• [DLA 2629-1] libebml security update for one CVE
• debdiff for libebml/buster
• [DLA 2636-1] pjproject security update for one CVE
• NMU leptonlib/unstable for four CVEs
• PU bug #987376 leptonlib/buster for four CVEs
• debdiff for ring/unstable which resulted in upload of version 20210112.2.b757bac~ds1-1 that fixed two CVEs
• PU bug #987246 tnef/buster for one CVE

There was a boy named Eustace Clarence Scrubb and he almost deserved it.

"Oh Aslan," said she, "it was kind of you to come." "I have been here all the time," said he, "but you have just made me visible." "Aslan!" said Lucy almost a little reproachfully. "Don't make fun of me. As if anything I could do would make you visible!" "It did," said Aslan. "Did you think I wouldn't obey my own rules?"

"My son," said Ramandu, "it is not for you, a son of Adam, to know what faults a star can commit."

"My own plans are made. While I can, I sail east in the Dawn Treader. When she fails me, I paddle east in my coracle. When she sinks, I shall swim east with my four paws. And when I can swim no longer, if I have not reached Aslan's country, or shot over the edge of the world in some vast cataract, I shall sink with my nose to the sunrise and Peepiceek shall be the head of the talking mice in Narnia."

Changes in drat version 0.2.0 (2021-04-21)

• A documentation website for the package was added at https://eddelbuettel.github.io/drat/ (Dirk)
• The continuous integration was switched to using r-ci (Dirk)
• The docs/ directory of the main repository branch can now be used instead of gh-pages branch (Dirk in #112)
• A new repository https://github.com/drat-base/drat can now be used to fork an initial drat repository (Dirk)
• A new vignette Drat Step-by-Step was added (Roman Hornung and Dirk in #117 fixing #115 and #113)
• The test suite was refactored for docs/ use (Felix Ernst in #118)
• The minimum R version is now R (>= 3.6) (Dirk fixing #119)
• The vignettes were switched to minidown (Dirk fixing #116)
• A new test file was added to ensure NEWS.Rd is always at the current release version.

This post by Dirk Eddelbuettel originated on his Thinking inside the box blog. Please report excessive re-aggregation in third-party for-profit settings.

UK Railways

How Privatization Fails : Railways

The Above video is by a gentleman called Shaun who basically shared that privatization as far as UK is concerned is nothing but monopolies and while there are complex reasons for the same, the design of the Railways is such that it will always be a monopoly structure. At the most what you can do is have several monopolies but that is all that can happen. The idea of competition just cannot happen. Even the idea that subsidies will be less or/and trains will run on time is far from fact. Both of these facts have been checked and found to be truthful by fullfact.org. It is and argued that UK is small and perhaps it doesn t have the right conditions. It is probably true but still we do deserve to have a glance at the UK railway map.

UK railway map with operators

The above map is copyrighted to Map Marketing where you could see it today . As can be seen above most companies had their own specified areas. Now if you had looked at the facts then you would have seen that UK fares have been higher. In fact, an oldish article from Metro (a UK publication) shares the same. In fact, UK nationalized its railways effectively as many large rail operators were running in red. Even Scotland is set to nationalised back in March 2022. Remember this is a country which hasn t seen inflation go upwards of 5% in nearly a decade. The only outlier was 2011 where they indeed breached the 5% mark. So from this, what we see is Private Gains and Private Gains Public Losses perhaps seem fit. But then maybe we didn t use the right example. Perhaps Japan would be better. They have bullet trains while UK is still thinking about it. (HS2).

Japanese Railway Below is the map of Japanese Railway

Railway map of Japan with private ownership courtesy Wikimedia commons

Japan started privatizing its railway in 1987 and to date it has not been fully privatized. And on top of it, amount as much as 24 trillion of the long-term JNR debt was shouldered by the government at the expense of taxpayers of Japan while also reducing almost 1/4th of it employees. To add to it, while some parts of Japanese Railways did make profits, many of them made profits by doing large-scale non-railway business mostly real estate of land adjacent to railway stations. In many cases, it seems this went all the way up to 60% of the revenue. The most profitable has been the Shinkansen though. And while it has been profitable, it has not been without safety scandals over the years, the biggest in recent years was the 2005 Amagasaki derailment. What was interesting to me was the Aftermath, while the Wikipedia page doesn t share much, I had read at the time and probably could be found how a lot of ordinary people stood up to the companies in a country where it is a known fact that most companies are owned by the Yakuza. And this is a country where people are loyal to their corporation or company no matter what. It is a strange culture to west and also here in India where people change jobs on drop of hat, although nowadays we have record unemployment. So perhaps Japan too does not meet our standard as it doesn t do competition with each other but each is a set monopoly in those regions. Also how much subsidy is there or not is not really transparent.

U.S. Railways Last, but not the least I share the U.S. Railway map. This is provided by A Mr. Tom Alison on reddit on channel maporn. As the thread itself is archived and I do not know the gentleman concerned, nor have taken permission for the map, hence sharing the compressed version

U.S. Railway lines with the different owners

Now the U.S. Railways is and has always been peculiar as unlike the above two the U.S. has always been more of a freight network. Probably, much of it has to do that in the 1960 s when oil was cheap, the U.S. made zillions of roadways and romanticized the road trip and has been doing it ever since. Also the creation of low-cost airlines definitely didn t help the railways to have more passenger services, in fact the opposite. There are and have been smaller services and attempts of privatization in both New Zealand and Australia and both have been failures. Please see papers in that regard. My simple point is this, as can be seen above, there have been various attempts at privatization of railways and most of them have been a mixed bag. The only one which comes close to what we think as good is Japanese but that also used a lot of public debt which we don t know what will happen on next. Also for higher-speed train services like a bullet train or whatever, you need to direct, no hair pen bends. In fact, a good talk on the topic is the TBD podcast which while it talks about hyperloop, the same questions is and would be asked if were to do in India. Another thing to be kept in mind is that the Japanese have been exceptional builders and this is because they have been forced to. They live in a seismically active zone which made Fukushima disaster a reality but at the same time, their buildings are earthquake-resistant. Standard Disclaimer The above is a simplified version of things. I could have added in financial accounts but that again has no set pattern. For e.g. some Railways use accrual, some use cash and some use hybrid. I could have also shared in either the guage or electrification but all have slightly different standards, although uniguage is something that all Railways aspire for and electrification is again something that all Railways want although in many cases it just isn t economically feasible.

