbps traffic. The trick is to make each network able to send same-village traffic with the shortest route possible, and provide multiple routes so that when one route is overloaded, it will fallback to another.

Btw, DirectConnect, fyi , is not a virtual network. Its just a server which provide one point where users can share the file listing of what being shared on their system. Whenever a transfer occurs, it doesnt go through the DirectConnect server anymore. Its purely between the users and the other users. Imagine the server as a MatchMaker, and 2 clients as a Guy and a Gal. The MatchMaker only become the middle person to match the Guy and Gal with each other. Once the Guy and Gal met, the MatchMaker task ended there, whatever happened afterward, is between those two, the MatchMaker have no business neither control about it. The DirectConnect hubs in no way connected to each other over villages. They are just yet another computer on UTP network, all limitation of the UTP network applies to them too. So, that blue bubble in your diagram, is 100% inaccurate.

Okay thats all for now. If I want to explain more indepth of the network design from my analysis, it going to take a very long paper here. Plus, my data is not 100% accurate as I can only view from the IP level of the communication across UTP computers, I will need more access to the network devices and some worthy motivation if you want me to do a proper analysis of the design. I'm not quite supportive to those DirectConnect hubs and filesharing of illegal softwares. The only set of thing I see as okay to be shared are those TV Series, Anime, Free and Open Source Softwares, documents. TV Series and Anime are grey in the legal area because they available freely on the TV in the first place. But Movies, pirated softwares, porns, MP3/music, are generally very clear they stay in the Illegal area, and I am quite against them. However, your blaming that DirectConnect affect the UTP Internet connection is very inaccurate and I can't make myself not to rant. As you can see, DirectConnect handles same-village clients, if there really are overload of traffic, it is happening within the network itself, but not at the gateway to Internet. Of course, I noticed that V1, V2,V4 suddenly connected together while its not supposed to be, but still, it misses the point, if the design is correct, traffic should not go through the servers/gateway to the Internet. Unless, like I said again, some stupid person have set the routers to go through one single point and caused everything to get clogged when heavy traffic.

If UTP network is really designed centralized like the diagram you show us, my suggestion, its time for ITMS to learn how to layout everything in a decentralized way or hire someone to design it out. Centralized network design for a lot of traffic is soo not cool, it can't handle all this 4000 students traffic elegantly, breaks easily, and causes bottleneck at the center.

Genius: A gift?, or a curse?

The news spreading around the net about Sufiah, a child prodigy 10 years ago who was accepted to Oxford at the age of 12, is now living in a pitiful life as a hooker.

This is not the first time cases like this happens to Malaysian-born genius, previously, (I forgot his name), the boy who managed to fluently read when was 3 years old, is now, a drug addict. There are also some other similar happenings to people around me which I happened to see throughout my school life transfering from state to state with my family.

What possibly have been the cause of this?. Why does these born-geniuses suddenly end up in a pathetic situation?. My opinion, its because of the people surrounding these geniuses and also the media.

These gifted childs, are often the pride of their family and the people around them. Some family, or people around, being very proud of these childs, wanted to show the world about the child. And there came the media, news, gossips, and in a short time, these childs became well known to the world. However, this action, IMO, is a very bad action. The media coverage, the news, and the popularity these children gain from the media, started to create pressure against these childrens to perform well in their academics. Young childrens, they are not emotionally strong when facing this type of pressure , they are very vulnerable to it. By giving media attention to these gifted childs, it created an environment where the children started to be bounded to their gifts. Honor of family, hope of race and nation, hope of people around them, started to turn their gifts to a curse of life. Slowly everything accumulate, and these children .. cracks .. and break. Together with them, the loss of the talents they have, the loss of the potentials these children might open to the future of mankind.

The same goes to the life of normal children. Parents, teachers, family, tend to push children to their limit with very high hopes, very high expectations. Forcing childrens to go to tuition daily, forcing them to strain themselves into studying to get good results, etc. This, IMO, is very bad. The children became overworked, tired, and pressured. Strong ones will be able to cope, but the weak ones started to crack. They started revolting, creating problems to people around them, and destroying themselves. Even the strong ones, they might have some parts of them broken, because of the way they have been raised.

Children are meant to be happy, that is how they develop their minds. Don't cause them to break by putting a lot of pressure to them. These small minds and simple logic can't cope with too much pressure. For the gifted ones, please don't put them to the eyes of the world, let them grow and enjoy their childhood freely. Protect them. When they are older, when they are ready to carry the burden of popularity, that will be when its time to let the world know about them.

My parents does not pressure me on how they want me to be and let I choose the path I want to take. And I am very glad about that.

The are no such thing as "free" in this world. Everything have a payment - not necessarily in term of money. Even Free softwares have their payments - effort to learn how to use it. Gaining popularity == losing your freedom as the world will be watching at you. Having gifted, does not mean that gift won't ask for its price sooner or later.

You want something, you'll lose something. You create something, you'll destroy something. Give and take. Every action have a reaction. From great power, comes great responsibility. Everything have a price. No such thing as a perfect Utopia. Thats how nature keeps it balance. What important is to find the point optimum point.

Malaysian Election 2008

Seems like its getting near, and people from both Barisan National (BN) and Opposition parties started doing their usual crazy stuff. Both sides with their promises. Both sides with their accusations about their opponent. Which will win?. Lets wait and see. Which party I will vote?, Nobody (because I'm not yet legal to vote :P ). Furthermore, I prefer to be neutral. I value practicality more too.

I myself is not really excited with this event. Why?. Well, I just don't like the system of voting for a party and the party who decides who will become the leader. I see this method, is somewhat not really voting for a leader who will represent my voice and interest, but rather simply choosing what group of people will be the government. Voting for a group, IMHO, made me unable to choose one particular individual, who I feel, is suitable to lead Malaysia better.

In both BN and Opposition, there are good leaders, also in both of them a bunch of lamers (though I admit, IMO, theres one particular side which filled with lamers, but still, there are some good leaders in them too). Voting for a party does not guarantee me that my vote won't help those lamers. I don't want those lamers to become Malaysia leaders, because they sucks!.

