LinuxTag is looking for projects to participate in this year’s exhibition. The Call for Projects contains everything that project members need to know about the conditions. Sharpen your pen and send us a substantive description of your project! Despite the deadline ends March 24, 2010, we operate on a first come first serve base - don’t loose time! Read everything about the application process in the Call for Projects.

As expected set-up is quick and easy, even directly from the iPhone, and it works even though the beta state rather. As long as your contacts do not have more than one mobile number. But there is at least one new problem to solve: how to get Apple Adressbook sync again with Gmail?

Since Mac OSX 10.5.3 there is a new feature that enables Apple Address Book sync with Gmail by using the Google Data APIs Objective-C Client Library - not only for iPhone and iPod touch owners. It works very well, although not all fields are synced correctly. Maybe this is the niche commercial solutions like Spanning Sync.

However to re-enable the “Sync Now” function, i found a two command solution at Google mobile help. By default, the sync client for Google is an “app client”, which means it requires some other address book to run (MobileMe, Yahoo, Exchange or an iPod contact sync) to run. To enable Google sync client to operate as a full sync client, you have to change the client type from “app” to “server”. This will enable the “Sync now” button and will make sure Google sync is run every time a sync is run.

To change the Google sync client type, open a terminal window and type (one line)
sudo defaults write /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/GoogleContactSync.framework/Resources/ClientDescription Type 'server'

Then type the following one line command to restore the permissions on the plist file:
sudo chmod 644 /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/GoogleContactSync.framework/Resources/ClientDescription.plist

You can now go in Address Book’s preferences and enable Google contacts sync, without needing to enable Yahoo sync or plug an iPod for sync to work. Optionally go into iSync > Preferences and add the iSync menu to your menu bar. This let’s you see when it is syncing, and sync it manually.

Of course you can also initiate the synchronisation using the command line. Use this to run it periodically using launchd or cron:
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/GoogleContactSync.framework/Versions/A/Resources/gconsync --sync gconclid --register 1 --username user@gmail.com --password PASSWORD --syncmode fast

Wonder why this is a so mac centric post? On my Linux workstations I am using Sunbird in combination with the Provider for Google Calendar plugin and the Google contacts extension for Thunderbird since ages without having any trouble. But getting the the Apple stuff to work right with Google took me quite some time. Kudos to Michael Shick!

The program committee for the 15th LinuxTag is seeking exciting and suitable proposals for the lecture program on topics including, but not limited to, the following: Open hardware, Software and development, Application examples and case studies, Free software in education, research, and administration, Collaboration among several projects and initiatives, and Cool New Inventions and Experiments (CNIE). In addition, LinuxTag has chosen three core themes for its 2009 conference program. The program committee is seeking proposals on these themes in particular: Mobility, Processes, and Responsibility

Interested speakers are asked to submit their papers until February 8th, 2009. After this deadline it’s unlikely that proposals are accepted. Find the terms and conditions of the Call for Papers at LinuxTag’s website or download a nice formatted print version (PDF).

After christmas we will travel to Berlin to Chaos Communication Congress (25C3) and LinuxTag’s Free Software End of Year Lounge- hope to see you there!

By setting the following two values you can reduce this to two clicks:

• browser.ssl_override_behaviour = 2
• browser.xul.error_pages.expert_bad_cert = true

Then Firefox 3 behaves like it’s predecessor and you are not bugged by every self signed certificate. By the way: you should import CAcert.orgs root certificate at least for identifying websites into the keyring of your browser.

Kudos to Robin for mentioning the second configuration option to save another click!

I really like this improved new error page, because the click path you have to follow requires that you read through all information once and hopefully remember the correct click path next time you encounter a SSL certificate with an unknown signature.

Unfortunately this new feature gets after a while really annoying. Luckily users may configure this feature using about:config. I suggest you change browser.ssl_override_behaviour to 2.

I proudly present the first proove that the Bieramyde is not only a mysterious tale:

Picture credits: Martin ‘notlocalhorst’ Lasarsch