Indian Railways Indian Railways itself recently made the move from Cash to Accrual couple of years back. In-between for a couple of years, it was hybrid. The sad part is and was you can now never measure against past performance in the old way because it is so different. Hence, whether the Railways will be making a loss or a profit, we would come to know only much later. Also, most accountants don t know the new system well, so it is gonna take more time, how much unknown. Sadly, what GOI did a few years back is merge the Railway budget into the Union Budget. Of course, the excuse they gave is too many pressures of new trains, while the truth is, by doing this, they decreased transparency about the whole thing. For e.g. for the last few years, the only state which had significant work being done is in U.P. (Uttar Pradesh) and a bit in Goa, although that is has been protested time and again. I being from the neighborly state of Maharashtra , and have been there several times. Now it does feels all like a dream, going to Goa :(.

Covid news Now before I jump on the news, I should share the movie Virus (2019) which was made by the talented Aashiq Abu. Even though, am not a Malayalee, I still have enjoyed many of his movies simply because he is a terrific director and Malayalam movies, at least most of them have English subtitles and lot of original content.. Interestingly, unlike the first couple of times when I saw it a couple of years back. The first time I saw it, I couldn t sleep a wink for a week. Even the next time, it was heavy. I had shared the movie with mum, and even she couldn t see it in one go. It is and was that powerful Now maybe because we are headlong in the pandemic, and the madness is all around us. There are two terms that helped me though understand a great deal of what is happening in the movie, the first term was altered sensorium which has been defined here. The other is saturation or to be more precise oxygen saturation . This term has also entered the Indian twitter lexicon quite a bit as India has started running out of oxygen. Just today Delhi High Court did an emergency hearing on the subject late at night. Although there is much to share about the mismanagement of the center, the best piece on the subject has been by Miss Priya Ramani. Yup, the same lady who has won against M.J. Akbar and this is when Mr. Akbar had 100 lawyers for this specific case. It would be interesting to see what happens ahead. There are however few things even she forgot in her piece, For e.g. reverse migration i.e. from urban to rural migration started again. Two articles from different entities sharing a similar outlook.Sadly, the right have no empathy or feeling for either the poor or the sick. Even the labor minister Santosh Gangwar s statement that around 1.04 crores were the only people who walked back home. While there is not much data, however some work/research has been done on migration to cites that the number could be easily 10 times as much. And this was in the lockdown of last year. This year, again the same issue has re-surfaced and migrants learning lessons started leaving cities. And I m ashamed to say I think they are doing the right thing. Most State Governments have not learned lessons nor have they done any work to earn the trust of migrants. This is true of almost all state Governments. Last year, just before the lockdown was announced, me and my friend spent almost 30k getting a cab all the way from Chennai to Pune, how much we paid for the cab, how much we bribed the various people just so we could cross the state borders to return home to our anxious families. Thankfully, unlike the migrants, we were better off although we did make a loss. I probably wouldn t be alive if I were in their situation as many didn t. That number is still in the air undocumented deaths Vaccine issues Currently, though the issue has been the Vaccine and the pricing of the same. A good article to get a summation of the issues outlined has been shared on Economist. Another article that goes to the heart of the issue is at scroll. To buttress the argument, the SII chairman had shared this few weeks back

Adar Poonawala talking to Vishnu Som on Left, right center, 7th April 2021.

So, a licensee manufacturer wants to make super-profits during the pandemic. And now, as shared above they can very easily do it. Even the quotes given to nearby countries is smaller than the quotes given to Indian states

Prices of AstraZeneca among various states and countries.

The situation around beds, vaccines, oxygen, anything is so dire that people could go to any lengths to save their loved ones. Even if they know if a certain medicine doesn t work. For e.g. Remdesivir, 5 WHO trials have concluded that it doesn t increase mortality. Heck, even AIIMS chief said the same. But both doctors and relatives desperation to cling on hope has made Remdesivir as a black market drug with unoffical prices hovering anywhere between INR 14k/- to INR30k/- per vial. One of the executives of a top firm was also arrested in Gujarat. In Maharashtra, the opposition M.P. came to the rescue of the officials of Bruick pharms in Mumbai. Sadly, this strange affliction to the party in the center is also there in my extended family. At one end, they will heap praise on Mr. Modi, at the same time they can t get wait to get fast out of India. Many of them have settled in horrors of horror Dubai, as it is the best place to do business, get international schools for the young ones at decent prices, cheaper or maybe a tad more than what they paid in Delhi or elsewhere. Being an Agarwal or a Gupta makes it easier to compartmentalize both things. Ease of doing business, 5 days flat to get a business registered, up and running. And the paranoia is still there. They won t talk on the phone about him because they are afraid they may say something which comes back to bite them. As far as their decision to migrate, can t really blame them. If I were 20-25 yeas younger and my mum were in a better shape than she is, we probably would have migrated as well, although would have preferred Europe than anywhere else.

Internet Freedom and Aarogya Setu App.

Internet Freedom had shared the chilling effects of the Aarogya Setu App. This had also been shared by FSCI in the past, and recently had their handle being banned on Twitter. This was also apparent in a legal bail order which the high court judge gave. While I won t go into the merits and demerits of the bail order, it is astounding for the judge to say that the accused, even though he would be on bail install an app. so he can be surveilled. And this is a high court judge, such a sad state of affairs. We seem to be putting up new lows every day when it comes to judicial jurisprudence. One interesting aspect of the whole case was shared by Aishwarya Iyer. She shared a story that she and her team worked on quint which raises questions on the quality of the work done by Delhi Police. This is of course, up to Delhi Police to ascertain the truth of the matter because unless and until they are able to tie in the PMO s office in for a leak or POTUS s office it hardly seems possible. For e.g. the dates when two heads of state can meet each other would be decided by the secretaries of the two. Once the date is known, it would be shared with the press while at the same time some sort of security apparatus would kick in place. It is incumbent, especially on the host to take as much care as he can of the guest. We all remember that World War 1 (the war to end all wars) started due to the murder of Archduke Ferdinand.