When a party wins in a certain state or wins in overall Malaysia, its the people within the party are the ones who choose who will be the leader for that state or the leader of Malaysia. This system, is bad in a way that, its not people who chooses the leader. Within a party, there will always be cronism, etc. Thus, those who wins to be the party leaders, are those who have best influence within the party. I don't like this 2 layers of choosing leaders.

I want to vote for a Person NOT a party.

The Barisan National party, being having too much majority, and always-win, made them Microsoft-like with hidden corruptions. While the Opposition parties, with their impractical promises, accusations, and lame attitude. So, which party will win this time around?. One thing I'm sure, no matter who win, its not us who will get to choose the person who will become the person who will really represent us.

Oh yeah, Go Barrack Obama!!! Go Larry Lessig!!!..

To: Anonymous Coward Who Don't Understand What My Motivation of Reviving UTPchat

Seems like theres one anonymous coward (or maybe the rector himself hide this student's identity), responding at rector's note at UTP ELearning.

Dear Datuk Dr. Zainal,

I would truly support UTP Management to close down IRC and DC++ regardless what reasons given by the students.

I agree that UTP facilities are meant for academic, not for entertainment.

As far i m concern, the request of not to ban IRC shall not be entertained at all. This kind of request carries no value at all as the matter of fact, majority of the students use IRC for non academic purpose, and i admit that i m part of the majority.

I dont understand the reason behind why these students still want to fight for it as if they are paying for the facilities for entertaiment? Why dont they spend their time to struggle and get 4.0 every semester?

So what if the students get the IRC? would they still perform well and obtain 4.0 every semester? Definitely NO because entertainment are more enjoyable than study.


Let's put it in simple term... Who provide the internet facilities? Student or UTP Management? Obviously is UTP Management. So the UTP Management has the fullest authority to do anything, and there shall no be any questions about it. If the students do not like it or dissatisfied, please leave UTP and go create their own IRC in other campuses. I believe there are thousands of SPM leavers and DIploma students who are craving to enter UTP.

Lastly, i hope this issue should have a full stop because it has been carry over and over again. Nothing to be negotiate anymore. Students should understand their responsibility as a student. And that explains everything.

I am sorry for such informal feedback. Perhaps i feel very close to you due to your concern of us.

Dear Anonymous (whoever you are),

Obviously you, either have not been in UTPchat during its glory, have not known any of our graduated older seniors, have not seen what the importance of living as a community, living for others, not only for yourselves.

In any organizations, its the people who made up the organization. The leaders, or organization authority, only lead the way and make sure everything is in control, but its the people who make the organization strong. Without their students, a university will just a building with lecturers and management team.

UTP graduates, since years ago, is well known of their ability to mix with people, and good in both life and studies. But seeing the juniors, I have a feeling that, the identity will no longer be there in the future. Since, they sit in their room, study ,study, study, trying to get 4.0, to the point, a lot of them, forget one important thing - being a good citizen and a good community person who cares about others.

There are more in life than only 4.0CGPA. Your exam results, will only serve you to get your first job, just that. Your future jobs after that, its not your results that matters, its your contribution to your previous employer. But, lessons you learnt from being a good community person, you will bring it to your death. If you look around you, a lot of newer students in UTP nowadays, have lost this community value. They care more about themselves. The spirit of living in community is just not there in them. In the previous UTP era, UTPchat, and Grapevine, served as the environment where this community spirit was built upon.

About the term "entertainment" you mentioned above, for your information, I am not fighting to legalize those DirectConnect hubs. Being an OpenSource contributor made me very familiar with all these Digital Millennium Copyright Acts and related. I am not fighting so that we can share illegal stuff all around UTP, what I am fighting for is, a way for these long lived communication mediums to be revived in a way that is legal, and beneficial for students. I have no problem with disabling filesharing etc, provided that there are acceptable, logic reasons for it. We IRC Operators are ready to cooperate if requested correctly.

There are more in IRC and Forums than just "entertainment". It serves as an convenient environment for people to share ideas, share opinions, voice out problem, discuss for solutions, etc. You, obviously have not been in the industry/world of which IRC and Forums are being used for professional purposes. Professionals, does make use Forums and IRC as a way for them to communicate with other people, usually asking for support or for a simple teleconference. I know because this is how my company do things. And how a lot of others (usually OpenSource industry-related), take advantage of these technologies as a way for them to collaborate globally. I am fighting to build this type of community within UTP, this is what my primary motivation is.

Let's put it in simple term... Who provide the internet facilities? Student or UTP Management? Obviously is UTP Management. So the UTP Management has the fullest authority to do anything, and there shall no be any questions about it. If the students do not like it or dissatisfied, please leave UTP and go create their own IRC in other campuses. I believe there are thousands of SPM leavers and DIploma students who are craving to enter UTP.

UTP provide the facilities, and students who pay for it. Granted, majority of us are being under PETRONAS Convertible Loan Contract, but read that again, its a LOAN. We will need to pay that back later after we graduate. Either by money, or by working with PETRONAS (read: you are going to be a bounded-worker, not being able to have your Freedom, for 10 years). Frankly, if its not because the Convertible Loan Contract stated clearly that my location must be at UTP, I have been long gone from UTP, to some other university that worth that Loan money which I put that 10 years of my future Freedom at stake. Knowing people from other universities, and involving with them, made me noticed that, I have missed quite a number of real-life opportunities to improve my skills, simply because I am stuck at the hidden desert of Sri Iskandar. Furthermore, all these policies, while might benefit the Engineering students in some way (through, well, restricting them from being in ICT), is a discrimination against the ICT students. ICT world is unlike Engineering world where results matters more. ICT world, skills worth more than the results. Results only shows that you have learn this,this,that formally, but not the students skills. ICT talents can usually identified from what the students have done beforehand, what they can prove they worth. And these marketable skills, are not acquired through formal learning, but through experimenting and exploring around with technologies and involving with the communities which share the same interests of that technology. However, the environment in UTP, is not condusive for such activities. I know UTP have more Engineering students than ICT/BIS, but that does not mean, we, the minority, can be ignored from our opportunities.

SPM students craving for UTP?. Think about it, its because the way UTP market themselves to those students, not because they really know how is UTP . Oh yeah btw, I believe, quite a number of students who joins UTP, is not because they want to join UTP. But instead, because they get that Loan-which-masquerade-as-Scholarship, I am quite confident that quite a number of students who entered UTP, are those who applied for Oversea studies with PETRONAS but failed and get to UTP instead.

