GNU Planet!

10 September 2024

Unifont 16.0.01 is now available.  This is a major release.

From the NEWS file:

  * Updates to synchronize Unifont with Unicode 16.0.0 release.

  * Many new upper-plane Chinese ideographs added.

  * New "make" build dependency on ImageMagick's "convert" program
    to build thumbnail images of the Unicode plane bitmaps.

  * unifont-combining-$(VERSION).txt is now included in the
    distribution set to provide spacing information on all
    combining characters.

  * Many other minor updates; see ChangeLog for details.

Download this release from GNU server mirrors at:

     https://ftpmirror.gnu.org/unifont/unifont-16.0.01/

or if that fails,

     https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/unifont/unifont-16.0.01/

or, as a last resort,

     ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/unifont/unifont-16.0.01/

These files are also available on the unifoundry.com website:

     https://unifoundry.com/pub/unifont/unifont-16.0.01/

Font files are in the subdirectory

     https://unifoundry.com/pub/unifont/unifont-16.0.01/font-builds/

A more detailed description of font changes is available at

      https://unifoundry.com/unifont/index.html

and of utility program changes at

      https://unifoundry.com/unifont/unifont-utilities.html

Enjoy!


Paul Hardy

Stow 2.4.1 has been released.  This release contains some minor bug-fixes -- specifically, fixing the --dotfiles option to work correctly with ignore lists, allowing options in .stowrc with spaces, and avoiding a spurious warning on Perl >= 5.40.  There were also some clean-ups and improvements, mostly internal and not visible to users.  Read details of what's new: http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/stow.git/tree/NEWS

We have released version 7.1.1 of Texinfo, the GNU documentation format. This is a minor bug-fix release.

It's available via a mirror (xz is much smaller than gz, but gz is available too just in case):

http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/texinfo/texinfo-7.1.1.tar.xz
http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/texinfo/texinfo-7.1.1.tar.gz

Please send any comments to bug-texinfo@gnu.org.

Full announcement:

https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-texinfo/2024-09/msg00041.html

libffcall version 2.5 is released.

New in this release:

• Added support for the following platforms: (Previously, a build on these platforms failed.)
  • loongarch64: Linux with lp64d ABI.
  • riscv64: Linux with musl libc.
  • hppa: Linux.
  • powerpc: FreeBSD, NetBSD.
  • powerpc64: FreeBSD.
  • powerpc64le: FreeBSD.
  • arm: Android.

• Fixed support for the following platforms: (Previously, a build on these platforms appeared to succeed but was buggy.)
  • ia64: Linux.
  • arm64: OpenBSD.

• Simplified the environmental requirements (the library no longer allocates a temporary file in /tmp) on the following platforms:
  • Linux.
  • macOS.
  • FreeBSD 13 and newer.
  • NetBSD 8 and newer.

Libtoolers!

The Libtool Team is pleased to announce the release of libtool 2.5.2, a beta release.

This beta release was not planned, but additional testing of a recent bugfix
was requested for distros to have the chance to test it with mass-rebuilds.

The details of this bugfix can be found here:
    https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=71489
The commit for this bugfix can be found here:
    https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/libtool.git/commit/?id=0e1b33332429cd578367bd0ad420c065d5caf0ac

I hope to release the stable in a couple of weeks if testing goes well!

GNU Libtool hides the complexity of using shared libraries behind a
consistent, portable interface. GNU Libtool ships with GNU libltdl, which
hides the complexity of loading dynamic runtime libraries (modules)
behind a consistent, portable interface.

There have been 9 commits by 4 people in the 35 days since 2.5.1.

See the NEWS below for a brief summary.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed!
The following people contributed changes to this release:

  Bruno Haible (1)
  Ileana Dumitrescu (6)
  Sergey Poznyakoff (1)
  Tobias Stoeckmann (1)

Ileana
 [on behalf of the libtool maintainers]
==================================================================

Here is the GNU libtool home page:
    https://gnu.org/s/libtool/

For a summary of changes and contributors, see:
  https://git.sv.gnu.org/gitweb/?p=libtool.git;a=shortlog;h=v2.5.2
or run this command from a git-cloned libtool directory:
  git shortlog v2.5.1..v2.5.2

Here are the compressed sources:
  https://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/libtool-2.5.2.tar.gz   (1.9MB)
  https://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/libtool-2.5.2.tar.xz   (1.0MB)

Here are the GPG detached signatures:
  https://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/libtool-2.5.2.tar.gz.sig
  https://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/libtool-2.5.2.tar.xz.sig

Use a mirror for higher download bandwidth:
  https://www.gnu.org/order/ftp.html

Here are the SHA1 and SHA256 checksums:

  e3384dc0099855942f76ef8a97be94edab6f56de  libtool-2.5.2.tar.gz
  KSdftFsjbW/3IKQz+c1fYeovUsw6ouX4m6V3Jr2lR5M=  libtool-2.5.2.tar.gz
  71b7333e80b76510f5dbd14db54d311d577bb716  libtool-2.5.2.tar.xz
  e2C09MNk6HhRMNNKmP8Hv6mmFywgxdtwirScaRPkgmM=  libtool-2.5.2.tar.xz

Verify the base64 SHA256 checksum with cksum -a sha256 --check
from coreutils-9.2 or OpenBSD's cksum since 2007.