As nobody wants that, the best way is to make sure that a political murder doesn t happen on your watch. Now while I won t comment on what it would be, it would be safe to assume that it would be z+ security along with higher readiness. Especially if it as somebody as important as POTUS. Now, it would be quite a reach for Delhi Police to connect the two dates. They either will have to get creative with the dates or some other way. Otherwise, with practically no knowledge in the public domain, they can t work in limbo. In either case, I do hope the case comes up for hearing soon and we see what the Delhi Police says and contends in the High Court about the same. At the very least, it would be irritating for them to talk of the dates unless they can contend some mass conspiracy which involves the PMO (and would bring into question the constant vetting done by the Intelligence dept. of all those who work in PMO). And this whole case is to kind of shelter to the Delhi riots which happened in which majorly the Muslims died but their deaths lay unaccounted till date

Conclusion In Conclusion, I would like to share a bit of humor because right now the atmosphere is humorless, both with authoritarian tendencies of the Central Govt. and the mass mismanagement of public health which they now have left to the state to do as they fit. The peice I am sharing is from arre, one of my goto sites whenever I feel low.

Changes in Rblpapi version 0.3.11 (2021-04-20)

• Support blpAutoAuthenticate and B-PIPE access, refactor and generalise authentication (James Bell in #285)
• Deprecate excludeterm (John in #306)
• Correct example in README.md (Maxime Legrand in #314)
• Correct bds man page (and code) (Michael Kerber, and John, in #320)
• Add GitHub Actions continuous integration (Dirk in #323)
• Remove bashisms detected by R CMD check (Dirk #324)
• Switch vignette to minidown (Dirk in #331)
• Switch unit tests framework to tinytest (Dirk in #332)

This post by Dirk Eddelbuettel originated on his Thinking inside the box blog. Please report excessive re-aggregation in third-party for-profit settings.

New age communication So first, we had email and usenet. As I mentioned above, email was designed with fine intentions. Intentions that make it stand even today, independently. But not everything, back then, was that great either. For example, instant messaging was very closed and centralised then too. Things like: ICQ, MSN, Yahoo Messenger; all were centralized. I wonder if people still have access to their ICQ logs. Not much has chagned in the current day either. We now have domination by: Facebook Messenger, Google Whatever the new marketing term they introdcue, WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal etc. To my knowledge, they are all centralized. Over all this time, I m yet to see a product come up with good (business) intentions, to really empower the end user. In this information age, the most invaluable data is user activity. That s one data everyone is after. If you decline to share that bit of free data in exchange for the free services, mind you, that that free service like Facebook, Google, Instagram, WhatsApp, Truecaller, Twitter; none of it would come to you at all. Try it out. So the reality is that while you may not be valuating the data you offer in exchange correctly, there s a lot that is reaped from it. But still, I think each user has (and should have) the freedom to opt in for these tech giants and give them their personal bit, for free services in return. That is a decent barter deal. And it is a choice that one if free to choose

Retaining my data I m fond of keeping an archive folder in my mailbox. A folder that holds significant events in the form of an email usually, if documented. Over the years, I chose to resort to the email format because I felt it was more reliable in the longer term than any other formats. The next best would be plain text. In my lifetime, I have learnt a lot from the internet; so it is natural that my preference has been with it. Mailing Lists, IRCs, HOWTOs, Guides, Blog posts; all have helped. And over the years, I ve come across hundreds of such content that I d always like to preserve. Now there are multiple ways to preserving data. Like, for example, big tech giants. In most usual cases, your data for your lifetime, should be fine with a tech giant. In some odd scenarios, you may be unlucky if you relied on a service provider that went bankrupt. But seriously, I think users should be fine if they host their data with Microsoft, Google etc; as long as they abide by their policies. There s also the catch of alignment. As the user, you should ensure to align (and transition) with the product offerings of your service provider. Otherwise, what may look constant and always reliable, will vanish in the blink of an eye. I guess Google Plus would be a good example. There was some Google Feed service too. Maybe Google Photos in the near decade future, just like Google Picasa in the previous (or current) decade.

History what is On the topic of retaining information, lets take a small drift. I still admire our ancestors. I don t know what went in their mind when they were documenting events in the form of scriptures, carvings, temples, churches, mosques etc; but one things for sure, they were able to leave a fine means of communication. They are all gone but a large number of those events are evident through the creations that they left. Some of those events have been strong enough that further rulers/invaders have had tough times trying to wipe it out from history. Remember, history is usually not the truth, but the statement to be believed by the teller. And the teller is usually the survivor, or the winner you may call. But still, the information retention techniques were better. I haven t visited, but admire whosoever built the Kailasa Temple, Ellora, without which, we d be made to believe what not by all invaders and rulers of the region. But the majestic standing of the temple, is a fine example of the history and the events that have occured in the past.

Ellora Temple - The majectic carving believed to be carved out of a single stone

Dominance has the power to rewrite history and unfortunately that s true and it has done its part. It is just that in a mere human s defined lifetime, it is not possible to witness the transtion from current to history, and say that I was there then and I m here now, and this is not the reality. And if not dominance, there s always the other bit, hearsay. With it, you can always put anything up for dispute. Because there s no way one can go back in time and produce a fine evidence. There s also a part about religion. Religion can be highly sentimental. And religion can be a solid way to get an agenda going. For example, in India - a country which today consitutionally is a secular country, there have been multiple attempts to discard the belief, that never ever did the thing called Ramayana exist. That the Rama Setu, nicely reworded as Adam s Bridge by who so ever, is a mere result of science. Now Rama, or Hanumana, or Ravana, or Valmiki, aren t going to come over and prove that that is true or false. So such subjects serve as a solid base to get an agenda going. And probably we ve even succeeded in proving and believing that there was never an event like Ramayana or the Mahabharata. Nor was there ever any empire other than the Moghul or the British Empire. But yes, whosoever made the Ellora Temple or the many many more of such creations, did a fine job of making a dent for the future, to know of what the history possibly could also be.