UTP popular marketing phrase is "Well-Rounded Students", students, who have balance balanced in all aspect of life - not only studies. From what I am seeing now in UTP, well, a bunch of people who have their "Study" bar high, but other bars (especially in ways of living as community), low, which does not make a Round, but some random shape instead.

Lastly, i hope this issue should have a full stop because it has been carry over and over again. Nothing to be negotiate anymore. Students should understand their responsibility as a student. And that explains everything.

And a human, should understand their responsibility toward other humans. A person in a community, should understand their responsibility toward the betterment of the community. These are some values, that a formal education will never teach their students. Students will learn this, through living and contributing to a community. IRC and Forums, are some examples of the medium to build a community.

I doubt this will be a full-stop anytime soon, but this is what I believe in - I will try my best to make UTP understand the technical/community advantage and importance of these two technologies. These technologies have benefited me in my current career, and my community - #linux of UTPchat. I believe it can benefit others too if it is implemented in a proper controlled manner.

I don't believe in stopping these technologies ever fix anything, it'll creates new problem instead - or worse, losing what they can benefit for it simply because we are ignorant and treat everything is bad. What important here, is to educate people, the proper way to use these technologies so that it won't be abused. "There are no such thing as a bad technology, technologies have no mind to think, its the users who make it good, or bad." So, instead of living in denial through blaming that technology is bad, this technology is bad, the user themselves who should be blamed because they are not being responsible for themselves and abuses the technologies to the extent it corrupts them.

Re: An Open Letter for the Rector of PETRONAS University of Technology

The long awaited reply from the rector have arrived!!. Its accessible from UTP ELearning Moodle Site.

=========================================

Thanks for the reply Rector,

--------
5th March 2008
UTP Chat - Internet Relay Chat (IRC)

Dear Students ,
Further to some comments/complaints made by a couple of you on the above, please see the following explanation :

As you are aware, we faced serious network problems way back in 2005. Based on the network study conducted, it was found that the network congestions were caused by several factors including servers hosting Internet Relay Chat. After much deliberation, discussion, information exchange with other higher institutions, checking with experts as well as feedback from the students themselves, we found that the disadvantages for outweigh the advantages.

I am aware of that. However, note that I am not against the current network infrastructure which separates the 5 villages. Didn't I said in my original letter that I am a sysadmin too?, I know the advantages/disadvantages. Plus, considering I am someone in the community and experienced things first-hand, I am confident with my knowledge. What I want to fight for here, is reviving the two communication medium which was once flourished in UTP community. Below are my arguments related to your reasons + some mythbusting which somehow, UTP students, some ITMS, and those complaining students, don't understand the real technical background.

The above action had to be taken because the following happenings were noted:
1. Downloading of non-academic related materials e.g. movies, songs, graphics, etc. These are all big size files that chew up a lot of network resources which are very expensive and limited. This had hampered genuine users who are in dire needs of this resources to accomplish their tasks/assignments or any education related matters.

2. Downloading of obscene materials. These materials are then shared over the networks. Please bear in mind that these are not only violating UTP rules and regulations but also Malaysian law. (some students are now waiting disciplinary action)

This is related to the access control at the UTP gateway level. It is not related to UTPchat, neither Grapevine. I am aware of the layer-8 problem which students abusing the upstream connection and caused problem with the connection. Connection to the Internet is not related to UTPchat operation, as we are operating within the UTP LAN itself. Even if we do use the upstream connection, the IRC protocol, is a very light text communication protocol. The link utilization is very low, even lower than people browsing the Internet.

These 2 reasons, are in no way directly related with UTPchat.

3. Playing online games over the network. We also noticed some computers are never being switched off, indicating that the computers are working all night long. This is not only a waste of valuable resources including electricity but worse still it affects students performance due to insufficient rest

Games are games, IRC is IRC. I am fighting for the survival of IRC and the Forums. I myself does not play game much. Maybe once a while. But most of the time, I spend sharpening my ICT skills, and contributing to Open Source projects, and helping people at the IRC channels. Its much more fun and worthy :P.

4. There are also cases of hacking or intruding into computers of others including staff. We treat hacking activities very seriously, hence stern action has been taken on those responsible.

This is the problem of UTP designs itself, and the lack of monitoring and lack of competent people to maintain the vulnerabilities. The staff computers, are poorly maintained. The Operating Systems are not updated with latest security fixes, etc. New vulnerabilities are discovered everyday, its ITMS's job to make sure all of those computers are being patched early before anything happens.

Frankly I say this, the new network layout, in no way secure those staff computers from real crackers. Theres several ways to reach those computers, make it remotely from room, or from other ways which include going as near as possible to the computer. Nonetheless, the new layout does stop the lame-cracker-wannabees in UTP, so, I guess theres one benefit of it.

"No such thing as a 100% secure computing environment, its just the matter of time until someone figure out the method". This is why, maintenance, and competent IT security team is a must.

Again, this point does not relate in any way with my quest to revive UTPchat and its also not my quest to change this network layout as I'm quite okay with it.

5. We also noticed that the chat room is fast becoming a forum or platform to condemn certain personalities, use of abusive words, spreading of rumours, sexual harassment etc. which had offended so many people. Furthermore, hosting IRC had attracted unnecessary traffic to certain portion of the network resulting in network congestion/bottleneck and hence complaints from users.

Again I mention this, IRC is a very light text-based communication protocol. Its traffic (at least for the UTPchat IRC) does not even utilize 1% of out network bandwidth, if theres a congestion/bottleneck somewhere, there must be someone else (which I also hate), doing something.

Rumors, condemn, is a normal thing in communication. Even without those, people will still spreading rumors etc through the traditional way -> "The Mouth". These students, are already above their legal age, by rights, what they said, is their responsibility. Us operators and moderators, can only moderate them, its not our rights to stop them from voicing their opinions. In my opinion, whatever words they use, whatever rude they are, what more important, is their opinion, make it bad oponion or make it good opinion. Condemns, is also opinions in a way, but instead of stopping them (and caused them to condemn even more), find a way to resolve it. Nonetheless, whenever there are reports of objectionable content which have a valid reason, the operators/moderators will take it down. But those students, instead of reporting to us to resolve it, they report to ITMS/UTP management who dont know a thing about it. Which results on hurting innocent people (usually the operators and moderators).