Use a .sig file to verify that the corresponding file (without the
.sig suffix) is intact.  First, be sure to download both the .sig file
and the corresponding tarball.  Then, run a command like this:

  gpg --verify libtool-2.5.2.tar.gz.sig

The signature should match the fingerprint of the following key:

  pub   rsa4096 2021-09-23 [SC]
        FA26 CA78 4BE1 8892 7F22  B99F 6570 EA01 146F 7354
  uid   Ileana Dumitrescu <ileanadumi95@protonmail.com>
  uid   Ileana Dumitrescu <ileanadumitrescu95@gmail.com>

If that command fails because you don't have the required public key,
or that public key has expired, try the following commands to retrieve
or refresh it, and then rerun the 'gpg --verify' command.

  gpg --locate-external-key ileanadumi95@protonmail.com

  gpg --recv-keys 6570EA01146F7354

  wget -q -O- 'https://savannah.gnu.org/project/release-gpgkeys.php?group=libtool&download=1' | gpg --import -

As a last resort to find the key, you can try the official GNU
keyring:

  wget -q https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-keyring.gpg
  gpg --keyring gnu-keyring.gpg --verify libtool-2.5.2.tar.gz.sig

This release was bootstrapped with the following tools:
  Autoconf 2.72e
  Automake 1.17
  Gnulib v1.0-563-gd3efdd55f3

NEWS

• Noteworthy changes in release 2.5.2 (2024-08-29) [beta]

** Bug fixes:

  - Use shared objects built in source tree instead of the installed
    versions for more reliable testing.

  - Fix test in bug_62343.at for confirmed Cygwin/Mingw32 where the
    incorrect architecture version of a compiler was generating
    object files that could not be linked with a library file.

  - Fix typos found with codespell.

** Changes in supported systems or compilers:

  - Add support for 32-bit mode on FreeBSD/powerpc64.


Enjoy!

We're pleased to announce the release of GNU MediaGoblin 0.14.0. See the release notes for full details and upgrading instructions.

Highlights of this release are:

• Preliminary support for Docker installation
• Preliminary support for OS packaging on GNU Guix
• Major configure/build overhaul
• Extended configuration documentation

This version has been tested on Debian Bookworm (12), Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 24.04 and Fedora 39.

Thanks go to co-maintainer Olivier Mehani for his major contributions in this release!

To join us and help improve MediaGoblin, please visit our getting involved page.

We are pleased to announce the release of GNUnet 0.22.0.
GNUnet is an alternative network stack for building secure, decentralized and privacy-preserving distributed applications. Our goal is to replace the old insecure Internet protocol stack. Starting from an application for secure publication of files, it has grown to include all kinds of basic protocol components and applications towards the creation of a GNU internet.

This is a new major release. It breaks protocol compatibility with the 0.21.x versions. Please be aware that Git master is thus henceforth (and has been for a while) INCOMPATIBLE with the 0.21.x GNUnet network, and interactions between old and new peers will result in issues. In terms of usability, users should be aware that there are still a number of known open issues in particular with respect to ease of use, but also some critical privacy issues especially for mobile users. Also, the nascent network is tiny and thus unlikely to provide good anonymity or extensive amounts of interesting information. As a result, the 0.22.0 release is still only suitable for early adopters with some reasonable pain tolerance .

• gnunet-0.22.0.tar.gz ( signature )
• gnunet-0.22.0-meson.tar.gz ( signature ) NEW: Test tarball made using the meson build system.
• gnunet-gtk-0.22.0.tar.gz ( signature )
• gnunet-fuse-0.22.0.tar.gz ( signature )

The GPG key used to sign is: 3D11063C10F98D14BD24D1470B0998EF86F59B6A

Note that due to mirror synchronization, not all links might be functional early after the release. For direct access try http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gnunet/

A detailed list of changes can be found in the git log , the NEWS and the bug tracker . Noteworthy highlights are

