Seems Linux is vulnerable to a vmsplice exploit allowing local users to be come root. This affects kernels 2.6.17 till 2.6.24.1. For those building their own kernels, patches for 2.6.22, 2.6.23 and 2.6.24 are available. For older kernels, you can grab a git commit fixing it, or check the diff between the 2.6.24.1 and 2.6.24.2 patch (I think the latter looks nicer :-P).

Start them compilers!

Joy oh joy. Remember the good ole days when OpenWrt accused Sveasoft of violating the GPL, only to be accused by Sveasoft themselves in return to do something similar? Welcome to the déjà vu then.

It seems DD-WRT is doing the same thing.

Someone recently pointed me to a Linux.com article on derivative Linux distribution. Whereas lots of people - including me - used to think it was okay to run a distro without providing sources as long as they were provided upstream, by the 'mother distro', this article makes things clear: it is not. Mepis got targeted for this and had to provide the full sources themselves. Of course, if that is what the GNU Public License says, that's how it has to be done - you cannot claim your distro is GPL if you don't honour that same license. Strangely, it seems, no other distros (and there are plenty of derivative distributions) got targeted at the time.

Zenwalk users might know a certain guy called Béranger, who has 'annoyed' the Zenwalk team with his (rightful) questions about source availability. It seems he did not loose his edgy approach though - read this article about Zenwalk not complying with the GPL. While he certainly has a point, when it comes to his communication skills there really is a lot of room for improvement.

The wait is over: 2.6.24 hit the stores on January 24th. What particularly interests me - and lots of Linux laptop users - is the shitload of wireless drivers integrated! Drivers for Intel's IPW3945 and 4965, Broadcom's 'AirForce One' thingies - I'll keep it diplomatic - and other stuff too. Sadly, the rt2x00 driver seems not to have been updated - which means a lot of people will still experience speed problems. The fix for this is using the rt2x00 git branch.

Arch has this wonderful hook called 'encrypt' that allows you to unlock your encrypted root partition with an external key if you want so. The problem is this implementation is rather rigid - the encrypt hook can only handle one partition and corresponding key for now (actually it can only handle a root partition by default). My 'hack' allows non-root partitions to get mounted automatically without having to resort to /etc/crypttab for unlocking information, but that is a weak point at the same time: you cannot have multiple encrypted partitions with this method - unless, of course, you continue to use /etc/crypttab.

Okay. You guys know how fond I am of tinkering and breaking things :-). Well, today, I discovered once again how fabulous OpenWrt is. Those familiar with Linux will know cross-compiling can be a pain. Routers and other embedded devices often run on non-x86 architectures (my router, an Asus WL-500G Deluxe, is a MIPS-based device), which means you have to set up some sort of cross compilation environment, and that takes time. Well, with OpenWRT, there's no need to go through all of that.

Something to fill the void! I know my avid readers are fiending for new material, so this is to let them know all hope is not lost ^_^.

More to come! Quality can not be guaranteed though.