Older blog entries for faw (starting at number 35)

I should write about this a few days ago but didn't have the time. Sorry. Well, these are great news (at least for me), a few days ago I sent the second part of my T&S and already got approved. My AM (Hi Clément) also pointed out a few changes that were needed in my packages that are already fixed and uploaded; Clément already sent the report and considering that, I'm now waiting for the Front Desk to review my application (and after that, DAMnation. I'm happy! I also finish the adoption of xless and levee. I still have to finish the MyPasswordSafe adoption, but before I have to fix a RC bug related to the use of sudo as the gain-root command (instead of fakeroot) in the alpha buildd. Thanks neuro that already give me a few tips on how to solve it.

Following the random ideas season:

• Next week, Extremadura will host the i18n Debian people, the idea is to discuss lots of ideas, specially i18n Infrastructure, but not only discuss, also code a lot!

• I do not like the idea to have sourceless firmware in main and I really like Don Armstrong proposal on that subject.

• I still have to finish the desproxy, tuxfrw and thumbs packaging work to get it in time for etch.

• I'm wondering how a tally sheet with more than 10 choices looks like

Like a lot of people already did, in the last two weeks I've been fighting SPAM in my company and also on the server of Free Software Projects that I'm part of the System Administration Team. In most cases I'm using postfix with clamscan and postgrey, but I will switch to amavisd-new to use SpamAssassin (with razor/pyzor). But I'm still studying the various alternatives in a Debian Sarge system.

Happy Birthday!!! I was waiting a little bit, in other parts of the world Debian is already celebrating, now people from Brazil (and also UTC-0300) can join the party! Last Saturday our Debian User Group celebrate the Debian Anniversary with a big barbecue, sports and good conversations during the entire afternoon! Next Saturday (19.August) different Debian User Groups in Brazil will coordinate the Debian Day in different cities at the same time. Have fun! 13 years of Debian and counting! :-)

In a quick note, I'm still moving ahead with my NM. I have to fix a few points on my packages (and I'm still waiting my sponsor -- Hi Otavio! -- to upload a couple of packages). And I have a few more to work on, I hope I find the time in the next days.

At Monday (14.August) night (20h 00min UTC-0300) I visit (pt_BR) a very small city in the state I live in Brazil. They invited me to speak about Debian and Free Software for a group of students and also for locals. It was a nice talk and one of the things that got my attention is the number of women interested, of course, I told them to visit the Debian Women Project (which reminds me that I need to translate the site -- and lots of other files). Back to the work!

On Saturday (05.Aug.2006) I sent the answers for some questions that zorglub (my AM) in reply to the first part of T&S. At the same time he sent the second part of the T&S, that I just replied with the answers. The second part was not as time intensive as the first part (but took me almost the entire weekend to finish).

CVS pserver for webwml repository is still disabled, which makes the life for non-DD translators a little bit hard, since we don't have access to CVS using SSH and all the files and/or patches needs to go throught the very cool commiters on debian-www. Recently, a new helping page (while we do not have pserver access restored), based on the mail sent by Raphael Hertzog to debian-devel, was launched by Frans Pop: tarballs of the webwml CVS repository. Thanks Frans! And I would like to point all translators that use check_trans.pl to the website statistics with a special hint to the specific language page that contains almost the same information from the check_trans.pl and could help to keep track of files being too out of date.

Thanks to Luk Claes, new translate-docformat was uploaded to fix Policy 7.6 Violation. madcoder has a list of affected packages. During the weekend I work on my packages, I'm waiting for my sponsor to get them uploaded to the archive closing the "adoption process" and fixing a few bugs and lintian warnings. There are some news from the DDTP and no news from the CVS pserver for non-DDs (and unfortunately, in this case: no news, bad news). I also sent a mail do debian-l10n-portuguese about the future of our list, we need to change a few points, create and update documentation, change our coordinators in some areas (they are MIA for quite a while now) and structure the team to be ready for future changes and also to work focused to get as much translations as possible in "etch".

That's it... end of my University Vacation. Back to classes, busy schedule for the semester, I hope to manage everything in a very good way, so I can keep up-to-date with my Debian work.

Yes, that's it! July 28th, SysAdmin Day! I received only one "Happy SysAdmin Day" today, but I'm very happy! I also sent a few messages to friends and other sysadmins, congratulating them. So, if you didn't hug your sysadmin today, do it as soon as possible, and if he (or she) doesn't like to be hugged, at least say that you appreciate his/her job, that would be nice.

Keeping you up-to-date about my NM process, I have some good news since last time I wrote here. I was approved in the P&P! And I just sent the answers to T&S Part 1, by far, this was the most time intensive part of the NM until now. I had to fix RC-bugs, write shell script, write manpages and answer another round of questions. It is a hard part of the NM, IMHO, not because of the questions but because of the time required to prepare everything as good as possible. There is always something new to learn about Debian, how the project works, where to find information, how to help, it is really amazing. Extremadura i18n meeting is pretty close and we have a proposal to work in the debian-installer language packs (or something like that) trying to add more languages (and trying to save space or using another approach to load the languages).