For your information sir, us UTPchat IRC Operators, does have our rules in handling these abuser, such as banning, etc. Theres a popular saying "IRC is a priviledge, its not a rights. Abuse, and be ready to face the consequences". However, this require users to report to us who are abusing the system so that actions can be taken. But, those some UTP students, being themselves who don't understand the technology, take IRC as a rights for them, and instead of reporting to us for us to take action, they reported those to ITMS and even UTP management, which technically, not controlling the IRC infrastructure. And ITMS and UTP management, not doing what to do, start taking weird,annoying,irrational actions which caused problems to innocent people.

Nonetheless, even us IRC operators and Forum moderators, who technically maintain the system, have our limitation of enforcing our rules. Sometimes we need cooperation from higher authority (such as ITMS), to track down and eliminate the abuser, but we don't have that power/technical access to the facilities to track down of those - which results to -> us being blamed.

(I think this is the only point from you that valid and related to my open letter)

6. Some students employed tunneling tools to monopolise the bandwidth utilization.

HAHA!. Okay, I'm guessing this is what ITMS or those people who don't understand the real technology and complains based on rumours told you right?. HAHA! . (pardon me, I cant help it, as I am expecting this answer from you, and I really want to bust this myth)

Sir, these "tunneling to steal bandwidth" thing, is a myth. Tunneling, in computer networking term, means putting one type of traffic from a certain protocol, into another protocol for transmission. The common use of tunneling in UTP is for certain students, to access certain network protocol ports outside of UTP, such as IMAP (port 143 or 993 - for downloading email for offline viewing), SMTP (port 25 or 465 - for sending email ), SSH (port 22 - for controlling a remote computer at home/work - like me), to access external IRC network (port 6667-6669 - I need this a lot for me to communicate with other Open Source people), and others. UTP network is too restrictive which only allow port 80 and 443 (http and https), so, people who need those other protocols, had to tunnel out through some service provider. The Internet is not only what people see in the web browser, its more than that.

Granted, that through tunneling, users can also try to download from torrent or other services, nonetheless, traffic shaping (limiting speed) can always be done. A good traffic shaping rule and a dedicated and competent admininistrator who are dedicated to hunt down those abusers and take action on them, will be able to keep those at par (instead of this lazy only-port80-and-port443 rule).

We have spent so much time and effort to correct the situation resulting in the following outcome :

1. A stable and efficient production network.
2. Complaint pertaining to internet access has significantly reduced to only 3% which is only due to some site/configuration/equipment limitations.
3. Network congestion has been reduced tremendously and the network efficiently had reached more than 75%.
4. Minimized or reduced the chances of virus attack to the whole network. In term of operation, it will be more efficient and easy to isolate the network should outbreaks or attacks occur.
5. Rectification time pertaining to internet access problem or any network related problem is very much reduced. This resulted in more efficient services to all users.
6. Good feedbacks received from users pertaining to internet and network services.

This , (again) in no way related to my quest to revive UTPchat. This is more related to the network separation, and better access control at the gateways. Again, I am not fighting the network separation, and I am not fighting those NetworkBox gateways.

I believe the Internet Relay Chat is not the only way for voicing opinions , views, etc .There are more meaningful activities such as debates, elocution, and other co curriculum activities that provide opportunities to voice your opinion, develop your soft skills, etc.and engaging in intellectual discourse. There are also other activities that can nurture your creativity such as IDS, EDX etc.

Yes those are some of the options. But if you look again, they are mostly academical. Debates and elocutions, does those actually voicing a real concern which happening around and asking for a change?? - rather than debating/speaking, simply for certificates and winning competitions??. The equality is not there, only debaters can voice their opinion, but how about those people , those audience who does not have time/chance to join such thing? are they should be ignored ? are they does not have the rights to voice out?. Some people, take time to think and arrange their points, they can't quickly speakup and debate in real-time manner (I know I am. Blog, letters, and text-communication which allow some time for reply is my way to voice out). Does these people opinions, who will surely lost in a debate event because of they need time, be ignored ?. Some people also, have nervous problem which cause them unable to go to bigger public, does their opinion can be ignored too?. My answer, is a big NO.

These Internet technologies such as IRC and Forums, provide a different medium for these people to voice out, on their free time, without any limitation (that they need to join debate/elocution etc). Anyone, make it people with good grades, people with bad grades, people who does not these chances to voice out in real public, are able to voice out. The virtual environment encourage people to read the opinions itself, rather than questioning who are giving the opinions. Anyone can voice out, anyone can be listened, anyone can reply, regardless who you are.

About events like IDS/EDX/etc, those develops only skills that relates to that events (event management, communication between committee, etc). Again, they serve more academical purposes. What about people who want to develop skills different that those?. They need their own medium, they need their own community. IRC and Forums, can give them a place and communication medium for knowing/finding people who have the same interests build their own community. One notable example, is #linux of UTPchat. That IRC channel, consist of people who share enthusiasm related to the Linux operating system and Open Source world (that includes me). We use the medium for us to gather more people who share the same enthusiasm, help each other, and develop skills related to our interest. We are quite hidden from management right now, as we prefer to do our events unofficially due to bureaucracy takes too much time for us to handle. You can try asking our CIS Dept Head of Dept, Dr. Kamil. He knows about us under the name UTP Open Source Software Association, and he's been quite supportive for us.

All in all, UTP has spent a lot to develop and maintain all these facilities yearly. It is only wise that you use it for meaningful purposes whilst at the same time develop good moral values in you as individuals.
I hope you understand our rationale on the above . We only want the best for you .

For the network design implemented on 2005, I understand and accept the rationale, because I've been spent 1 whole semester during my foundation years trying to understand the network. :). But I am still not getting an acceptable rationale that UTPchat and the forums are bad.

========


Considering my original open letter was misinterpreted. Let me make it clear what I am fighting for here, in point form.

• UTPchat and Grapevine existed in UTP as a community environment since years ago. Also a symbol of Free speech in UTP.


• UTP network redesign on 2005, caused UTPchat and Grapevine to be unstable.


