S5E4: "You Had Better Watch Yourself"

Posted 2020-04-12 23:59
Modified 2020-04-11 23:05
Comments 0

We talk about teleconferencing options and why you might want to consider them over Zoom. We also talk about teleconferencing etiquette.

• Just the Tip
• Notes
• 15 Clams
• Errata
• Music

Just the Tip

• Paden talks about anvil.
  • In a nutshell, it’s a protection against bruteforce attempts or DoS attempts. While not perfect, it’s very useful for many rate-limiting applications.

Notes

Starts at 10m15s.

I was drinking water. Paden was drinking PBR. Jthan was drinking water.

• Teleconferencing options
  • We open up talking about videophones (which never really caught on for several reasons).
  • Sometimes, A/V is preferable as a medium over text (but in IT/Operations, almost all of the important information we need to convey is in text format).
  • The study I was thinking of is probably the one referenced here (and echoed here).
  • The one Paden was referencing was probably this one.
  • Zoom has had some concerns – we didn’t know they had resolved most of these by the time we had recorded. I’m unsure of the status of the 0day we mention.
  • Apache OpenMeetings
    • I haven’t personally deployed it, but Apache does to their credit tend to put effort in.
    • They also offer enterprise support, I believe.
  • SRS
    • I was thinking of Red5, but turns out there’s quite a few of RTMP server software.
    • RTMP servers are nice because they’re a minimal data stream, and excellent for a unidrectional one-to-many format (think conference talks).
  • BigBlueButton
    • It’s specifically geared towards online learning. Great for school environments, and the development is quite active.
  • There is a Moodle Livestreaming Plugin
    • I’m unsure how well maintained it is, however.
  • There’s Twitch…
    • But it’s not really geared for meetings or educational experience.
  • Finally, and our favourite, is Jitsi Meet.
    • They even have a very easy-to-use, and free (with MUCH less limitations than Zoom’s free offering) hosted option.
    • I was indeed the one to suggest Jitsi Meet to PLUG.
  • Worth a mention is BlueJeans.
    • I’ve never used it extensively, so I can’t speak much about it.
• Teleconferencing etiquette
  • Don’t share audio or video unless it’s required (either by policy/expectation or because you’re the one presenting); otherwise, it’s much less distracting if you leave your microphone and camera muted if not necessary.
    • If this can be addressed from a technological perspective rather than a personal responsibility/etiquette procedure, it is recommended you use that method to “enforce” the etiquette.
  • More of a policy than etiquette, but keeping your camera on should not be required by non-presenting participants.
  • Pants (or dresses, etc.) are required if your camera is going to be on at any point. Duh.

15 Clams

In this segment, Jthan shares with you a little slice of life. The title is a reference to this video. (2m16s in)

Starts at 43m12s.

Jthan asks a philosophical question: in Vault’s sealing/key sharding, for a personal-use instance, should you have more than one shard?

He goes into more detail on his blog post.

(If you have an Android phone and would like a separate encryption passphrase from unlock passphrase, you can use an app called Cryptfs Password.)

The Pass compatibility/replacement I’m writing is called VaultPass. It’s almost done at time of writing these shownotes.

Errata

• Jthan uses Wagtail, who really didn’t bother to implement full-text search indexing for MySQL or MariaDB. Because they’re dumbass webdevs on the pgsql fad fanboy train who don’t realize that MySQL outperforms Postgres for web apps. (Seriously. Look it up.)
• Good news! A lot of the issues Zoom had that we talk about have been fixed.
  • While I commend their quick response, it still lags behind the typical large-scale open source response and my confidence in them remains low.
• I was right; Google Hangouts is sunsetting.

Music

Author r00t^2
Categories Season Five