Enough of the drift So, in my opinion, having events documented is important. It d be nice to have skills documented too so that it can be passed over generations but that s a debatable topic. But events, I believe should be documented. And documented in the best possible ways so that its existence is not diminished. A documentation in the form of certain carvings on a rock is far more better than links and posts shared on Facebook, Twitter, Reddit etc. For one, these are all corporate entities with vested interests and can pretext excuse in the name of compliance and conformance. So, for the helpless state and generation I am in, I felt email was the best possible independent form of data retention in today s age. If I really had the resources, I d not rely on digital age. This age has no guarantee of retaining and recording information in any reliable manner. Instead, it is just mostly junk, which is manipulative and changeable, conditionally.

Email and RSS So for my communication, I like to prefer emails over any other means. That doesn t mean I don t use the current trends. I do. But this blog is mostly about penning my desires. And desire be to have communication over email format. Such is the case that for information useful over the internet, I crave to have it formatted in email for archival. RSS feeds is my most common mode of keeping track of information I care about. Not all that I care for is available in RSS feeds but hey such is life. And adaptability is okay. But my preference is still RSS. So I use RSS feeds through a fine software called feed2imap. A software that fits my bill fairly well. feed2imap is:

• An rss feed news aggregator
• Pulls and extracts news feeds in the form of an email
• Can push the converted email over pop/imap
• Can convert all image content to email mime attachment

In a gist, it makes the online content available to me offline in the most admired email format In my mail box, in today s day, my preferred email client is Evolution. It does a good job of dealing with such emails (rss feed items). An image example of accessing the rrs feed item through it is below

RSS News Item through Evolution

The good part is that my actual data is always independent of such MUAs. Tomorrow, as technology - trends - economics evolve, something new would come as a replacement but my data would still be mine.

Mobile trends Trends have shown. Data mobility is a commodity expectation now. As such, I wanted to have something fill in that gap for me. So that I could access my information - which I ve preferred in a format - easily in today s trendy options. I tried multiple options on my current preferred platform of choice for mobiles, i.e. Android. Finally I came across Aqua Mail, which fits in most of my requirements. Aqua Mail does

• Connect to my laptop over imap
• Can sync the requested folders
• Can sync requested data for offlince accessibility
• Can present the synchronized data in a quite flexible and customizable manner, to match my taste
• Has a very extensible User Interface, allowing me to customize it to my taste

Pictures can do a better job of describing my english words.

Aqua Mail Message List Interface

Aqua Mail Message View Normal

Aqua Mail Message View Zoomed - Fit to Screen

All of this done with no dependence on network connectivity, post the sync. And all information is stored is best possible simple format.

Changes in version 0.0.7 (2021-04-16)

• Add rmarkdown to Suggests: as an implicit conditional dependency
• Switch vignette to minidown and its water framework, add minidown to Suggests as well
• Update two URLs in the README.md file

This post by Dirk Eddelbuettel originated on his Thinking inside the box blog. Please report excessive re-aggregation in third-party for-profit settings.

I am arranging to take a cottage at Wallington near Baldock in Herts, rather a pig in a poke because I have never seen it, but I am trusting the friends who have chosen it for me, and it is very cheap, only 7s. 6d. a week [ 20 in 2021].

The red commemorative plaque not only limits Orwell's tenure to the time he was permanently in the village, it omits all reference to his first wife, Eileen O'Shaughnessy, whom he married in the village church in 1936.

Wallington's Manor Farm, the inspiration for the farm in Animal Farm. The lower sign enjoins the public to inform the police "if you see anyone on the [church] roof acting suspiciously". Non-UK-residents may be surprised to learn about the systematic theft of lead.

Changes in RcppArmadillo version 0.10.4.0.0 (2021-04-12)

• Upgraded to Armadillo release 10.4.0 (Pressure Cooker)
  • faster handling of triangular matrices by log_det()
  • added log_det_sympd() for log determinant of symmetric positive matrices
  • added ARMA_WARN_LEVEL configuration option, to control the degree of emitted warning messages
  • reduced the default degree of warning messages, so that failed decompositions, failed saving/loading, etc, no longer emit warnings
• Apply one upstream corrections for arma::randn draws when using alternative (here R) generator, and arma::randg.

Changes in RcppArmadillo version 0.10.3.0.0 (2021-03-10)

• Upgraded to Armadillo release 10.3 (Sunrise Chaos)
  • faster handling of symmetric positive definite matrices by pinv()
  • expanded .save() / .load() for dense matrices to handle coord_ascii format
  • for out of bounds access, element accessors now throw the more nuanced std::out_of_range exception, instead of only std::logic_error
  • improved quality of random numbers

This post by Dirk Eddelbuettel originated on his Thinking inside the box blog. Please report excessive re-aggregation in third-party for-profit settings.

Brief History

• 17th century: The Kingdom of Sikkim is founded by the Namgyal dynasty and ruled by Buddhist priest-kings known as the Chogyal.
• 1890: Sikkim becomes a princely state of British India.
• 1947: Sikkim continues its protectorate status with the Union of India, post-Indian-independence.
• 1973: Anti-royalist riots take place in front of the Chogyal's palace, by Nepalis seeking greater representation.
• 1975: Referendum leads to the deposition of the monarchy and Sikkim joins India as its 22nd state.

Languages

• Official: English, Nepali, Sikkimese/Bhotia and Lepcha
• Though Hindi and Nepali share the same script (Devanagari), they are not mutually intelligible. Yet, most people in Sikkim can understand and speak Hindi.