• On the same period too, theres a case which was a stupid-irresponsible UTP student, caused UTPchat and Grapevine being attacked because of false accusation through blocking our physical ports and caused the servers had to be moved around UTP. Directly caused Grapevine to die, and UTPchat to lose momentum.


• After 3 years, those who have been in UTP since the era of UTPchat and Grapevine (including me), noticed the change in UTP community life. Students, especially younger generations, live in their own microcommunity, not knowing others besides people in their class, people who they worked together in events. We, the earlier generation, noticed that UTP students, is slowly losing the quality which our seniors had in themselves. The environment in UTP, no longer have the aura it have several years ago. Learning from our experience, we conclude that, the loss of UTPchat and Grapevine, is one of the major reason this problem to happen.


• Me, as one of the people who are in charge of UTPchat - and the person who have been working hard to maintain the intrastructure, decided that, I must do something, before I end my studies in UTP. UTPchat must be revived, if possible, as an entity which is approved by UTP, and managed in a proper way by a community. I don't want, after I left UTP, these communities and infrastructure will die together with the loss of me. Maintaining this IRC network is hard, and I can't find any new talents who I see as capable to succeed me - mainly because, the many new students, are hidden in their room/class, trying to score 4.0 CGPA.


• What I'm requesting here are:




• cooperation from UTP, for UTPchat, to be revived as an approved entity. I am willing to help with the technical matters, and resolve any issues which UTP might had with us during the previous era.


• I want the large community UTP students, to be revived back, maybe not exactly like the previous era, but having a large community who knows each other, have benefits on its own. New students must know what they have been missing. Having knowing a lot of people (especially seniors) helps them too in the future. Theres a saying, "90% of the job market, is from the hidden world of social network". Having good grades, while it helps to make students pass the filters, could not beat the power of knowing people who work in the company.


• An official cooperation from ITMS, for us to properly control and stop abusers. Also, some additional resource - namely, a subnet, which can be accessed from any villages easily, for us to put UTPchat server. This will reduce the complexity of UTPchat (from 5 servers , to only 1) and hopefully, I am able to find someone to succeed me. This server also, will be also be used to provide a facility, for growth of usage of Open Source technology in UTP.

I hope you will consider this request. Thank you.

====
Update - some additional message to Rector

Forgot to mention this, with my quest of reviving UTPchat as a proper medium of communication in UTP, I am putting together a document/plan for utilizing IRC protocol and Forums in a way that will be beneficial for students and also certain others like lecturers.

http://devel.foss.org.my/~kagesenshi/pub/colUTPit/

It is not yet complete as I still need time to gather ideas and information from several sources and put everything together. Currently I am on my internship and most of my time are focused for my current job. Nonetheless , there are still something there for you to refer to ..

Thank you

Why I wrote the open letter to rector

My Open Letter to UTP Rector generated a lot of response from UTP, especially from the students.

Some people asked me why I am doing this and why does it matters. So, here is my answer.

I am quite a believer of Free Culture (read the manifesto: http://freeculture.org/manifesto/). I believe that technology must not be held back. I believe that through good utilization of technology, we can improve ourselves to a better community. I believe that information should be freely available for those who want it. I believe in an open medium for people to express their thoughts and without the fear of being attacked because of their opinion. While I am not a supporter of censorship, I neither protest it. I know certain things should be censored, but the rest, it should not be limited.

Current situation in UTP, showing that the lost of the culture that I saw we once had during my early years in UTP. The lost of people who do things because of they believe its right. The lost of people who express and debate what they believe on in public. The lost of people with Free Thinkers (No, I dont mean atheist). UTPchat and Grapevine was once the place where these people were born, and with the death of GV and the dying breath of UTPchat, these people slowly reducing in number. Whats left are people who are afraid to stand up, people who are being too comfort with UTP environment, people who does not bother to fight for that they believe on. Whatever the management says is good, they take it as good, whatever the management says is bad, they take it as bad. Are these the future leaders of Malaysia? If yes, I doubt we will get anywhere past other countries in the future. We will remain followers, following what others do, and start shouting the nonsense of "Malaysia Boleh".

I just watched a video by Larry Lessig (the person behind Creative Commons) about "Change" (watch it here : http://lessig08.org/). While the video is about "Change Congress", I believe a lot of the points he presented in the video are also valid for us. Change come from bottom, to up. For us to change what UTP management think about technology, the students must change what they think about themselves and the technologies we use. So, I am asking you, are you satisfied with what UTP have done through limiting our access to technology?. Think about it. While other people who have a similar intellect like all of you, outside, are exposed to more real opportunities and real involvement of community, do you want to remain in the limited world of UTP network where even legal protocols, legal sites, are being blocked from access?. Is that how you want to live?.

ICT and BIS students, take note, this issue affects you more than the others. The current ICT market is not like what you might expect. People who have skills which they can prove through showing that they able to do it, are more desirable than students who have 4.0 CGPA, but what they know are just what they learn from books and classes. ICT market is tougher because of that reason. The abundance of unemployed ICT graduates are not because there are no jobs for them. But it is because they are not fit enough for the jobs. I have heard from several of my contacts that companies are having a tough time to hire because graduates does not have the skills needed for the job. Being in an environment where technology access is limited to you, how sure are you that you will have the required skills for your future career?. Think about it.

This ends my rant for today. Comments are welcomed

Update: Another video worth watching : How creativity is being strangled by the law

An Open Letter for the Rector of PETRONAS University of Technology

DISCLAIMER:
THIS OPEN LETTER IS MY OWN OPINION, FROM MY OWN POINT OF VIEW OF LOOKING AT THE CURRENT STATE OF AFFAIRS IN UTP. IT DOES NOT REPRESENT UTP STUDENTS AS A WHOLE, NEITHER IT TRIES TO REPRESENT THEM. SOME MIGHT NOT AGREE, SOME MIGHT, BUT I BELIEVE THOSE WHO LIVED DURING THE TRADITIONAL LEGACY OF UTPCHAT AND THOSE WHO ARE INVOLVED IN THE COMMUNITY ONCE SURROUNDING UTPCHAT AND GRAPEVINE WOULD AGREE TO SOME, IF NOT ALL, OF MY POINTS BELOW.

