apt-offline 1.7.2 released

 Posted on November 10, 2016  |  2 minutes  |  333 words  |  

I am happy to announce the release of apt-offline 1.7.2. This has turned out in time for the next release of Debian, i.e. Debian Stretch. A long standing cosmetic issue in CLI of the progress bar total item count has been fixed. There are also a bunch of other bug fixes, for which the specifics are present in the git logs. Also, in this release, we’ve tried to catch-up on the Graphical Interface, adding the GUI equivalent of the features, that were added to apt-offline in the recent past. [Read More]
apt  apt-offline  apt-offline-gui 

GNOME Shell Extensions and Chromium

 Posted on October 1, 2016  |  2 minutes  |  233 words  |  

Most GNOME users may be using one or more extensions for the GNOME Shell. These extensions allow extending functionality for the shell, or modify default behavior, to suit the taste of many users, who may want more than the default. Having flexibility to customize the desktop to ones personal need is a great feature, and the extensions help achieve them. The GNOME Shell Extensions distribution mechanism is primarily through the web. [Read More]
GNOME Shell Extensions  Chromium  Chrome  Browser 

Laptop Mode Tools 1.70

 Posted on September 24, 2016  |  2 minutes  |  232 words  |  

I’m pleased to announce the release of Laptop Mode Tools, version 1.70. This release adds support for AHCI Runtime PM, introduced in Linux 4.6. It also includes many important bug fixes, mostly related to invocation and determination of power states. Changelog: 1.70 - Sat Sep 24 16:51:02 IST 2016 * Deal harder with broken battery states * On machines with 2+ batteries, determine states from all batteries * Limit status message logging frequency. [Read More]
Laptop Mode Tools  power saving 

apt-offline 1.7.1 released

 Posted on September 12, 2016  |  1 minutes  |  159 words  |  

I am happy to mention the release of apt-offline, version 1.7.1. This release includes many bug fixes, code cleanups and better integration. Integration with PolicyKit Better integration with apt gpg keyring Resilient to failures when a sub-task errors out New Feature: Changelog This release adds the ability to deal with package changelogs (’ set ’ command option: --generate-changelog ) based on what is installed, extract changelog (Currently support with python-apt only) from downloaded packages and display them during installation (’ install ’ command opiton: --skip-changelog , if you want to skip display of changelog) New Option: --apt-backend Users can now opt to choose an apt backend of their choice. [Read More]
apt  apt-offline  debian 

User Mode Linux

 Posted on July 31, 2016  (Last modified on August 1, 2016)  |  4 minutes  |  825 words  |  

Recently, we had the User-Mode Linux suite out of Debian, which included user- mode-linux, user-mode-linux-doc and uml-utilities package. We are happy that we were able to bring it back into the archvie quick, and hope to maintain it active. For many who may not know about UML, here’s a discription from its website: User-Mode Linux is a safe, secure way of running Linux versions and Linux processes. Run buggy software, experiment with new Linux kernels or distributions, and poke around in the internals of Linux, all without risking your main Linux setup. [Read More]
UML  User Mode Linux  debian 

Fully SSL for my website

 Posted on July 15, 2016  |  1 minutes  |  64 words  |  

I finally made full switch to SSL for my website. Thanks to [this](https://hblok.net/blog/posts/2016/02/24/lets-encrypt-tls-certificate- setup-for-apache-on-debian-7/) simple howto on Let’s Encrypt. I had to use the upstream git repo though. The Debian packaged tool, letsencrypt.sh, did not have enough documentation/pointers in place. And finally, thanks to the Let’s Encrypt project as a whole.

PS: http is now redirected to https. I hope nothing really breaks externally.

SSL  https  let's encrypt  eff 

Leprosy in India

 Posted on July 10, 2016  |  3 minutes  |  427 words  |  

During my recent travel, I had quite a long layover at the Doha International Airport in Qatar. While killing time, I watched an interesting programme on the Al Jazeera network. The program aired on Al Jazeera is Lifelines. This special episode I watched, covered about “Leprosy in India”. After having watched the entire programme, I felt the urge to blog about it. First of all, it was quite depressing to me, to know through the programme, that the Govt. [Read More]
41000 feet  Qatar  Debconf  Leprosy 

apt-offline backports for Debian Jessie

 Posted on April 14, 2016  |  1 minutes  |  46 words  |  

For Debian Jessie, the version of apt-offline available is: 1.5.1. This version has had some [issues](https://bugs.debian.org/cgi- bin/pkgreport.cgi?pkg=apt-offline;dist=unstable).

My very 1st backports is available in the form of [apt-offline 1.7 for ](https://packages.debian.org/source/jessie-backports/apt- offline)[Debian](https://packages.debian.org/source/jessie-backports/apt- offline) Jessie Backports. For Debian Jessie users, this should fix most of the issues.

apt-offline  Jessie  Stable  Backports  debian 

Laptop Mode Tools 1.69 Released

 Posted on March 7, 2016  |  3 minutes  |  474 words  |  

Today is an auspicious day. For those who know (or follow) the Hindu religion will be familiar; Today is Maha Shivaratri![](/images/LMT-Maha- Shivaratri.jpeg) On this day, It is great delight for me to be able to release Laptop Mode Tools, version 1.69 This release adds on many bug fixes and some enhancements. There is a new module (disabled by default) for cpuhotplug. The release tarball also includes a basic PolicyKit file for convenience, that packagers can use for the Laptop Mode Tools Graphical Configuration Interface. [Read More]
laptop-mode-tools  shiva  Laptop Mode Tools 

Linux Power Savings 2016

 Posted on March 1, 2016  |  7 minutes  |  1356 words  |  

Having moved to a new place, now at times, I also have to deal with power outages. As heat increases, the power outages will be much longer and more frequent. So much, that UPS and Power Inverters run out. Such are ideal times to measure idle power consumption for my laptop. Here’s what my default (and idle) OS looks like. It should be standard to most “typical” users. Some minor odds could be apport, dnsmasq, and maybe, tor. [Read More]
power saving  laptop-mode-tools  laptop  battery