• transport :
  • A new experimental HTTP/3 communicator for peer-to-peer transport communicator.
  • New experimental NAT traversal functionality.
• util :
  • An implementation of Hybrid Public Key Encryption (HPKE) and related KEMs which are now used across the stack.
  • An implementation of Elligator used as part of our Diffie-Hellman exchanges and KEMs
• hostlist : The bootstrap URL is changed to https://bootstrap.gnunet.org/v22 and https://bootstrap.gnunet.org/latest for the release and development version (git head), respectively.
• gnunet-hello : A new CLI to import/export connectivity information (HELLOs) of peers manually.
• namestore : Significant zone import performance improvements in preparation for DNS TLD mirror deployments (.se, .nu, etc) .
• messenger :
  • Implementation of discourse subscriptions for live data streaming in chat rooms.
  • New functionality in CLI for the Messenger service to stream data via standard input and output.
• Build System :
  • Build variant to build a monolithic GNUnet library.
  • Cross compile the monolithic library for use on Android devices. An Android prototype can be found in this repository.

• There are known major design issues in the CORE subsystems which will need to be addressed in the future to achieve acceptable usability, performance and security.
• There are known moderate implementation limitations in CADET that negatively impact performance.
• There are known moderate design issues in FS that also impact usability and performance.
• There are minor implementation limitations in SET that create unnecessary attack surface for availability.
• The RPS subsystem remains experimental.

In addition to this list, you may also want to consult our bug tracker at bugs.gnunet.org which lists about 190 more specific issues.

This release was the work of many people. The following people contributed code and were thus easily identified: Christian Grothoff, t3sserakt, TheJackiMonster, Pedram Fardzadeh, Shichao, fence, dvn, nullptrderef and Martin Schanzenbach.

Screen is a full-screen window manager that multiplexes a physical
terminal between several processes, typically interactive shells.

The 5.0.0 release includes the following changes to the previous
release 4.9.1:

• Rewritten authentication mechanism
• Add escape %T to show current tty for window
• Add escape %O to show number of currently open windows
• Use wcwdith() instead of UTF-8 hard-coded tables
• New commands:

  - auth [on|off]
    Provides password protection
  - status [top|up|down|bottom] [left|right]
    The status window by default is in bottom-left corner.
    This command can move status messages to any corner of the screen.
  - truecolor [on|off]
  - multiinput
    Input to multiple windows at the same time

• Removed commands:

  - time
  - debug
  - password
  - maxwin
  - nethack

• Fixes:

  - Screen buffers ESC keypresses indefinitely
  - Crashes after passing through a zmodem transfer
  - Fix double -U issue

Release is available for download:
https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/screen/

Please report any bugs or regressions.
Thanks to everyone who contributed to this release.

Cheers,
Alex

This project aimed to implement a new communicator for GNUnet's Transport Next Generation (TNG) using the HTTP/3 protocol.

We chose ngtcp2 and nghttp3 for their stability and adherence to RFC standards. I began by studying communicator fundamentals and analyzing relevant code examples. I then created a QUIC communicator using libngtcp2, implementing essential communication features. Building on this, I integrated libnghttp3 to support HTTP/3 layer communication. After establishing basic uni-directional communication, I proceeded to implement bi-directional capabilities. With the help and guidance of my mentors, I completed the above work, including the selection and design of message transmission methods and the implementation of code.

We have two branches, dev/shichao/http3 for basic communication and dev/shichao/http3bidirect for bi-directional communication. They can pass the basic tests. However, we found that there were occasional failures during the test. We currently assume that this is caused by the test harness not being able to process the received data packets in time.

There are still many areas that can be improved in the HTTP/3 communicator, such as using CID map instead of IP address map. In addition, in bi-directional communication, the server's sending rate is slightly lower than the client's transmission rate, and this will be optimized in the future. Finally, integrating the Peer Identity into the TLS handshake in order to authenticate the peers is a natural feature to implement.

All the code is available upstream in the master branch and will be available with the next release.

Initially, I was unfamiliar with the ngtcp2 and nghttp3 libraries. While there were some examples available, I found limited guidance for more advanced usage. Through careful study and experimentation, I gradually gained a deeper understanding of these libraries. But in this process, I have a deeper understanding of QUIC and HTTP/3 protocols, and also improved my coding skills.

GNU Parallel 20240822 ('Southport') has been released. It is available for download at: lbry://@GnuParallel:4

Quote of the month:

  honestly the coolest software i've ever seen gotta be gnu parallel or
  ffmpeg, nothing like them
    -- @scootykins scoot
 
New in this release:

• --match Match input source with regexp to set replacement fields.
• {:%fmt} Use printf formatting of replacement strings.
• Bug fixes and man page updates.