Dear Datuk Dr Zainal Abidin Haji Kasim,

I am Mohd Izhar Firdaus Ismail (ID 7857), an ICT student in UTP from batch Jan2005, and also one of the active UTPchat IRCOperators. I am writing this because I feel like UTP action of forcing UTPchat to it knees several semesters ago is giving a bad impact on community life in UTP. A bad impact which caused UTP to waste the potential of the (so-called) 'cream de la cream' which UTP have grabbed early after their SPM examination.

UTPchat IRC Network, existed originally around more than 10 years ago, is an IRC (Internet Relay Chat) network for UTP students to socialize, do activities, as a community environment, place of discussions , and many more. We existed inofficially in the UTP network, yet was known by basically all UTP students and to some extends, staffs. The IRC network flourished as a place where UTP students meet each other, have fun, explore possibilities, voice opinions, share informations, bring up talents, and much more. UTPchat, indirectly contributes to the community spirit of which previous UTP graduates have. The spirit of caring each other, spirit of protecting what they believe is right, spirit of being a part and contributing to a community.

However, a change on 2005 in UTP network infrastructure, which separated the 5 villages in UTP to 5 separate networks, and an unexpected incident which relates to a stupidity of one of UTP's own student, caused UTPchat to face problem from UTP Management due to false accusation from those who don't understand the technical details behind the infrastructure. We faced trouble of keeping our infrastructure intact from the seemingly unstoppable mental and technical attack from UTP managements, thus lead to UTPchat's decline from the student's hearts.

The downfall of UTPchat , followed by the downfall of Grapevine, a LAN based discussion board indirectly affect the UTP students, their ability to voice their opinions truly from their hearts, in term of their ability to live as a community which care each other because they care. UTP students, indirectly became a group of people who only care for themselves, and do stuff for rewards/accreditation/certificate rather than doing stuff because they love doing it. This can be reflected by the decline of informal activities by students, the reduction of events/movements/groups in UTP which values creativity-building and community building, and the worst, UTP students no longer bother to protect their rights - which can be greatly reflected from the lack of interest for MPPUTP, lack of interest to try to make a change, lack of interest to voice their opinions. I believe that these downfall of other community movements in UTP was indirectly affected from the downfall of the medium where they communicate and voice their thoughts.

UTP students now, are more like a bunch of heartless robots, who come to UTP, simply for studying, to get their degree. They joined events because they wanted certificates, because they wanted to put those in their resume. We have lost the people who do stuff because they love it, do stuff because they care about it, do stuff because of pure interest without bothering for certificates, without bothering for accreditation, etc. UTP students now, they simply do whatever they have been told, without really questioning whether the decision are really good for them or not. They have lost their ability to voice out their opinions, they have lost their ability to fight, they have lost their ability to stand up and be true to themselves. The culture of previous UTP students, is just not there.

I remember that several years ago, during my junior days, UTP was such a fun place to be. Students from different batch, different courses, different races, different nation, mix with each other and befriend each other as equals. It was easy during that time to share thoughts and information with other friends. I miss the time when student are loud in declaring their opinions, their views about things, their suggestions. I miss the time when there exist a communication medium and a bond between students and other UTP residents through the network. I miss the time when UTP was filled with people who I can say that they are respectable people. I miss the time where there are a lot of creative thinker community in UTP, people who explores and create new ideas and stuff regardless what public says about them, people who are willing to try because of pure interest rather than being forced.

What happened to UTP motto of creating so called 'Well-Rounded Students'?. Is that motto is simply a way to get students to come in and study in UTP and make them slaves (read: robots) who simply follow what their master told them to do?. Or does the definition of 'Well-Rounded' for the UTP Management means, people who spend more time on studying to get 4.0 CGPA? people who are obedient to orders? people who can be easily controlled? people who doesnt fight for their rights? people who only know what their course and events they joined taught them and can't do anything else? people who do things for rewards not because they really want to do it? Does getting 4.0 really matters if a student is only good academically but can't really apply what they have learn for the betterment of the nation? Reminds me of a poem by Robert Frost - The Road Not Taken. How willing are us to go against the flow and make a change?.

Sir, I'm asking you, "Is that what you want it to be?". If yes, so be it. There are still 2 or 3 batch of students from the old legacy in UTP, the generations who still carry the spirit of community from our seniors, and we are slowly reducing in number every semester. The new students, from my observations, are more interested in studying, excel in university's co-curriculum, rather than living as a community. Newer students mostly match my description of a bunch of robots, or, more likely, a bunch of obedient high school students, NOT university students who are adventurous to explore more in what they learn and louder to voice their opinions. The culture of previous UTP graduates are just not there in their hearts. Once these 2 or 3 batch of students graduated, I'm afraid thats the end, both for UTPchat and wholeness of UTP graduates.

Yes, I know posting this kind of thing is bad for UTP reputation and might be bad for me too. But something need to be done. Something need to change. Sitting behind the scene , complaining, ranting and watching the communities die won't get us to anywhere. A university is a place where students learn to utilize their potential, a place for students to develop their creativity beyond what being taught in class, beyond the academic perspective. There exist people with lots of talent and potential in UTP, but their potential got limited due to the restrictions put on them.

There are still a lot of points I wanted to raise to you sir, but they are more in the technical term rather than the points above which relates to 'soft' values of UTP students. So, I would keep those for later. If this letter somehow offended the some of the readers due to my sharp words, I am sorry for that.

Regards.

Fedora 9 Codename Announced???

Okay, Josh Boyer announced it @ fedora-announce-list, and the winner is Sulphur (at least from the vote results)

https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-announce-list/2008-January/msg00012.html

Somehow, I don't feel quite happy about the announce. Naming of Fedora releases have been running in quite a fun manner since its started going public not so long ago. The name game starts only when the next release of Fedora almost done, suggestions come, voting was made (in approval voting - NOT the Pick-Only-One voting like the recent F9 name vote). The vote results remain secret and contributors wait anxiously for what name the winner going to be until a few days before release. And once it got official, the name got out not through announcements, but from people who saw fedora-release was changed in cvs commits!!.

The name game and waiting for the name confirmation was somehow like a fun reward for the hard work of all people who spent their time and effort on the release. The names are not treated as a development Codenames, but as the Release names which contributors are proud of.

Did the long lived fun tradition changed simply because somebody wanted to get names early for doing release-name related artworks?. Or was it due some other considerations?. I wonder how many other contributors feels the same.

