Open source software and nice hardware

rfkill on Debian without /sbin/rfkill

Sat, 01 Nov 2025 17:07:51 +0100

+++ Saturday  1 November 2025 +++

rfkill on Debian without /sbin/rfkill
=====================================

Today I installed Debian Bookworm on an old laptop.
For the installation I used an ISO-image from last year:

   debian-12.8.0-amd64-netinst.iso

I had downloaded this ISO in the past to install some virtual
machines, and now used this again so I didn't have to download a new
one.

During the install it recognized the WiFi-chip, and a working
wireless connection was set up. The installer downloaded a lot of
packages, everything went fine.

No WiFi
-------
After the installation was done, the laptop rebooted as usual.
After log in, there was no working network connection :(

Trying to get the WiFi working, a message showed that the
WiFi connection was not possible due to a soft rf-kill.

It turned out that rfkill was not installed, /sbin/rfkill
was missing.

Solution
--------
In the /sys/class/rfkill directory were three sub directories:
rfkill0, rfkill1, and rfkill2.

In each of these directories, the virtual file 'soft' was set
at "1". In all three sub directories I issued the command

     echo "0" > soft

After this, I was able to setup the WiFi using wpa_supplicant,
and there was much rejoicing

The first thing I did, was `apt-get install rfkill' :)


Last edited: $Date: 2025/11/01 17:07:51 $

FreeBSD 15.0-BETA2 VM-image in Qemu

Mon, 20 Oct 2025 17:43:49 +0200

+++ Monday 20 October 2025 +++

FreeBSD 15.0-BETA2 VM-image in Qemu
===================================

FreeBSD not only publishes images for install media, but also
VM-images.

I downloaded FreeBSD-15.0-BETA2-amd64-zfs.qcow2.xz

Which is the qcow2 image of the FreeBSD 15.0 BETA2 VM, with ZFS as
file system.

Starting the VM from Qemu
-------------------------
Firstly, unpack the file with unxz.

To start the virtual machine from Qemu, I used the following
command:

    qemu-system-x86_64 \
     -m 1024 \
     -nic user,model=virtio-net-pci,hostfwd=tcp::10022-:22 \
     -device virtio-blk,drive=myhd \
     -drive if=none,file=FreeBSD-15.0-BETA2-amd64-zfs.qcow2,id=myhd

This starts the VM with 1024 Mb RAM, and a network interface where
we can access port 22 via port 10022 on localhost.

Boot single mode
----------------
Because the VM-image do not contain password database files, we
first have to boot into single mode.

Read the notes at:
https://lists.freebsd.org/archives/freebsd-stable/2025-October/003466.html

Let it boot and at the boot-menu, just choose `2' to boot
into single user mode.

Get out of read-only mode
-------------------------
The root file system will be mounted in read-only mode. To switch
to read-write mode:

    zfs set readonly=off zroot/ROOT/default
    zfs mount -a

Create the password database files
----------------------------------
To create the password database files:

    pwd_mkdb /etc/master.passwd
    passwd

With this we create the master.passwd file and set a password
for the user `root'.

Enable sshd
-----------
In order to work from the console, we enable sshd.
Start `ed' and add a line in /etc/rc.conf:

    sshd_enable="YES"

Create a user
-------------
Next, create a user so we can login over ssh and become root.

   adduser

Add a username, and make the user part of the group 'wheel', and perhaps
some others, like `operator'.

Reboot and access over ssh
--------------------------
Reboot the machine.

From a console, start ssh to port 10022 to the VM.

On our system, Qemu offered a DHCP lease on 10.0.2.15, where
10.0.2.2 is the gateway for the VM to the local machine.

The DHCP lease includes the routing. Without further configuration,
we can access the internet.

Bootstrapping pkg
-----------------
Bootstrapping pkg gave some errors:

    Certificate verification failed for /C=US/O=Let's Encrypt/CN=E8

This is recolved by:

    certclt rehash

After this, we can bootstrap pkg:

    pkg bootstrap

And install some packages:

    pkg install -y git gnupg emacs-nox lynx rcs

and have some fun!

Last edited: $Date: 2025/10/20 17:43:49 $

End of life of news.individual.net

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 19:35:24 +0200

+++ Tuesday 30 September 2025 +++

End of life of news.individual.net
==================================

Today the sad news arrived. In two years news.individual.net
will be discontinued.

news.individual.net is a service from the Freie Universität Berlin.

news.individual.net is a UseNet server. Anybody could use this
service against a very modest price.

Usenet is a world wide discussion system and one of the oldest
distributed networks on the Internet.

