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Submission + - NASA funded study states people could be on the moon by 2021 for $10 billion (examiner.com)

Submitted by MarkWhittington
MarkWhittington writes: The Houston Chronicle reported that NextGen Space LLC has released the results of a study that suggests that if the United States were to choose to do space in some new and creative ways, American moon boots could be on the lunar surface by 2021. The cost from the authorization to the first crewed lunar landing would be just $10 billion. The study was partly funded by NASA and was reviewed by the space agency and commercial space experts.

Submission + - Critical vulnerability in all windows versions allowing remote code execution (microsoft.com)

Submitted by QuantumReality
QuantumReality writes: A remote code execution vulnerability exists in Microsoft Windows when the Windows Adobe Type Manager Library improperly handles specially crafted OpenType fonts. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of the affected system. An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights.

Submission + - US Government detained Laura Poitras every time she flew .. (techdirt.com) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Since the 2006 release of “My Country, My Country,” Poitras has left and re-entered the U.S. roughly 40 times. Virtually every time during that six-year-period that she has returned to the U.S., her plane has been met by DHS agents who stand at the airplane door or tarmac and inspect the passports of every de-planing passenger until they find her (on the handful of occasions where they did not meet her at the plane, agents were called when she arrived at immigration).

Each time, they detain her, and then interrogate her at length about where she went and with whom she met or spoke. They have exhibited a particular interest in finding out for whom she works.

Submission + - Microsoft suspends availability of Windows 10 builds (betanews.com)

Submitted by Mark Wilson
Mark Wilson writes: If you haven't already downloaded Windows 10 build 10162 or 10166, you're now too late. Microsoft has suspended the availability of these two builds — previously available on the Slow and Fast rings respectively — in the run up to the big launch day in a couple of weeks' time.

As we edge closer and closer to the RTM build of Windows 10, Microsoft is now asking Windows Insiders to stick with the build they currently have installed for the time being. Anyone who hasn’t upgraded to these latest preview builds is out of luck. As well as disabling upgrading through Windows Update, Microsoft is also suspending ISOs and activation.

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: VPN solution to connect two mixed environment households? 1

Submitted by RavenLrD20k
RavenLrD20k writes: My first Ask Slashdot, so be gentle... I am a programmer by trade with a significant amount of training as a Network Administrator (AAS in Computer Networking). I have no problem with how to build three or four separate networks in each location and make them route over the internet. My weakness is in trying to setup a VPN for a secured two way connection between location A and location B, both mixed OS environments, with the requirement that all of the internet traffic on B gets routed through A first. I've already looked at some boxed solutions, such as LogMeIn Hamachi, but there hasn't been much in the way of mixed environment support.

Some background: Due to recent events it's become necessary for me to have remote access to all of my Parents' computers which are about 4 hours away(location B) from my home location(location A). This is to facilitate me being able to log in and apply patches and security updates without requiring someone on the other end sending me Desktop Sharing invites (I'm already going to be upgrading their 2 systems to Windows 7 Ultimate on my dime for this purpose). The ISP for Location B also seems to be blocking the Desktop Sharing ports as this method has completely stopped working for us without notice, and router configs have been verified as forwarding the necessary ports. Location B also has 2 grandchildren that will have a Windows 7 Home Edition Laptop (for MS Office based classwork), a Linux Mint Machine (to start, he has full reign to do whatever he wants to this machine after initial setup with the understanding that if he "breaks" it, he fixes it), and several BeagleBone or R-Pi machines for my Son's experiments while he's visiting for the summer.

Location A has two networks. First is the one with the public IP that I run my Linux servers and physically connected Desktop on. This network also has a wireless interface that allows gaming machines and phones on the North side of the house to connect to. Network two is behind the NAT and runs a dual-band wireless connection for devices on the south side. I would rather not have this second network get internet access through the VPN but through the traditional means.

Location A has a 150/30 cable connection with a 2TB cap. Location B has a 20Mb/s symmetrical uncapped Fiber connection. I also have a VPS "in the cloud" running CentOS which has a 1Gbps Inbound 20Mbps(1Gbps burstable) Outbound connection which may be repurposed for this if necessary. I figure this to be common sense but I would prefer that the the connection between the locations be routed as opposed to bridged as to avoid the issues that come with sending broadcast packets over the internet.

As I said, I primarily want this to be able to remote into my parents' systems to provide maintenance and support instead of having to budget an emergency trip when things go awry. On top of this I'd also like some way to be able to monitor/control my son's online activities while he's away (hence my desire to route at least his traffic, if not all Location B internet traffic, through Location A). Also note: I'm not a helicopter parent by any means and only monitor once in a while to get a general idea of what his online trend is; and the extent of "control" is if grandpa and grandma say he needs time off the computer for x days for bad behavior or whatever, I want to be able to enforce that rule where he won't be able to sneak around while they're in bed. This connection will not have any firewalling or blocking enabled by default. I want everyone to have complete open access to the full internet (this too is to help educate my son in smart browsing/chatting and encourage "you break it, you fix it").