A month with FreeBSD, Zope and Plone

For the past month, I have been working as an intern at Inigo Tech. The company focuses on Zope and Plone deployment and customization and I'm the sysadmin of the company server.

FreeBSD

The company server uses FreeBSD as the OS with several BSD Jails on top of it. BSD Jails is one of the virtualization technology on the OS level. Unlike Xen, Qemu and VirtualBox, Jails is a very lightweight virtualization where the Guest environment does not run any kernel on it. While Xen, Qemu and VirtualBox allows different OSes running as Guest, Jails can only support another BSD installations.

I found that Jails is very useful for those who only needs better process and environment separation and doesn't need another full blown OS features. Interested to know what available on the Linux world for this, I went googling and found the Linux-Vserver Project and the OpenVZ Project. However, the RPM packages provided by both of them (especially the kernel) are quite not in sync with the current Fedora repositories. So, if anybody thinking of trying them out, I would recommend installing on CentOS or a Debian derivative instead as the packages does not being updated as fast as Fedora. Btw, if anybody successfully deployed a OpenVZ guest, can you post me an easy to follow guide??. As I'm quite confused with the OpenVZ documentations (the templates etc).

But so far, I think thats the only thing I liked from the BSD world. Everything else, are kindof PITA and not elegant in my point of view. Perhaps because I have been pampered by RPM way too much. Ports, while have quite a large collection of packages, is not as elegant as RPM or DEB in package management. If only for installation and removal of packages, Ports works quite well, but if I want to do extra stuff to the installed files, everything went messy. Dependency hell, I dont know how many times i've faced that in Ports. Updating and removing packages feels quite scary when it might causes another app, hidden somewhere, to have a library problem. For the filesystem hierarchy and file placements, is another messy thing as trying to separate stuff that maintained by package manager and stuff that are done by local user is not as clear as in RPM distros. But for this, I might be biased as I come from the Red Hat Linux / Fedora Linux origins and still not that experienced in BSD. Perhaps after exploring and learning more about the BSD way of doing stuff, I might change my opinion on this.

Zope and Plone

In Inigo Tech, I was introduced for the first time to Zope and Plone. I have heard about it before, and followed the debate on Fedora mailing list about why Fedora 7 could not support Zope and Plone due to Python2.5, but I had never tried using it firsthand. What I know about during that time Zope was that its something like Tomcat but in Python, with Plone as one of the most popular app running on Zope.

After this whole month of using Zope and Plone, I grown to like it and the ideas it brought together. I have been a fan of proper separation of services and environments since I learned about virtualization. So, I feel Zope is a great platform. A virtual filesystem on an ORDB? Cool!. Full separation of the web environment and the host server? Great!. Using Instances instead of a full copy of files? Yay!. Plugins architechture, of which different instances can have different set of Plugins? Superb!. All in all, I love Zope, except for maybe, the ZMI which looks kind of cluttered, but looks good or not is a matter of who looking at it :).

As for Plone, Inigo sees it as an alternative to Microsoft SharePoint. As I had never tried out SharePoint, I couldn't comment much about their differences/similarities. But one thing I know, Plone offers more features that SharePoint in term of document management and sharing, Plone is easier to use than SharePoint, Plone can work nicely with commodity softwares while SharePoint requires you to upgrade to IE7, Vista, Office 2007 etc, and best of all, Plone is Free! and SharePoint is dictated by Microsoft (>.<) . So, that makes it Plone is better than SharePoint right? So if your company want to buy SharePoint, how about you look at Plone first before deciding ;).

======

All in all, working with Inigo is fun with all these. I'm glad I took Kaeru's offer and not other internship offers with other companies. Plus, I got to telecommute. Saved some hassle of transportation, food, etc :D

Whats New , and Whats Old - A little comparison between Ubuntu 7.10 new features with the upcoming Fedora 8 and older Fedora releases

Ubuntu 7.10 'Gutsy Gibbon' was just released a few days ago, and Fedora 8 just hit devel-freeze yesterday. With all the hype going all over the internet, one point annoys me - when some Ubuntu users claiming that some of the new features in Ubuntu are something Fedora does not have. Now, lets bust this myth. (This list might not be complete)

Ubuntu 7.10 feature list was taken from : http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/releasenotes/710tour

GNOME 2.20

Both Fedora 8 and Ubuntu 7.10 uses GNOME 2.20.

Compiz Fusion

Both Fedora 8 and Ubuntu 7.10 have Compiz 0.6.0 during its release. However, in Fedora 8, compiz will not be enabled by default , as there are several issues which still need to be fixed in Fedora's point of view, one of it is the Xv video support - patches are being developed by Red Hat developers in fixing the the X server and Xv and apply it upstream. Compiz is enabled by default in Ubuntu - with a hack patch applied in mplayer to allow Xv rendered properly on Mplayer only.

In Ubuntu 7.10, Compiz-Fusion plugins are included in the installation CD and enabled by default . As for Fedora 8, the Compiz-Fusion plugins can be yum'ed from the repositories.

yum install compiz-fusion compiz-fusion-extras

CCSM is currently under review, it might not reach Fedora 8 during the release because Fedora 8 already hit its devel freeze. Anyway, it will available as an update. (Maybe I can try poking Jesse to make an exemption for this)

Desktop Search

Desktop search was enabled by default during Fedora Core 5 (yes, FIVE!), but due to complains about it eating too much resource , it was made optional on later releases. Desktop search can be yum'ed from the repos to those who want it.

yum install deskbar-applet tracker-search-tool

Fast User Switch

One of the new features of Ubuntu 7.10 is FUS. This feature was developed under Fedora Project and was integrated together during the release of Fedora 7.

See: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Desktop/FastUserSwitching

Firefox Plugin

The firefox plugin finder is from upstream, therefore, all distros using it get the feature

Ubuntu 7.10 repositories now have Firefox add-ons packaged in DEB. This feature is a creditable new feature. There was a discussion about this not so long ago in Fedora-Devel-List ( https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg01097.html ). Concerns were raised about low-quality and vulnerable add-ons might be hitting the repository if the package submission are not properly managed. Maybe we will be seeing this in Fedora after a guideline for the XPIs is available.