We have all seen that real discussions on UseNet have been in
decline for a long time.

Some people say that "Usenet has been dying for years", starting
at the Eternal September in 1993 (when AOL began offering Usenet
access).

Still, it is sad to see a UseNet server die.


I am thankful for the service they have been providing for so
many years. As a happy user of the service of
news.individual.net I'll have to look for another provider.

At least the Freie Universität Berlin gave us two years notice.


Last edited: $Date: 2025/09/30 19:35:24 $

Reading RSS feeds on OS X Mavericks

Thu, 25 Sep 2025 16:13:36 +0200

+++ Thursday 25 September 2025 +++

Reading RSS feeds on OS X Mavericks
===================================

To have some fun and to add some extra functionality to my old Macbook
Air (from 2013), running OS X Mavericks, I searched for an RSS feed
reader.

I installed NetNewsWire 3.2.12, which I downloaded from
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/netnewswire

Google Reader
-------------
NetNewsWire supports syncing with Google Reader.
Google Reader is one of the many discontinued Google services.

Several self hosted online RSS aggregators support the Google Reader
API. The advantage is that you can use different devices when reading
your feeds, without the need for any synchronization.

Unfortunately, the connection to Google Reader is hard coded into
NetNewsWire, and it is not possible to connect to a different
aggregator.

RSS feeds and the smol web
--------------------------
RSS feeds are important to keep the smol web alive.

The smol web can mean different things, here I use the term to
describe that part of the word wide web that contains the independent
websites crafted by human beings, with human created content,
non-corporate and without trackers or other surveillance marketing
methods.

Firstly, the big internet search engines have stopped indexing the
websites that make up the smol net. Nowadays they index sites like
Reddit. It has become very hard to discover smol web websites.

When you manage to discover an interesting smol web website, the best
thing you can do is to add its feed to your feed reader. With this
you help yourself as well as the creator of this website.

Next, many smol web sites usually don't publish daily new content, but
at a more leisurely frequency. Without a RSS feed reader, the
continues river of new content makes it hard to keep up with these web
sites.

OPML file
---------
NetNewsWire offers the great option to import OPML files.

I publish an OPML file on my website, you can find it here:
http://box.matto.nl/links.opml

Every time I add a website to my links-page, I look for the feed.
When available, I add it to the GNU Recutils file. A script uses the
recutils tools to create a new version for the links page and the OPML
file. With the links page and the OPML file I hope to help in the
discovery of smol web websites.

After installing NetNewsWire I imported this OPML file to quickly
get started.

Inaccessible feeds
------------------
Just a few feeds from the OPML file are accessible. Most feeds are
only available using an encrypted https connection.

Encrypted https connections are of course always a problem when using
an older operating system. Older hardware is very often still capable
enough for many day to day tasks, but is sadly made obsolete by the
requirements of encrypted connections.

If you run a smol web website, the best thing you can do is to make it
not only available from a encrypted https connection, but also from an
unencrypted http connection.
The second best thing you can do, is to make your RSS feed available
from an unencrypted http connection and make sure that it is a
complete feed, with not only a title and a link, but with the complete
content of the web page.

If your website doesn't publish an RSS feed, creating one should be
a priority.

Let's keep the smol web alive!


Last edited: $Date: 2025/09/25 16:13:36 $

Adopt Git repos in Forgejo on FreeBSD

Mon, 08 Sep 2025 16:05:04 +0200

+++ Monday  8 September 2025 +++

Adopt multiple Git repos in Forgejo on FreeBSD
==============================================

Forgejo is a self-hosted lightweight open source Git forge.

On FreeBSD, Forgejo can be simply installed using the package manager.
Forgejo offers support for migrating repositories from well know public
forges, like GitHub and GitLab.

Bare Git repositories can be easily adopted in Forgejo in bulk.

Copy the repositories to Forgejo
--------------------------------
The root directory for the repositories is:

    /var/db/forgejo/data/forgejo-repositories/

For each user there is a sub directory in this root directory.

Copie the Git repositories to the sub directory of the user.

* The directory name of the Git repository must be in lowercase
* The directory name must end in ".git".
* Change the ownership of the directories to git:git.

Adopt the repositories
----------------------
Log in with the admin user in the web interface.
Go to Site administration - Code assets - Repositories

Click in the button "Unadopted reposities".

Enter the name of the user.
This will show the list of recognized Git repository, with a
button "+Adopt files".

Clicking on this button will import the Git repository in
Forgejo, including a complete dashboard with Issues, Actions,
and so on.


Last edited: $Date: 2025/09/08 16:05:04 $