Comment Re:No, they just need reliable Linux distros. (Score 1) 187

by Wolfrider (#50066359) Attached to: Interviews: Linus Torvalds Answers Your Question

--#1, systemd takes away choice. Binary logging by default is incredibly bad, and I don't want to have to change it manually every time I do an install. If I wanted Windows, AIX or Solaris, I'd be running those instead of Linux. I think way too many distros are changing over to systemd when it's not really what a lot of people want or need. SysV was OK, Upstart was fine for most people's needs. Give me a sane /etc/rc.local at bootup and I'm good.

--Systemd resembles the MCP from TRON too much for my taste, it's taking over too many functions and subsystems. And the main coder "LP" has a history of horribly buggy software. I've also seen reports of systems being unable to boot that are running systemd when they were working fine before they were upgraded.

--#2, Linux Mint Debian edition is pretty reputable, I wouldn't exactly call it niche. I have the ISO for Void but haven't installed it to test in a VM yet. Devuan admittedly needs to do a general ISO release to make sure it gets better exposure and testing (update - I just checked their page and it looks like they have made progress in the last couple of months, so I plan to test Devuan $soon.)

--Just my $2.02.

Comment Re:No, they just need reliable Linux distros. (Score 1) 187

by Wolfrider (#50060137) Attached to: Interviews: Linus Torvalds Answers Your Question

--I'm not an AC. I've been using/adminning Linux since 1996, and I *despise* systemd. I'm looking into Mint Debian edition #2, Void, and Devuan to get away from systemd.

--Not looking to get into an argument, just wanted you all to know that we do exist, we are real admins, and we want a sane init environment + logging system that we can work with.

Submission + - "We screwed up," says Reddit CEO in formal apology

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: After moderators locked up some of Reddit's most popular pages in protest against the dismissal of Victoria Taylor, and an online petition asking the company to fire CEO Ellen Pao reached more than 175,000 signatures over the weekend, Pao has issued an apology. The statement reads in part: "We screwed up. Not just on July 2, but also over the past several years. We haven’t communicated well, and we have surprised moderators and the community with big changes. We have apologized and made promises to you, the moderators and the community, over many years, but time and again, we haven’t delivered on them. When you’ve had feedback or requests, we haven’t always been responsive. The mods and the community have lost trust in me and in us, the administrators of reddit. Today, we acknowledge this long history of mistakes. We are grateful for all you do for reddit, and the buck stops with me."

Submission + - Surveillance Court: NSA Can Resume Bulk Surveillance (nytimes.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: We all celebrated back in May when a federal court ruled the NSA's phone surveillance illegal, and again at the beginning of June, when the Patriot Act expired, ending authorization for that surveillance. Unfortunately, the NY Times now reports on a ruling from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which concluded that the NSA may temporarily resume bulk collection of metadata about U.S. citizens's phone calls. From the article: "In a 26-page opinion (PDF) made public on Tuesday, Judge Michael W. Mosman of the surveillance court rejected the challenge by FreedomWorks, which was represented by a former Virginia attorney general, Ken Cuccinelli, a Republican. And Judge Mosman said that the Second Circuit was wrong, too. 'Second Circuit rulings are not binding' on the surveillance court, he wrote, 'and this court respectfully disagrees with that court’s analysis, especially in view of the intervening enactment of the U.S.A. Freedom Act.' When the Second Circuit issued its ruling that the program was illegal, it did not issue any injunction ordering the program halted, saying that it would be prudent to see what Congress did as Section 215 neared its June 1 expiration."

Comment Re:FreeNAS (Score 1) 212

> ZFS can be unstable if not fed enough RAM.

--I have seen ZFS (FreeBSD and Linux) be "stable" with ~2GB of RAM, as long as you are using a 64-bit OS. In my experience, these days ZFS only needs lots of RAM if you are doing de-duplication - although this can be gotten around to a certain extent if you use an SSD drive for L2ARC; it will just be slower. Maxing out your RAM is recommended if you want max speed and you can afford it, but there are other ways. As long as you're not doing de-dup and not expecting miracles; my ZFS backup/fileserver only has 6GB of RAM and is doing fine running Ubuntu 14.04-64-LTS.

Submission + - Study: Major ISPs Slowing Traffic Across the US (theguardian.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A study based on test results from 300,000 internet users "found significant degradations on the networks of the five largest internet service providers" in the United States. This group includes Time Warner Cable, Verizon, and AT&T. "The study, supported by the technologists at Open Technology Institute’s M-Lab, examines the comparative speeds of Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), which shoulder some of the data load for popular websites. ... The study, supported by the technologists at Open Technology Institute’s M-Lab, examines the comparative speeds of Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), which shoulder some of the data load for popular websites." These findings arrive shortly after the FCC's new net neutrality rules took effect across the U.S.

Submission + - Popular Security Software Came Under Relentless NSA and GCHQ Attacks (firstlook.org)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: The National Security Agency and its British counterpart, Government Communications Headquarters, have worked to subvert anti-virus and other security software in order to track users and infiltrate networks, according to documents from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The spy agencies have reverse engineered software products, sometimes under questionable legal authority, and monitored web and email traffic in order to discreetly thwart anti-virus software and obtain intelligence from companies about security software and users of such software. One security software maker repeatedly singled out in the documents is Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab, which has a holding registered in the U.K., claims more than 270,000 corporate clients, and says it protects more than 400 million people with its products.

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