Ethnicity

• Nepalis: Migrated in large numbers (from Nepal) and soon became the dominant community
• Bhutias: People of Tibetan origin. Major inhabitants in Northern Sikkim.
• Lepchas: Original inhabitants of Sikkim

Food

• Tibetan/Nepali dishes (mostly consumed during winter)
  • Thukpa: Noodle soup, rich in spices and vegetables. Usually contains some form of meat. Common variations: Thenthuk and Gyathuk
  • Momos: Steamed or fried dumplings, usually with a meat filling.
  • Saadheko: Spicy marinated chicken salad.
  • Gundruk Soup: A soup made from Gundruk, a fermented leafy green vegetable.
  • Sinki : A fermented radish tap-root product, traditionally consumed as a base for soup and as a pickle. Eerily similar to Kimchi.
• While pork and beef are pretty common, finding vegetarian dishes is equally easy.
• Staple: Dal-Bhat with Subzi. Rice is a lot more common than wheat (rice) possibly due to greater carb content and proximity to West Bengal, India s largest producer of Rice.
• Good places to eat in Gangtok
  • Hamro Bhansa Ghar, Nimtho (Nepali)
  • Taste of Tibet
  • Dragon Wok (Chinese & Japanese)

Buddhism in Sikkim

• Bayul Demojong (Sikkim), is the most sacred Land in the Himalayas as per the belief of the Northern Buddhists and various religious texts.
• Sikkim was blessed by Guru Padmasambhava, the great Buddhist saint who visited Sikkim in the 8th century and consecrated the land.
• However, Buddhism is said to have reached Sikkim only in the 17th century with the arrival of three Tibetan monks viz. Rigdzin Goedki Demthruchen, Mon Kathok Sonam Gyaltshen & Rigdzin Legden Je at Yuksom. Together, they established a Buddhist monastery.
• In 1642 they crowned Phuntsog Namgyal as the first monarch of Sikkim and gave him the title of Chogyal, or Dharma Raja.
• The faith became popular through its royal patronage and soon many villages had their own monastery.
• Today Sikkim has over 200 monasteries.

Major monasteries

• Rumtek Monastery, 20Km from Gangtok
• Lingdum/Ranka Monastery, 17Km from Gangtok
• Phodong Monastery, 28Km from Gangtok
• Ralang Monastery, 10Km from Ravangla
• Tsuklakhang Monastery, Royal Palace, Gangtok
• Enchey Monastery, Gangtok
• Tashiding Monastery, 35Km from Ravangla

Reaching Sikkim

• Gangtok, being the capital, is easiest to reach amongst other regions, by public transport and shared cabs.
• By Air:
  • Pakyong (PYG) :
    • Nearest airport from Gangtok (about 1 hour away)
    • Tabletop airport
    • Reserved cabs cost around INR 1200.
    • As of Apr 2021, the only flights to PYG are from IGI (Delhi) and CCU (Kolkata).
  • Bagdogra (IXB) :
    • About 20 minutes from Siliguri and 4 hours from Gangtok.
    • Larger airport with flights to most major Indian cities.
    • Reserved cabs cost about INR 3000. Shared cabs cost about INR 350.
• By Train:
  • New Jalpaiguri (NJP) :
    • About 20 minutes from Siliguri and 4 hours from Gangtok.
    • Reserved cabs cost about INR 3000. Shared cabs from INR 350.
• By Road:
  • NH10 connects Siliguri to Gangtok
  • If you can t find buses plying to Gangtok directly, reach Siliguri and then take a cab to Gangtok.
• Sikkim Nationalised Transport Div. also runs hourly buses between Siliguri and Gangtok and daily buses on other common routes. They re cheaper than shared cabs.
• Wizzride also operates shared cabs between Siliguri/Bagdogra/NJP, Gangtok and Darjeeling. They cost about the same as shared cabs but pack in half as many people in luxury cars (Innova, Xylo, etc.) and are hence more comfortable.

---

Gangtok

• Time needed: 1D/1N
• Places to visit:
  • Hanuman Tok
  • Ganesh Tok
  • Tashi View Point [6,800ft]
  • MG Marg
  • Sikkim Zoo
  • Gangtok Ropeway
  • Enchey Monastery
  • Tsuklakhang Palace & Monastery
• Hostels: Tagalong Backpackers (would strongly recommend), Zostel Gangtok
• Places to chill: Travel Cafe, Caf Live & Loud and Gangtok Groove
• Places to shop: Lal Market and MG Marg

Getting Around

• Taxis operate on a reserved or shared basis. In case of the latter, you can pool with other commuters your taxis will pick up and drop en-route.
• Naturally shared taxis only operate on popular routes. The easiest way to get around Gangtok is to catch a shared cab from MG Marg.
• Reserved taxis for Gangtok sightseeing cost around INR 1000-1500, depending upon the spots you d like to see
• Key taxi/bus stands :
  • Deorali stand: For Darjeeling, Siliguri, Kalimpong
  • Vajra stand: For North & East Sikkim (Tsomgo Lake & Nathula)
  • Rumtek taxi: For Ravangla, Pelling, Namchi, Geyzing, Jorethang and Singtam.