Talking quickly about Brazil, August is almost there, our Debian User Group already find a place to celebrate Debian Anniversary, which is great and will allow us to prepare everything in the best way possible to have a very nice event. Translation work is a little bit delayed because CVS pserver is offline and translators without ssh access (non Debian Developers) can't work directly, we are routing our files and patches do debian-www, a huge thanks for all people helping us to get the files commited!

University classes are about to begin. Next week (August 31st), let's go for another round. I got visit from my cousing from Sao Paulo and also from my cousins from Netherlands, busy weekend (which delayed a little bit my NM answers, but it was all fun). :-)

I'm trying to get involved with DebConf Organization, we are in the middle of lots of changes. I'm working to get my packages uploaded to get them in "etch" and "in time". I'm also waiting for the new point release of Sarge (r3) so we can update Debian-BR-CDD (r1). Speaking about Debian-BR-CDD, we are ready to migrate to RT which will help to keep the tasks (DebConf Teams also use it).

So, my AM is back, he had some problems with his notebook. Last week he sent the second part of the P&P questions, 31 (exactly, thirty one) questions about the bug tracking system, good practices and how to work with different aspects of Debian Project. I couldn't say if the second part was hard or not, but it demands a lot of reading and writing. I'm happy so far (and I hope that he is also happy with my answers). Next step is the Tasks and Skills, but first I have to wait to get an OK on the P&P part.

The Debian Day is coming, 16.August is the Debian Anniversary, this year the project celebrates 13 years. Debian User Groups all around the world celebrate the day in a different way, but we call it the Debian Day. Another big event on the way it the Software Freedom Day, I hope to find the time to coordinate it all aroung Brasil, like FLISOL. I also have some reports to write, time is 'ticking' and I have to finish them as soon as possible (yes, writing here will not make the reports appear from the ground, but I would like to register it somewhere).

The i18n Extremadura Meeting is getting closer. I'm also happy to see some friends start working with Debian packages.

So, first semester of 2006 come to an end. Now it is time to register for the subjects of the next semester and then take a rest (at least from University) for the next couple of weeks.

Ok, lots of things moving, and lots of them moving pretty fast, but (yes... you know... there is always one or two around) not everything is quite easy (and lots of things are more complicated than they should be, thanks to people that loves to push on that way). Somebody should say that if it is easy it shouldn't be fun... well... it is quite true, anyway, sometimes you would like one or two items to be easier. These days, a lot of ideas in mind and not that much time to work on them, but I really would like to get a few things done and I will try my best during the next weeks to accomplish this. Let's see what happens! :-)

And yes, we are in the middle of the year, time to check priorities, look to the six months that I left behind and start thinking about the next months until the end of the year. Sometimes you have triggers for that, situations that make you think about yourself, your friends and your family... yes... sorry... it should be a tech diary. ;-)

Hey! Good news, I got approved to the ID Check on 2006-06-20. I got the first part of the Philosophy and Procedures and I already sent the answers. The license analysis is a little bit time-consuming, specially if you take the time to read debian-legal related drafts and to find issues related to other licenses. I'm a little bit worried because I wrote a pretty big mail, I hope it is ok, but we will see. For now, I'm ready for the next step! :-)

Just a sidenote, lots of tests and exams! Papers to prepare... at least. I'm learning cool things in C programming.

Debconf6 has gone! It was a great time, I leave on the last day, I met lots and lots of people, had the change to learn a lot and had the opportunity to help the DebConf Organization Team. You can see lots of pictures from DebConf6 and here is my mugshot.

I came back from DebConf6 and stopped in São Paulo for the Linux World, to take care of a Debian Booth in the .Org Area. Good time there, met some friends and exchange lots of ideas. It was the first LinuxWorld in Brasil, a really good event, totally different from FISL. I also had the chance to meet the Development Team of Archimedes, a CAD software written in Java.

Great News! My NM process start moving again. After answer some questions from the NM Front Desk, I got a mail from my Applicantion Manager, he asked me about my GPG key to check my identity, explain the next steps and ask me about my biography, Debian and Free Software involvement and plans for the future. I'm really happy! Less than two months after being advocate by otavio I already have an AM, I'm already looking forward for the next steps.

We (the Debian l10n portuguese team) also managed to clean the translation delta for the d-i manual, our goal is to keep it up-to-date. Another goal is to clean the WML (Debian website) translation delta and translate 100% of the strings for all leves of d-i, specially now that we are preparing the last beta release.

We had FLISOL in March. Now we are looking forward for the Debian Day in Brazil (we celebrate the Debian Project Anniversary) and the Software Freedom Day in September. This year is a really busy year, there are other events in the schedule and I hope I can attend the Debian i18n Extremadura Meeting in early september in Spain, we will see. :-)

I'm almost in the end of the semester at University. It will give some extra time to work in Debian and in other related stuff, I need to finish a couple of reports about Debian Booth in Free Software events. I also need to get some things done.

Here we are! Debconf6! :o)

Sorry, I didn't have much time to post. But I'm at Oaxtepec attending DebConf and trying to help a little bit the Local Team. I'm meeting lots and lots of people. There are some pictures. I also take lots of pictures. May 13rd is the Debian Day, it sets the end of DebCamp and the beginning of DebConf. Nice time, really nice time!