Dynamic Screen Configuration

XRanR have been included together in Fedora 7. Ubuntu 7.10 just included it.

Graphical Configuration for X and BulletProofX

Now now now ... this is REALLY OLD .. Fedora have a similar configurator called System-Config-Display and that tool have been around in Fedora ever since I started using it .. and that was .. Fedora Core 3 (read, THREE) and it might have existed older than that. System-Config-Display supports Xinerama (Multi Display) as long as that too.

Same goes for BulletProofX (but in a different form). When a X session was misconfigured , system-config-display will automatically reset Xorg.conf to the lowest settings of which Xorg can start. This feature have been around as long as system-config-display.

One thing nice in Ubuntu's BulletProofX is the display configurator actually display itself to allow manual adjustments. In Fedora, it'll simply reconfig automatically - and sometimes this doesnt work and causes a failure loop. I had to run system-config-display manually to fix the settings when that happens. I have asked for this 'feature' before, but Fedora believes the fallback should be done automatically without user interaction, and running system-config-display to allow manual reconfigure is considered a hack because it does not fix the actual problem. Any issues about fallback not functioning properly are supposed to be reported at bugzilla.

Printer Support

Ubuntu 7.10 includes a modified Fedora's System-Config-Printer. (thats all I could say, as I dont use printer much).

NTFS Writing using NTFS-3G

Ubuntu 7.10 includes NTFS-3G for accessing NTFS partitions. NTFS-3G have been enabled by default in Fedora since Fedora 7 LiveCDs. Fedora Core 6 added this support through update.

Power Consumption

Ubuntu 7.10 inludes kernel 2.23 which includes tickless kernel support. Fedora 8 also includes kernel 2.23. Fedora 7 might be having kernel 2.23 from updates soon.

Encrypted Harddisk

Alternate installer for Ubuntu 7.10 includes install-time encrypted hdd creation support.

I dont see this in Fedora's Anaconda installer, but a little googling for "encrypted hdd fedora" pointed me to
Fedora Core 5 release note which then pointed me to LUKS. Maybe theres an easy way to encrypt HDD post-installation in Fedora, but I dont know that for now. While I dont see theres a need for encrypted HDD support for / as those installed in / are basically stuff from RPM which everyone have access to on the net, and good admins will separate the system and the data and encrypt the data partition, maybe some people really need it.

Security Framework

Ubuntu 7.10 just included AppArmor by Novell in their release. A similar tool is available in Fedora since long ago called SELinux. SELinux was developed by NSA and has more strict control and security, but however, it was tauted hard to configure. That has changed in Fedora 7 with lots of GUI configuration tools were introduced for ease of maintaining SELinux.

The rest?

well, I have no idea what "Additional installation profiles for Ubuntu Server" , "Profile-based Authentication Configuration", and "Improved thin-client support" supposed to mean in the Tour page, so I couldn't compare them.


What Fedora 8 Will Have, Sooner Than Other Distros

The full feature list available here: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Releases/8/FeatureList

- NetworkManager 0.7.0 is under heavy development and is included in Fedora 8.
- Online-Desktop - Internet and Desktop - Working together! - Online Desktop developer interview
- IcedTea - IcedTea are the fully Free components of Sun's OpenJDK
- PulseAudio - PulseAudio is a powerful sound server system which supports advanced mixing capabilities.
- Eclipse 3.3 - Fedora Eclipse IDE.
- Animated Wallpaper - Animated wallpaper for your Desktop - Fedora Artwork interview (details in one of the paragraphs)
- Enhanced Bluetooth Improvements - Bluetooth Improvements developer interview

Fedora: Infinity | Freedom | Voice.

31st August - Malaysia Independence Day Anniversary .. and TMnut blocked my IRC access???

(Flag img taken from Ditesh's post)


Okay .. its 31st August again .. the anniversary of Malaysia independence from Great Britain .. and I'm at home for a holiday .. and guess what .. I noticed a shocking discovery .. The DARNED TMnut blocked my IRC access!!! - on port 6667 in particular

Some Xchat output

* Looking up irc.freenode.net
* Connecting to chat.freenode.net (204.11.244.21) port 6667...
* Connection failed. Error: Connection refused
* Looking up irc.dal.net
* Connecting to irc.dal.net (194.68.45.50) port 6667...
* Connection failed. Error: Connection refused
* Disconnected ().
* Looking up irc.prison.net
* Connecting to irc.prison.net (209.249.249.126) port 6667...
* Connection failed. Error: Connection refused
* Disconnected ().
* Looking up irc.rizon.net
* Connecting to us.iso.rizon.net (216.246.56.111) port 6667...
* Connection failed. Error: Connection refused
* Looking up irc.dal.net
* Connecting to irc.dal.net (194.68.45.50) port 6669...
* Connected. Now logging in...
* *** Looking up your hostname...
* *** Found your hostname, cached
* *** Checking Ident

SEE THAT??!! .. outbound port 6667 access is blocked!!

being curious if they blocked also inbound port 6667 to my tunneled UTPchat IRC server, I ssh'ed to an external box, made my irc server listening on port 6667-6669 .. and tried netcat'ing to it .. and heres the output

[kagesenshi@devel ~]$ nc tunnel.utpchat.net 6667
[kagesenshi@devel ~]$ nc tunnel.utpchat.net 6668
:tunnel.utpchat.net NOTICE AUTH :*** Looking up your hostname...
:tunnel.utpchat.net NOTICE AUTH :*** Couldn't resolve your hostname; using your IP address instead
^C
[kagesenshi@devel ~]$ nc tunnel.utpchat.net 6669
:tunnel.utpchat.net NOTICE AUTH :*** Looking up your hostname...
:tunnel.utpchat.net NOTICE AUTH :*** Couldn't resolve your hostname; using your IP address instead
^C
[kagesenshi@devel ~]$ 

Notice that connection is refused to port 6667

WTF!! .. damn .. if not because ure the only ISP which my family can afford, (and generally the ONLY ISP in Malaysia) ... I would tell my dad to switch to other ISP... grrr ....

grr ... Heck .. I want my Freedom!! ..

Its "Merdeka" (Independence) anniversary .. and here I am , with my Freedom to IRC blocked ..

Update : I just checked it again today, and it looks like my IRC access is back ... Happy .. but still pissed off ..