Exploring Gangtok on an MTB

• If you'd like to explore Gangtok at your own pace, you could rent a cycle from Hub Outdoor or HillBike. I paid INR 600 for a day at HillBike.
• These are well-maintained geared mountain bikes, so adapting to inclines and declines should be a breeze, even for beginners.
• Cycling down from Ganesh Tok to Tashi View Point is an absolute delight and in my opinion, the best thing you can do in Gangtok.
• While it is a little unconventional and exhausting (uphill stretches), but a 100% recommended unless you ve been skipping leg day
• Pro tip : Make sure you use the right/back brake while decelerating downhill and not the left/front brake.
• Recommended route [3-5hrs, 20.3Km, 1770-2081ft] : Chandmari (HillBike) -> Sera Jhe Dro-Phen-Ling Monastery > Ganesh Tok > Tashi View Point > Bakthung Falls > Vajra Stand > Tsuklakhang Palace & Monastery > Enchey Monastery > Chandmari

---

North Sikkim

• The easiest & most economical way to explore North Sikkim is the 3D/2N package offered by shared-cab drivers.
• This includes food, permits, cab rides and accommodation (1N in Lachen and 1N in Lachung)
• The accommodation on both nights are at homestays with bare necessities, so keep your hopes low.
• In the spirit of sustainable tourism, you ll be asked to discard single-use plastic bottles, so please carry a bottle that you can refill along the way.
• Zero Point and Gurdongmer Lake are snow-capped throughout the year

3D/2N Shared-cab Package Itinerary

• Day 1
  • Gangtok (10am) - Chungthang - Lachung (stay)
• Day 2
  • Pre-lunch : Lachung (6am) - Yumthang Valley [12,139ft] - Zero Point - Lachung [15,300ft]
  • Post-lunch : Lachung - Chungthang - Lachen (stay)
• Day 3
  • Pre-lunch : Lachen (5am) - Kala Patthar - Gurdongmer Lake [16,910ft] - Lachen
  • Post-lunch : Lachen - Chungthang - Gangtok (7pm)
• This itinerary is idealistic and depends on the level of snowfall.
• Some drivers might switch up Day 2 and 3 itineraries by visiting Lachen and then Lachung, depending upon the weather.
• Areas beyond Lachen & Lachung are heavily militarized since the Indo-China border is only a few miles away.

---

East Sikkim

Zuluk and Silk Route

• Time needed: 2D/1N
• Zuluk [9,400ft] is a small hamlet with an excellent view of the eastern Himalayan range including the Kanchenjunga.
• Was once a transit point to the historic Silk Route from Tibet (Lhasa) to India (West Bengal).
• The drive from Gangtok to Zuluk takes at least four hours. Hence, it makes sense to spend the night at a homestay and space out your trip to Zuluk

Tsomgo Lake and Nathula

• Time Needed : 1D
• A Protected Area Permit is required to visit these places, due to their proximity to the Chinese border
• Tsomgo/Chhangu Lake [12,313ft]
  • Glacial lake, 40 km from Gangtok.
  • Remains frozen during the winter season.
  • You can also ride on the back of a Yak for INR 300
• Baba Mandir
  • An old temple dedicated to Baba Harbhajan Singh, a Sepoy in the 23rd Regiment, who died in 1962 near the Nathu La during Indo China war.
• Nathula Pass [14,450ft]
  • Located on the Indo-Tibetan border crossing of the Old Silk Route, it is one of the three open trading posts between India and China.
  • Plays a key role in the Sino-Indian Trade and also serves as an official Border Personnel Meeting(BPM) Point.
  • May get cordoned off by the Indian Army in event of heavy snowfall or for other security reasons.

---

West Sikkim

• Time needed: 3N/1N
• Hostels at Pelling : Mochilerro Ostillo

Itinerary

Day 1: Gangtok - Ravangla - Pelling

• Leave Gangtok early, for Ravangla through the Temi Tea Estate route.
• Spend some time at the tea garden and then visit Buddha Park at Ravangla
• Head to Pelling from Ravangla

Day 2: Pelling sightseeing

• Hire a cab and visit Skywalk, Pemayangtse Monastery, Rabdentse Ruins, Kecheopalri Lake, Kanchenjunga Falls.

Day 3: Pelling - Gangtok/Siliguri

• Wake up early to catch a glimpse of Kanchenjunga at the Pelling Helipad around sunrise
• Head back to Gangtok on a shared-cab
• You could take a bus/taxi back to Siliguri if Pelling is your last stop.

---

Darjeeling

• In my opinion, Darjeeling is lovely for a two-day detour on your way back to Bagdogra/Siliguri and not any longer (unless you re a Bengali couple on a honeymoon)
• Once a part of Sikkim, Darjeeling was ceded to the East India Company after a series of wars, with Sikkim briefly receiving a grant from EIC for gifting Darjeeling to the latter
• Post-independence, Darjeeling was merged with the state of West Bengal.

Itinerary

Day 1 :

• Take a cab from Gangtok to Darjeeling (shared-cabs cost INR 300 per seat)
• Reach Darjeeling by noon and check in to your Hostel. I stayed at Hideout.
• Spend the evening visiting either a monastery (or the Batasia Loop), Nehru Road and Mall Road.
• Grab dinner at Glenary whilst listening to live music.

Day 2:

• Wake up early to catch the sunrise and a glimpse of Kanchenjunga at Tiger Hill. Since Tiger Hill is 10km from Darjeeling and requires a permit, book your taxi in advance.
• Alternatively, if you don t want to get up at 4am or shell out INR1500 on the cab to Tiger Hill, walk to the Kanchenjunga View Point down Mall Road
• Next, queue up outside Keventers for breakfast with a view in a century-old cafe
• Get a cab at Gandhi Road and visit a tea garden (Happy Valley is the closest) and the Ropeway. I was lucky to meet 6 other backpackers at my hostel and we ended up pooling the cab at INR 200 per person, with INR 1400 being on the expensive side, but you could bargain.
• Get lunch, buy some tea at Golden Tips, pack your bags and hop on a shared-cab back to Siliguri. It took us about 4hrs to reach Siliguri, with an hour to spare before my train.
• If you ve still got time on your hands, then check out the Peace Pagoda and the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway (Toy Train). At INR 1500, I found the latter to be too expensive and skipped it.

---

Tips and hacks

• Download offline maps, especially when you re exploring Northern Sikkim.
• Food and booze are the cheapest in Gangtok. Stash up before heading to other regions.
• Keep your Aadhar/Passport handy since you need permits to travel to North & East Sikkim.
• In rural areas and some cafes, you may get to try Rhododendron Wine, made from Rhododendron arboreum a.k.a Gurans. Its production is a little hush-hush since the flower is considered holy and is also the National Flower of Nepal.
• If you don t want to invest in a new jacket, boots or a pair of gloves, you can always rent them at nominal rates from your hotel or little stores around tourist sites.
• Check the weather of a region before heading there. Low visibility and precipitation can quite literally dampen your experience.
• Keep your itinerary flexible to accommodate for rest and impromptu plans.
• Shops and restaurants close by 8pm in Sikkim and Darjeeling. Plan for the same.