News about GNU Parallel:

• Powerful GNU parallel, more than a loop https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/powerful-gnu-parallel-more-than-loop-zhenguo-zhang-18dxc
• How To Increase File Transfer Speed Using Parallel Rsync? https://contentbase.com/blog/increase-file-transfer-speed-parallel-rsync/
• Converting WebP Images to PNG Using parallel and dwebp https://bytefreaks.net/2024/07/27
• Turbocharging the Box CLI with GNU Parallel https://medium.com/box-developer-blog/turbocharging-the-box-cli-with-gnu-parallel-ee44c48811c0

GNU Parallel - For people who live life in the parallel lane.

If you like GNU Parallel record a video testimonial: Say who you are, what you use GNU Parallel for, how it helps you, and what you like most about it. Include a command that uses GNU Parallel if you feel like it.

GNU Parallel is a shell tool for executing jobs in parallel using one or more computers. A job can be a single command or a small script that has to be run for each of the lines in the input. The typical input is a list of files, a list of hosts, a list of users, a list of URLs, or a list of tables. A job can also be a command that reads from a pipe. GNU Parallel can then split the input and pipe it into commands in parallel.

If you use xargs and tee today you will find GNU Parallel very easy to use as GNU Parallel is written to have the same options as xargs. If you write loops in shell, you will find GNU Parallel may be able to replace most of the loops and make them run faster by running several jobs in parallel. GNU Parallel can even replace nested loops.

GNU Parallel makes sure output from the commands is the same output as you would get had you run the commands sequentially. This makes it possible to use output from GNU Parallel as input for other programs.

For example you can run this to convert all jpeg files into png and gif files and have a progress bar:

  parallel --bar convert {1} {1.}.{2} ::: *.jpg ::: png gif

Or you can generate big, medium, and small thumbnails of all jpeg files in sub dirs:

  find . -name '*.jpg' |
    parallel convert -geometry {2} {1} {1//}/thumb{2}_{1/} :::: - ::: 50 100 200

You can find more about GNU Parallel at: http://www.gnu.org/s/parallel/

You can install GNU Parallel in just 10 seconds with:

    $ (wget -O - pi.dk/3 || lynx -source pi.dk/3 || curl pi.dk/3/ || \
       fetch -o - http://pi.dk/3 ) > install.sh
    $ sha1sum install.sh | grep 883c667e01eed62f975ad28b6d50e22a
    12345678 883c667e 01eed62f 975ad28b 6d50e22a
    $ md5sum install.sh | grep cc21b4c943fd03e93ae1ae49e28573c0
    cc21b4c9 43fd03e9 3ae1ae49 e28573c0
    $ sha512sum install.sh | grep ec113b49a54e705f86d51e784ebced224fdff3f52
    79945d9d 250b42a4 2067bb00 99da012e c113b49a 54e705f8 6d51e784 ebced224
    fdff3f52 ca588d64 e75f6033 61bd543f d631f592 2f87ceb2 ab034149 6df84a35
    $ bash install.sh

Watch the intro video on http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL284C9FF2488BC6D1

Walk through the tutorial (man parallel_tutorial). Your command line will love you for it.

When using programs that use GNU Parallel to process data for publication please cite:

O. Tange (2018): GNU Parallel 2018, March 2018, https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1146014.

If you like GNU Parallel:

• Give a demo at your local user group/team/colleagues
• Post the intro videos on Reddit/Diaspora*/forums/blogs/ Identi.ca/Google+/Twitter/Facebook/Linkedin/mailing lists
• Get the merchandise https://gnuparallel.threadless.com/designs/gnu-parallel
• Request or write a review for your favourite blog or magazine
• Request or build a package for your favourite distribution (if it is not already there)
• Invite me for your next conference

If you use programs that use GNU Parallel for research:

• Please cite GNU Parallel in you publications (use --citation)

If GNU Parallel saves you money:

• (Have your company) donate to FSF https://my.fsf.org/donate/

GNU sql aims to give a simple, unified interface for accessing databases through all the different databases' command line clients. So far the focus has been on giving a common way to specify login information (protocol, username, password, hostname, and port number), size (database and table size), and running queries.

The database is addressed using a DBURL. If commands are left out you will get that database's interactive shell.

When using GNU SQL for a publication please cite:

O. Tange (2011): GNU SQL - A Command Line Tool for Accessing Different Databases Using DBURLs, ;login: The USENIX Magazine, April 2011:29-32.

GNU niceload slows down a program when the computer load average (or other system activity) is above a certain limit. When the limit is reached the program will be suspended for some time. If the limit is a soft limit the program will be allowed to run for short amounts of time before being suspended again. If the limit is a hard limit the program will only be allowed to run when the system is below the limit.