Carry

• a couple of extra pairs of socks (woollen, if possible)
• a pair of slippers to wear indoors
• a reusable water bottle
• an umbrella
• a power bank
• a couple of tablets of Diamox. Helps deal with altitude sickness
• extra clothes and wet bags since you may not get a chance to wash/dry your clothes
• a few passport size photographs

Shared-cab hacks

• Intercity rides can be exhausting. If you can afford it, pay for an additional seat.
• Call shotgun on the drives beyond Lachen and Lachung. The views are breathtaking.
• Return cabs tend to be cheaper (WB cabs travelling from SK and vice-versa)

Cost

• My median daily expenditure (back when I went to Sikkim in early March 2021) was INR 1350.
• This includes stay (bunk bed), food, wine and transit (shared cabs)
• In my defence, I splurged on food, wine and extra seats in shared cabs, but if you re on a budget, you could easily get by on INR 1 - 1.2k per day.
• For a 9-day trip, I ended up shelling out nearly INR 15k, including 2AC trains to & from Kolkata
• Note : Summer (March to May) and Autumn (October to December) are peak seasons, and thereby more expensive to travel around.

---

Souvenirs and things you should buy

Buddhist souvenirs :

• Colourful Prayer Flags (great for tying on bikes or behind car windshields)
• Miniature Prayer/Mani Wheels
• Lucky Charms, Pendants and Key Chains
• Cham Dance masks and robes
• Singing Bowls
• Common symbols: Om mani padme hum, Ashtamangala, Zodiac signs

Handicrafts & Handlooms

• Tibetan Yak Wool shawls, scarfs and carpets
• Sikkimese Ceramic cups
• Thangka Paintings

Edibles

• Darjeeling Tea (usually brewed and not boiled)
• Wine (Arucha Peach & Rhododendron)
• Dalle Khursani (Chilli) Paste and Pickle

Header Icon made by Freepik from www.flaticon.com is licensed by CC 3.0 BY

My main role in Debian is to help Debian to evolve so that it s always able to face the new challenges that are showing up.My approach is both corrective and proactive, I work to solve current problems and prepare for tomorrow s. This requires to remain sufficiently involved to identify new trends, see the deficiencies and be a force of proposition.Most of the changes require to interact with many people, and problems are often more relational than technical. I will ensure to follow the habits of interdependence (Think Win-Win, Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood, Synergize) to find a solution acceptable to all and to inspire others to do the same.The easiest changes to implement are technical (such as improvements to distro-tracker) and require little interaction. This work is used to recharge me by offering me an immediate reward for my efforts.Finally, and this is a substantive effort, I want to create in the project working conditions that allow all contributors to give their best. It starts with developing a common vision

• knows how to manage developers and software projects
  • bonus points for any experience in environments mixing volunteers and paid contributors
• is fluent and experienced enough in Python to be able to do software design and code reviews
  • bonus points for experience with: Django, Test Driven Development

• lead the Debian project funding initiative to a success
  • find useful projects to fund, for example by
    • discussing with various Debian teams / contributors (including the DPL)
    • running a survey among Debian developers
    • doing your own analysis
  • help with drafting and specifying the various projects
  • help to find someone to implement and review the projects
  • coordinate with those persons during execution
• manage other free software projects that Freexian would like to pursue
  • debusine: a software factory tailored for Debian packages
    • participate in design discussions, set milestones and goals
      • start with the short term needs of Freexian
      • but take into account the needs of Debian so that it can replace some aging infrastructure within Debian
    • coordinate with contractors, possibly implement some parts
  • infrastructure to run the various Freexian services and automate most of the administrative work (see Part2: From Debian LTS to Debian for the Enterprise )
• maybe coordinate the team of paid LTS/ELTS contributors

• Creation and maintenance of Debian packages
• Technical support
• Software development in Python (debusine, internal infrastructure)
• Security support (contributor to Debian LTS)

Debian

This was my 27th month of active contributing to Debian. I became a DM in late March 2019 and a DD on Christmas 19! \o/ This month was a bit exhausting; lots of moving parts. With the financial year ending, it was even more crazy, with me running around to banks, CA, et al.
Anyway, with now working on Ubuntu full-time, I did little of Debian this month. Here are the following things I worked on:

Uploads and bug fixes:

• polybar (3.5.5-1) - New upstream version, v3.5.5.
• ruby-http-parser (1.2.1-5) - Disable tests causing FTBFS on s390x architecture.
• debian-security-support (1:11+2021.03.19) - Fix for bug #984539: dpkg hook should never fail.
• Filed bug #985314 against asterisk (systemd misconfiguration) and added a patch as well.
• Filed bug #985421 against at (add DEP8 tests) and added a patch as well.

Other $things:

• Attended the Debian LTS team meeting.
• Mentoring for newcomers.
• Moderation of -project mailing list.

---

Debian (E)LTS

Debian Long Term Support (LTS) is a project to extend the lifetime of all Debian stable releases to (at least) 5 years. Debian LTS is not handled by the Debian security team, but by a separate group of volunteers and companies interested in making it a success. And Debian Extended LTS (ELTS) is its sister project, extending support to the Jessie release (+2 years after LTS support). This was my eighteenth month as a Debian LTS and ninth month as a Debian ELTS paid contributor.
I was assigned 60.00 hours for LTS and 39.00 hours for ELTS and worked on the following things:

LTS CVE Fixes and Announcements:

• Issued DLA 2580-1, fixing CVE-2021-21311, for adminer.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 4.2.5-3+deb9u2.
• Issued DLA 2581-1, fixing CVE-2021-27803, for wpa.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 2:2.4-1+deb9u9.
• Issued DLA 2585-1, fixing CVE-2020-13848, for libupnp.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 1:1.6.19+git20160116-1.2+deb9u1.
• Issued DLA 2589-1, fixing CVE-2020-26519 and CVE-2021-3407, for mupdf.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 1.9a+ds1-4+deb9u6.
• Issued DLA 2593-1, fixing bug #962596, for ca-certificates.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 20200601~deb9u2.
• Issued DLA 2589-2, fixing regression caused by DLA 2589-1, for mupdf.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 1.9a+ds1-4+deb9u7.
• Issued DLA 2598-1, fixing CVE-2020-25097, for squid3.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 3.5.23-5+deb9u6.
• Issued DLA 2599-1, fixing CVE-2021-28963, for shibboleth-sp2.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 2.6.0+dfsg1-4+deb9u2.
• Issued DLA 2601-1, fixing CVE-2021-3429, for cloud-init.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 0.7.9-2+deb9u1.
• Issued DLA 2558-2, fixing regression caused by DLA 2558-1, for xterm.
  For Debian 9 stretch, these problems have been fixed in version 327-2+deb9u2.
• Released debian-security-support to unstable via Holger to fix bug #984539.

ELTS CVE Fixes and Announcements:

• Issued ELA 374-1, fixing CVE-2021-27803, for wpa.
  For Debian 8 jessie, these problems have been fixed in version 2.3-1+deb8u13.
• Issued ELA 375-1, fixing CVE-2021-3410, for libcaca.
  For Debian 8 jessie, these problems have been fixed in version 0.99.beta19-2+deb8u2.
• Issued ELA 376-1, fixing CVE-2020-25638, for libhibernate3-java.
  For Debian 8 jessie, these problems have been fixed in version 3.6.10.Final-3+deb8u1.
• Issued ELA 382-1, fixing CVE-2020-25097, for squid3.
  For Debian 8 jessie, these problems have been fixed in version 3.5.23-5+deb8u3.
• Issued ELA 385-1, fixing CVE-2021-28963, for shibboleth-sp2.
  For Debian 8 jessie, these problems have been fixed in version 2.5.3+dfsg-2+deb8u2.
• Issued ELA 363-2, fixing regression caused by ELA 363-1, for xterm.
  For Debian 8 jessie, these problems have been fixed in version 312-2+deb8u2.

Other (E)LTS Work:

• Front-desk duty from 01-03 until 07-03 for ELTS and then from 29-03 until 04-04 for both LTS and ELTS.
• Triaged wpa, python-aiohttp, spip, wpa, qemu, tomcat7, tomcat8, grub2, mupdf, openssh, tiff, spice, pillow, xmlgraphics-commons, batik, libupnp, ca-certificates, salt, squid3, shibboleth-sp2, courier-authlib, cloud-init, spamassassin, openssl, libcaca, and openjpeg2.
• Marked CVE-2021-21330/python-aiohttp as not-affected for stretch.
• Marked CVE-2021-20233, CVE-2021-20225, CVE-2020-27779, CVE-2020-27778, CVE-2020-27749, CVE-2020-27748, CVE-2020-25647, CVE-2020-25632, CVE-2020-25631, and CVE-2020-14372, affecting grub2, as ignored for stretch and jessie.
• Marked CVE-2020-27842/openjpeg2 as no-dsa for jessie.
• Marked CVE-2020-27843/openjpeg2 as no-dsa for jessie.
• Marked CVE-2021-28041/openssh as not-affect for jessie.
• Marked CVE-2020-3552 3,4 /tiff as no-dsa for jessie.
• Marked CVE-2021-20201/spice as no-dsa for jessie.
• Marked CVE-2020-11988/xmlgraphics-commons as postponed for jessie.
• Marked CVE-2020-11987/batik as postponed for jessie.
• Marked CVE-2020-12695/libupnp as no-dsa for stretch.
• Marked CVE-2021-25122/tomcat7 as not-affected for stretch.
• Marked CVE-2021-25329/tomcat7 as ignored for stretch.
• Marked CVE-2021-28116/squid3 as postponed for stretch and jessie.
• Marked CVE-2021-3449/openssl as not-affected for stretch.
• Document extra notes for grub2 for LTS and co-ordinate with the sec-team.
• Document extra notes for pillow about piled-up issues in jessie.
• Issued DLA-2593-1 for ca-certificates on Microsoft s request; co-ordinating w/ them.
• Co-ordinating w/ maintainer of courier-authlib for stretch and jessie update.
• Fixing build failures of ELTS security tracker and re-ordering entries in data/CVE-EXTENDED-LTS/list file.
• Answer queries of dupondje and mikap about openssl on IRC; and it being not-affected for stretch.
• Help review the status of CVE-2021-3121/golang-github-gogo-protobuf-dev for Ola.
• Co-ordinating w/ Noah for cloud-init and setuptools.
• Auto EOL ed mongodb, linux, guacamole-client, node-xmlhttprequest, newlib, neutron, privoxy, glpi, and zabbix for jessie.
• Attended monthly meeting for Debian LTS.
• Answered questions (& discussions) on IRC (#debian-lts and #debian-elts).
• General and other discussions on LTS private and public mailing list.

---

Until next time.
:wq for today.

This post by Dirk Eddelbuettel originated on his Thinking inside the box blog. Please report excessive re-aggregation in third-party for-profit settings.

• Lost support from tens of organizations and companies, several of them important funders for the FSF s activities
• Alienated long-standing staff within it, leading to many important resignations
• Divided the overall free software community, gathering several thousand signatures both repudiating its actions and backing it
• In the Debian project, we have started a General Resolution process, with opinions all over the spectrum, to gauge whether the project will back either of the positions or none.

Each version is given a distinguishing version number.  If the
Program specifies that a certain numbered version of the GNU General
Public License "or any later version" applies to it, you have the
option of following the terms and conditions either of that numbered
version or of any later version published by the Free Software
Foundation.  If the Program does not specify a version number of the
GNU General Public License, you may choose any version ever published
by the Free Software Foundation.